Messiah Recap: Back From The Dead

By Jonathon Wilson
Published: January 1, 2020 (Last updated: last month)
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Messiah (Netflix) Season 1, Episode 2 recap: "Tremor"
3.5

Summary

“Tremor” brings two characters together as suspicions around Al-Masih and his “miracles” continue to mount.

This recap of Messiah Season 1, Episode 2, “Tremor”, contains spoilers.


In the opening scenes of Messiah Episode 2, “Tremor”, we meet the Iguero family: preacher Felix (John Ortiz), his wife Anna (Melinda Page Hamilton), and their daughter, Rebecca (Stefania LaVie Owen). The latter is the first we see, strolling through the Texas desert, taking a photograph of a bird, looking at the sun, and collapsing. The family is financially strapped due to Rebecca’s medical bills. When she returns after her latest episode, she’s immediately quizzed, and Felix has her turn out her pockets.

Eva (Michelle Monaghan) and Avrim (Tomer Sisley), meanwhile, are still separately on the trail of Al-Masih (Mehdi Dehbi). Avrim is being interviewed by his superiors and Eva herself about why the cameras went off for 12 minutes during Al-Masih’s escape. Avrim believes he’s being set up. But this is a man who keeps toothpaste in his car, so stability obviously isn’t his thing. He signs his daughter out of school, but while with her he thinks he sees Al-Masih and gives chase, leaving her in the car. Between his lack of basic childcare and the amount of time he must spend in his car, this is clearly a dude with some issues.

Of course, the man he chases isn’t Al-Masih. The real one is on the steps of Temple Mount, preaching about division, unity, an encroaching judgment day, and the weighing of one’s deeds. At least he picked the right venue for it. But authorities arrive to shut him down, and in the ensuing scuffle, a young boy who responded to Al-Masih’s appeal is shot. Miraculously, and I suppose true to his reputation, Al-Masih revives him and then vanishes. The young boy holds between his fingers the bullet that was moments before lodged in his chest. Muslim opinion is immediately split. Is this Isa returned? Is the man a heretic or a prophet?

Messiah Episode 2 also treats us to our first unofficial interaction between Eva and Avrim. They’re still in conflict currently, but anyone who has seen a show like this before can probably see where their relationship is going.

On the subject of Eva, ever the skeptic, she pores over the Temple Mount footage and immediately determines that, without a clear gunshot being visible, it could have been faked. They need to find the kid to see if it’s a charade, but her attempts to track him down prove fruitless since he and his family have been forced to move after the attention he garnered from being “touched by God.”

Not content with being suspicious of this kid, Eva is also deeply suspicious of Avrim and wants to learn more about him, but Al-Masih is detected via facial recognition in Jordan. Can he teleport too? The limits of his abilities remain mysterious.

So, too, do the motivations of Avrim. To close out Messiah Season 1, Episode 2, Jibril (Sayyid El Alami) is contacted at the border by a woman who gives him food and promises to free them all. As he walks away, Avrim knocks him out and carries him away.

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