The Chosen fans slam “unfair” Season 4 cinema release

The Chosen Season 4 has just dropped its final episodes in cinemas – but fans at home aren’t happy: they think their theatrical exclusivity is “unfair.”

The Chosen, created by Dallas Jenkins and following the life and teachings of Jesus Christ, has been extraordinarily successful. It’s believed it’s reached more than 200 million unique viewers since its launch in 2019, and it’s still the biggest audience-funded project in TV history.

However, it’s also had a pretty singular release strategy. For the most part, people have been able to watch it for free on the show’s app and website, as well as Prime Video, Peacock, and on The CW.

Season 4 has been a bit different. Encouraged by past theatrical releases of Season 3’s finale and a Christmas special, the whole season has been available exclusively in cinemas – much to the ire of fans.

The Chosen fans “don’t like” theatrical release of Season 4

Angel Studios

On The Chosen subreddit, u/paul_1149 complained about Season 4’s rollout in cinemas. “I’ve consistently defended the decision to use theater premiers to bring in money, ever since that decision was announced. It makes good business sense,” they wrote.

“But I had assumed that, as with Season 3, this season would be rolled out two episodes at a time, with their streaming following shortly thereafter. Then the next two episodes would follow, and so on, as a pattern. Basically the whole community would be together on the reveal, with only a small time lag between the theatergoers and the streamers.

“But now the entire season has been seen by theatergoers, and five weeks down the pike the streamers have seen nothing as yet. The forum has been become a minefield of spoiler posts, and even some of the background videos on YouTube are spoilers. Discussion has been crippled because some are hesitant to talk about what they’ve seen, while most of us have been unable to chime in and unwilling to even view what’s being said.

“The way this roll-out was done was a bridge too far. Streamers have waited too long, and the community has become much less cohesive.”

Others agree. “It’s worse for non-US fans. There is no theater option. It was the same for the Angel Studios films,” one wrote. “Their opening box office was $14m for ep 1-3. But because it’s not streaming if you didn’t see that you weren’t going to see ep 4-6. Their box office dropped to $8m. Almost cut in half,” another theorized.

“Now that I missed 1-3, I can’t see any of the others unless I want to see them out of sequence. I wanted to see them in theaters and I want to give this project my theater ticket money… I hope they don’t do it this way again,” a third wrote.

“It makes me sad to see the show going in this direction. My husband and I just had a baby, and our finances are very tight right now. I just can’t fork over all that money to see an entire season in theaters… it’s very unfair to those of us without an abundance of money to have to wait so long to see the season at all,” a fourth commented.

You can find out when to expect The Chosen Season 4 on streaming, as well as how long it’ll stay in cinemas.