Two Page Reviews: God's Not Dead A Light In Darkness
This is technically not God's Not Dead 3 but God's Not Dead A Light In Darkness. It's said to distance this from the crap emporium that is the GND films but I won't let up on this film because it's so different from its counterparts but still so similar
Onto the plot! Pastor David Hill is tossed in the clink for not turning over his sermons. This is based on something that happened in Houston, google the full story because you won't get it during this propaganda piece masquerading as a film. Here is a snopes article on it https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/houston-hustle/
Unsurprisingly, Dave is released and we're delighted to hear that Jude and Dave will be Co Pastors at St James.
The joy doesn't last a long time because a kid throws a brick through the window, knocking a gas container like thing. Jude goes to investigate while Dave calls the police and gets blowed up when he turns on a light and Dave drags him out of the burning church.
I'm genuinely wondering if that was enough to kill Jude. I honestly think based on the way it unfolded that Jude would've had the wind knocked out of him and maybe some glass damage from the exploding bulb but I don't think death was likely given what I am seeing. I could be wrong but from what I observed it seems that Jude would've in real life, walked away a little winded, but this is Pure Flix...
Jude utters his last words to Dave in Swahili, but he never spoke Swahili to Dave in either of the other films and we only know that he speaks Swahili like 2 minutes before he dies. This is something that seems tacked on. Aaaaand it took me longer to write this part of the script than it did for the writers to resolve the mystery Swahili at Jude's funeral. Translated it is: God is good all the time and all the time God is good. For a group known to be sex negative they sure like to blow their wad quickly
So the evil liberal college administration wants to take the church down and put in a Student Union. Jefferson from Married with Children is a friend to Dave. Dave decides to reject the offer the college makes, but the college won't go down without a fight and sends a demolition crew.
After all, the church is a bombed out husk AND a danger to the community because of the shape it's in. Dave has to stall so he filibusters.
Previously in the movie Dave enlisted the help of his brother, Brother gets a cease and desist from a Judge while she's at mass and they continue their merry adventure. They argue because Bro dared to ask questions about the faith and was made to feel unwelcome because he lived outside the prescribed box.
I wonder what other group of people have been disowned by loving Christian parents or made to feel hostility by the so called loving Christians similarly? Oh well, we're self aware enough but won't really do a damn thing about it so let's move on
Some Mandela effect crap is sprinkled into this with no point whatsoever or maybe it's to make us think David is a hero when he's just being a selfish prick that can relocate his church at the end of the film.
But before that happens, he flirts chastely with a soup kitchen woman that pursues him, gets punched in the face when Jefferson--I don't care about his name--comes at him because he brought hate comments on Facebook to his page and he got a brick through his window.
A Talking Head makes an appearance acting as if marginalized people should be civil to oppression because it's tolerating the status quo. Christians? Marginalized? Don't make me wet myself here NRA Dana.
So bottom line is: the apparent black guy that's a BLM activist is supposed to be against Dave because you can't believe that black people are made in the image of God and they're unfairly targeted by police at the same time right? He is the biggest detractor that comes around to admire Dave.
Dave has another interesting conversation with a black Pastor in his state of Arkansas. See Dave is "Tired of Christians rolling over" Here is what he says "Brotha who are you talking to? I am a black pastor in the Deep South, I can build you a new church with the bricks that have been thrown through my windows" Good slapdown in one way but not the other
The 2nd storyline that converges is simple: Undercover Christian is outed,rather she's struggling with her faith now but you'd swear they were using these as allegories for being gay or something the way they write this crap. Her boyfriend is a total spaz when he's on the train to Dumpville, he vandalizes the church property because as he says it "I've done my penance" and he's angry. I've known plenty of people that would vandalize a nearby place that's not a church. Now, I hate this because they make it a possible hate crime and honestly, I thought they were going to go the evil atheist angle because that's the tried and true for them.
Brick, I dub him Brick is mad and lonely and pissed that his Mom was forced out of her church because she divorced an abusive dip wad and they shunned her. This goes back to Brother and the rejection of people that will not live the prescribed way.
So, Brick sends Dave a message saying that he is the one that threw the brick that cost Jude his life and Dave attacks Brick. The administrators use this as a way to say the CHURCH is responsible for this divisiveness. It was never established in previous films that it was located on Hadley University's campus before
Onto the finale, David gives up his church and asks everyone to put the signs down because they want to be civil. However, the underlying issues of the day won't be addressed. Just be good Americans and pat ourselves on the back. We gave a surface level solution to a wound that needs to be probed and cleaned so it doesn't get gangrene! We only care about the surface to make ourselves feel better!
This movie just dodged the tough questions but glosses over them. The questions it did answer had to do with humanity and that Pastor Dave is a human being as opposed to the question of evil in the Universe, and Josh said Free will. I guess the free will of the victimized never play into it.
The black kid that is a detractor Dave's is a stereotyped Black college male that's dating a white woman--which is interesting to me because lots of these films don't take kindly to interracial relationships.
