Review
Community
Culture
Film & TV
Romance
5 min read

Nobody Wants This: the rom-com for tense times

Warning: contains warm depictions of strong community and belief.

Lauren writes on faith, community, and anything else that compels her to open the Notes app. 

A couple together on a sofa watch a laptop,
Kirsten Bell, Adam Brody.
Netflix.

I hope places of worship are ready to be inundated with hopeful singles, because it seems there is a market for spiritual authorities as romantic leads. 

In its latest hit, Nobody Wants This, Netflix saw Fleabag’s ‘Hot Priest’ and raised us ‘Hot Rabbi’. Through ten half-hour episodes – so watchable that it is easily viewed in two sittings or less – we follow the unlikely love story of recently single rabbi Noah, played by Adam Brody, and agnostic sex podcaster Joanne, played by Kristen Bell. The pairing of ‘a rabbi and a sex podcaster’ may sound more like the opening of a politically incorrect joke, but after an impressive 15.9 million views in its first week of streaming, it’s clear that somebody wants this. 

“Tonally, we’re at such a tense time,” shared Brody, as he tried to explain the show’s success. “I think just something that’s very positive and celebrates love, is funny and has a warm feeling. I think people are responding to that.”  

It’s true. In days of emotional heaviness and concern, we shouldn’t be surprised by the resurgence of genuinely good romantic comedies. But I don’t think that is all that accounts for the triumph of Nobody Wants This. Its seamless blend of profound religious concepts with an evolving and exploratory faith continually presents viewers with the idea that there is more and better to life. Its redemptive quality goes beyond the classic strangers-to-lovers storyline. Depictions of strong community and belief in greater things have captured an audience who crave something more than surface-level fluff, even from their rom-coms. 

Perhaps, their allure does not lie in authority, sacred position, or even in appearance, but in the fact that they, too, are real, vulnerable and multi-dimensional people. 

 We meet Joanne who, like many of us, is clumsily curious and searching. Initially, she is on a one-woman mission to prove that her work as a podcaster contributes to ‘something bigger’, then she wants to discover whether she is a ‘good’ person or not. These moments of self-exploration are only side quests in her constant longing for a love more lasting than her previous relationships. The character of Joanne is based on series creator, Erin Foster, who converted to Judaism after meeting her partner and, although the series’ highly criticised portrayal of Jewish women leaves much to be desired throughout the show, the season finale leaves us with a clear emphasis that Joanne is now searching for true belief amid conversion questions. 

In the role of Rabbi Noah, as in Fleabag’s Priest, we glimpse behind the proscenium into the life of someone who has committed to serving God. In their struggles, hopes and complicated relationships, we discover a humanness beyond the lectern, titles and ceremonial clothing. In Noah, we see a man who does not always get it right – who often misses the mark – but who owns up, makes amends and learns from his mistakes. During one particularly moving scene, Noah unashamedly brings the sacred into the mundane by introducing Joanne to her first Shabbat meal over a restaurant date. We see a person of faith who doesn’t allow personal holiness to segregate them from the grit of everyday life and who, above all, prioritises relationship over regimented religion. 

There is an obvious physical attraction to men such as Adam Brody and Andrew Scott playing men of the cloth, which I find equal parts weird and worrying for those unfamiliar with real-life clergy, as they’ve possibly had their expectations set a little high. But I wonder if it is their character’s humility, gentleness and authenticity that compels the audience, drawing us to trust them. Perhaps, their allure does not lie in authority, sacred position, or even in appearance, but in the fact that they, too, are real, vulnerable and multi-dimensional people. In these depictions, the life of faith and self-sacrificial vocation does not seem far-off or removed from our society. Not everyone who comes to faith is going to become a rabbi or a priest, but these men go a long way in dismantling the perception that religion and relationship with God is only for a certain, superhuman people. Far from the fire-and-brimstone stereotype, they are responsive, relatable and – crucially, for a romantic lead – emotionally available. 

Sure, sex and sexual attraction eventually plays a large role in the plot, but how many romantic comedies save their most tender scene for a powerful moment of humble prayer... ?

On another level, the overwhelming response to Nobody Wants This reveals a desire to be part of healthy relationships is characterised by respect, patience, honesty and kindness. One online comment stating that, ‘Hot Rabbi is a walking green flag,’ speaks for thousands who simply want to be treated well by those they trust. Another claims, ‘This show healed something in me.’ Noah and Joanne’s story not only defies convention around community and social expectations, but it bucks the trend with its non-toxic approach to dating and religion. In the face of a sabotaging ex-girlfriend, an unconvinced sister, and the giant conversion-shaped question-mark over their future, the two persist by continually choosing and honouring one another. 

The ultimate strength of Nobody Wants This is that it is founded in a story that seeks its worth in more than just sex. Sure, sex and sexual attraction eventually plays a large role in the plot, but how many romantic comedies save their most tender scene for a powerful moment of humble prayer, instead of a passionate kiss? Nobody Wants This presents the viewer with a better possibility, both of life as it is now and life as it could be. Through Joanne, the person who wants something more meaningful is afforded a front-row seat in exploring religion. Even to the total newbie, there is no judgment or embarrassment – and you’d be hard-pressed to find a person who’d get it as wrong as her, making the sign of the cross in a synagogue. Through Noah, our faith in mankind and religion institution is restored as we witness his honesty, patience and kindness. Surely, this cannot be bad press for any place of worship. 

