Fool The Bible producers Mark Burnett and Roma Downey once by setting the Internet ablaze with a potentially damning controversy, shame on them. But they won’t be headed down that path a second time, as the married duo have already decided that their upcoming theatrical film Son of God, which is largely culled from the previously aired footage of the History miniseries, will not feature any scenes with Mohamen Mehdi Ouazanni playing Satan. This is in response to last year’s viral outbreak of photos comparing the likenesses of Satan and President Barack Obama. It was almost definitely unintentional, but taking the character out of the narrative altogether is a clear sign of how little Burnett and Downey want to deal with a possible resurgence of Satan talk instead of more heavenly praises.
Downey sounds particularly headstrong about the decision, saying she wanted Jesus to be the absolute focal point of this film, telling THR, "I want his name to be on the lips of everyone who sees this movie, so we cast Satan out. It gives me great pleasure to tell you that the devil is on the cutting-room floor." Blessed are the editors, for theirs are the dirtiest floors.
Refresh your memory with the scene below, in which Jesus and Satan meet.
Son of God will feature both footage from The Bible as well as scenes that were cut out of the miniseries. Hopefully they won’t run into continuity problems where a character asks, "So, how was meeting Satan just now?" For what it’s worth, Diogo Morgado’s Jesus looks like the bassist from about a thousand garage bands, but no one made a stink about that.
20th Century Fox will be releasing the two-hour feature on February 28th, where it will go up against Liam Neeson’s airplane/texting thriller Non-Stop. The President might be too busy watching HBO screeners to attend. Check out the trailer for Son of God below.