I hated that the whole thing was someone who was angry at the church, why couldn't it have just been a complete accident where someone threw something and it was just two people playing around as opposed to the whole guilt story? I'm glad they didn't ANTIFA it
GND 3 was much better than the previous films but the faceless adversary was the same and while they treated individuals differently it was still the victimization narrative and Dave was a selfish prick acting as if this was happening TO HIM without other factors being present. There was a fuller picture this time but they squeezed it out in some ways to keep the victim narrative
I give this film 3 Christians with perpetual victim mentality out of 5
This has been A Review of God's Not Dead A Light In Darkness
Onto the plot! Pastor David Hill is tossed in the clink for not turning over his sermons. This is based on something that happened in Houston, google the full story because you won't get it during this propaganda piece masquerading as a film. Here is a snopes article on it https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/houston-hustle/
Unsurprisingly, Dave is released and we're delighted to hear that Jude and Dave will be Co Pastors at St James.
The joy doesn't last a long time because a kid throws a brick through the window, knocking a gas container like thing. Jude goes to investigate while Dave calls the police and gets blowed up when he turns on a light and Dave drags him out of the burning church.
I'm genuinely wondering if that was enough to kill Jude. I honestly think based on the way it unfolded that Jude would've had the wind knocked out of him and maybe some glass damage from the exploding bulb but I don't think death was likely given what I am seeing. I could be wrong but from what I observed it seems that Jude would've in real life, walked away a little winded, but this is Pure Flix...
Jude utters his last words to Dave in Swahili, but he never spoke Swahili to Dave in either of the other films and we only know that he speaks Swahili like 2 minutes before he dies. This is something that seems tacked on. Aaaaand it took me longer to write this part of the script than it did for the writers to resolve the mystery Swahili at Jude's funeral. Translated it is: God is good all the time and all the time God is good. For a group known to be sex negative they sure like to blow their wad quickly
So the evil liberal college administration wants to take the church down and put in a Student Union. Jefferson from Married with Children is a friend to Dave. Dave decides to reject the offer the college makes, but the college won't go down without a fight and sends a demolition crew.
After all, the church is a bombed out husk AND a danger to the community because of the shape it's in. Dave has to stall so he filibusters.
Previously in the movie Dave enlisted the help of his brother, Brother gets a cease and desist from a Judge while she's at mass and they continue their merry adventure. They argue because Bro dared to ask questions about the faith and was made to feel unwelcome because he lived outside the prescribed box.
I wonder what other group of people have been disowned by loving Christian parents or made to feel hostility by the so called loving Christians similarly? Oh well, we're self aware enough but won't really do a damn thing about it so let's move on
Some Mandela effect crap is sprinkled into this with no point whatsoever or maybe it's to make us think David is a hero when he's just being a selfish prick that can relocate his church at the end of the film.
But before that happens, he flirts chastely with a soup kitchen woman that pursues him, gets punched in the face when Jefferson--I don't care about his name--comes at him because he brought hate comments on Facebook to his page and he got a brick through his window.
A Talking Head makes an appearance acting as if marginalized people should be civil to oppression because it's tolerating the status quo. Christians? Marginalized? Don't make me wet myself here NRA Dana.
So bottom line is: the apparent black guy that's a BLM activist is supposed to be against Dave because you can't believe that black people are made in the image of God and they're unfairly targeted by police at the same time right? He is the biggest detractor that comes around to admire Dave.
Dave has another interesting conversation with a black Pastor in his state of Arkansas. See Dave is "Tired of Christians rolling over" Here is what he says "Brotha who are you talking to? I am a black pastor in the Deep South, I can build you a new church with the bricks that have been thrown through my windows" Good slapdown in one way but not the other
The 2nd storyline that converges is simple: Undercover Christian is outed,rather she's struggling with her faith now but you'd swear they were using these as allegories for being gay or something the way they write this crap. Her boyfriend is a total spaz when he's on the train to Dumpville, he vandalizes the church property because as he says it "I've done my penance" and he's angry. I've known plenty of people that would vandalize a nearby place that's not a church. Now, I hate this because they make it a possible hate crime and honestly, I thought they were going to go the evil atheist angle because that's the tried and true for them.
Brick, I dub him Brick is mad and lonely and pissed that his Mom was forced out of her church because she divorced an abusive dip wad and they shunned her. This goes back to Brother and the rejection of people that will not live the prescribed way.
So, Brick sends Dave a message saying that he is the one that threw the brick that cost Jude his life and Dave attacks Brick. The administrators use this as a way to say the CHURCH is responsible for this divisiveness. It was never established in previous films that it was located on Hadley University's campus before
Onto the finale, David gives up his church and asks everyone to put the signs down because they want to be civil. However, the underlying issues of the day won't be addressed. Just be good Americans and pat ourselves on the back. We gave a surface level solution to a wound that needs to be probed and cleaned so it doesn't get gangrene! We only care about the surface to make ourselves feel better!
This movie just dodged the tough questions but glosses over them. The questions it did answer had to do with humanity and that Pastor Dave is a human being as opposed to the question of evil in the Universe, and Josh said Free will. I guess the free will of the victimized never play into it.
The black kid that is a detractor Dave's is a stereotyped Black college male that's dating a white woman--which is interesting to me because lots of these films don't take kindly to interracial relationships.
I hated that the whole thing was someone who was angry at the church, why couldn't it have just been a complete accident where someone threw something and it was just two people playing around as opposed to the whole guilt story? I'm glad they didn't ANTIFA it
GND 3 was much better than the previous films but the faceless adversary was the same and while they treated individuals differently it was still the victimization narrative and Dave was a selfish prick acting as if this was happening TO HIM without other factors being present. There was a fuller picture this time but they squeezed it out in some ways to keep the victim narrative
I give this film 3 Christians with perpetual victim mentality out of 5
This has been A Review of God's Not Dead A Light In Darkness
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