Article
Culture
Digital
Freedom of Belief
4 min read

Failure to report Nigeria’s massacres reflects a wider media evolution

The new reporters and the struggle to tell the truth.

Chris Wadibia is an academic advising on faith-based challenges. His research includes political Pentecostalism, global Christianity, and development. 

A man reads a newspaper called The Punch.
Muhammad-Taha Ibrahim on Unsplash.

The large-scale slaughter of any religious group deserves robust, stubborn media coverage. Merciless persecution of Christians in Nigeria is the most overlooked and yet most newsworthy story in the country’s media landscape. This violence requires immediate and significantly expanded attention from local media. So why is it not making headlines?  

Nigeria, a charmingly vibrant and dynamic capital of the Christian world with nearly 100 million believers, is paradoxically the deadliest country in the world to be a Christian. NGO Open Doors estimates that 12 Nigerian Christians die every day because of their faith – one every two hours. Between October 2022 and September 2023, 4,118 people died in Nigeria simply for identifying as a Christian. These numbers seem more appropriate to the medieval world. The sad reality, however, is that gory, gruesome, and family-destroying violence against Christians is indeed occurring throughout contemporary Nigeria.   

Some new media voices, like Truth Nigeria courageously report on these sinister, lethal attacks. It’s a Nigeria-focussed media entity backed by Equipping the Persecuted, a US-based humanitarian non-profit organisation, devoted to exposing avoidable losses of life in Nigeria.  A disproportionate number of these nightmarish attacks deliberately target vulnerable Christians living in communities easily accessible to any of Nigeria's many Islamist terrorist sects. New media like Truth Nigeria are filling the coverage gaps created by legacy media inaction. Why are its peers in legacy media not reporting on them too?  

Who are the most trusted voices in the contemporary world? For perhaps the first time in modern history, legacy media no longer have seniority in the coliseum of global thought. Popular disenchantment with it is growing globally. Billions of people worldwide no longer perceive traditional legacy media as a trustworthy and legitimate arbiter of information.  

Few Nigeria-focused media voices (legacy or new) calculate it as in their interests to speak out against the abuses. 

A key reason for the growing disenchantment is the increasingly obvious and frustrating political capture of legacy media voices. Channels and publications were once trusted for their popularly perceived independence, objectivity, and nonpartisanship. Now those politically unbiased legacy media have become an endangered species nearing extinction.  

Such media evolution is especially pronounced in the US. An American media landscape once led by legacy media channels like CNN, ABC News, and Fox News now includes new-kid-on-the-block podcasters like Joe Rogan, Megyn Kelly, Tucker Carlson, and Candace Owens, whose shows attract millions of views and subscribers. Independent, personality-driven new media voices like these regularly outperform their legacy media counterparts, the latter of which are being increasingly deemed by critics as too establishmentarian, out of touch, and unappealing to younger viewers.     

In Nigeria, like in the US, popular public perception apprehends the relationship between media and the state to be too close for the media to operate autonomously and impartially. A relevant factor is the federal and state governments hold the lion’s share of power. They are able to shut down or severely damage the operational capacity of the media that does highlight the kleptocratic industrial complex reinforcing infamous world-leading levels of inequality. Few Nigeria-focused media voices (legacy or new) calculate it as in their interests to speak out against the abuses so entrenched in the social and historical fabrics of Nigerian society. Mass and violent persecution of Christians is perhaps the most significant of these abuses.  

Like many other countries, Nigeria has no shortage of newsworthy stories marked by great abuse and violence. However, the fact that the ongoing slaughter of Christians is taking place in one of the global capitals of Christianity, the religion most responsible for building the modern world, suggests the refusal of legacy media there to report on local massacres is driven by political factors. Ones that differentiate it from the dramatic changes in the media industry we are witnessing in countries like the US. 

Many influential media personalities in Nigeria went to Christian schools and universities, and worship in Christian churches. However, they refuse to use their positions of power to draw attention to fellow members of their global community of Christians who are violently killed every single day in the same sovereign land on which they sleep at night.   

What’s driving the reticence? 

One of the distinctive factors contributing to Nigerian legacy media reticence to cover such killings is that Nigeria is the only country in the world that is home to both world-leading numbers of Christians and Muslims. The country has the world’s sixth largest number of Christians and the world's fifth largest number of Muslims.  

Reports on killings of Christians, especially given that many Muslims also die from radical Islamist violence in Nigeria, could be perceived by viewers as religious bias fanning flames of sectarianism in a country already notorious for such violence. A second factor is that legacy media coverage of these slaughters implicates the disappointing response of Nigerian state agencies charged with maintaining security. Proud state personalities would likely react to negative media coverage of their performance by becoming even less engaged with the media.  

Either way, the Nigerian government has built for itself an infamous global reputation for being dysfunctional when trying to serve its citizens. And in contrast, only achieving a semblance of normal function when serving the interests of its kleptocrats and oligarchs. Vulnerable Christians living in regions affected by religiously motivated violence who live to see another day (unlike their less fortunate friends and family members) bear the brunt of a disinterested government and the politically captured media that fails to report it.