This article contains major character or plot details.<\/i><\/p>\n
Years ago, writer Julie Gearey was at a grocery store, and had a fleeting moment of connection with a young religious woman.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The stranger was dressed in full traditional garb, accompanied by multiple children, and the two shared a smile. \u201cI thought, \u2018I wonder what her life is like when she goes home,\u2019 \u201d Gearey tells Tudum. \u201cWe are a similar age, we have similar-age kids, and yet I\u2019m going my way into the mainstream world, and she\u2019s going left into her world.\u201d<\/p>\n The encounter with that woman would serve as the inspiration for Rosie (Molly Windsor), one of the central characters in Unchosen<\/i>, on Netflix now<\/a>. Cloistered away in a strict religious community, Rosie finds herself drawn to a mysterious stranger named Sam (Fra Fee) after he saves her daughter Grace (Olivia Pickering) from drowning. As she becomes entangled in a new romance, she\u2019s also dealing with abuse from her husband, Adam (Asa Butterfield), who\u2019s hiding his own secret. A rising star in their cult community (also known as the fellowship), Adam is quietly struggling with his sexuality, and also<\/i> finds himself attracted to Sam.\u00a0<\/p>\n Sam is an intriguing loner who happens to be a convicted murderer, and he<\/a> employs his power of manipulation to climb the ranks of the cult while using Rosie and Adam as pawns in the process. As the season comes to a close, Rosie manages to escape by the skin of her teeth, Adam stands up for his family at long last, and Sam reigns over the oppressive community.\u00a0<\/p>\n Below, Gearey, Windsor, Butterfield, and Fee answered all our burning questions about that pulse-accelerating finale and cliffhanger ending.\u00a0<\/p>\n Yes and no. While the show features a completely fictional cult and characters, Gearey did pull inspiration from the real-life stories<\/a> of former cult members. The writer connected with people who had managed to escape their religious sects, tracking them down via online forums and social media. \u201cIt was important to reassure them as much as we could that, firstly, nobody watching the show would ever recognize them, and, secondly, that whatever they had to say about the emotional experience of being involved, we would try to respect and reflect as truthfully as possible within the show,\u201d Gearey explains.<\/p>\n Adam\u2019s difficulty reconciling his sexuality with his religion was drawn from the similar experiences of former cult members. \u201cSeveral people we met had struggled with their sexuality within these groups,\u201d says Gearey. \u201cThat was a story that kept coming up again and again, if you\u2019re not straight, there\u2019s no place for you.\u201d<\/p>\n Another truthful nod? That horrifying scene when cult members use copious amounts of alcohol to punish Isaac (Aston McAuley) for having a cell phone.<\/p>\n \u201cWe spoke to some people who\u2019d escaped a particular group that used alcohol in terms of softening people up,\u201d Gearey says. \u201cIn fact, in several of these groups, alcoholism is a real problem, and I think it\u2019s because people are miserable. They\u2019re drinking to suppress that misery. We talked a lot about that, how it would be interesting to see people drinking whiskey socially, but then to also use that as an instrument of coercion, manipulation, and control.\u201d<\/p>\n When shaping the character of Adam, Butterfield turned to a 2020 BBC documentary which chronicles life inside a radical Christian movement. One member in particular, who carried himself in a rigid, robotic way, stood out to the actor.<\/p>\n \u201cEven walking up the steps, he would take it one at a time, almost as though he was scared of falling,\u201d Butterfield shares. \u201cI thought that was quite interesting and applied that to Adam, who is someone who has this secret \u2014 this thorn of untruth \u2014 that he\u2019s holding inside himself.\u201d<\/p>\n After enduring a painful, violent marriage with Adam, Rosie decides to end their relationship and take Grace with her as she escapes the cult<\/a>. She also reveals to her husband that she\u2019s been sleeping with Sam, which he angrily condemns despite the fact that he, too, had a sexual encounter with the escaped convict.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cAdam has his entire world essentially thrown into the air at that point,\u201d Butterfield tells Tudum. \u201cNot only has he finally heard this truth from Rosie, but he has his own truth still buried in his gut, [which is] so twisted and painful.\u201d Meanwhile, Gearey notes, Adam is being used and manipulated by Sam the whole time.<\/p>\n \u201cSam has enough sociopathic nature within him to sense people\u2019s weaknesses and people\u2019s trauma, and zero in on it,\u201d the writer says. \u201cAdam is an obstacle to Sam having Rosie.\u201d<\/p>\n All the animosity between Adam and Rosie temporarily goes out the window when Adam learns that Sam threatened Grace\u2019s life. He decides to help Rosie and their daughter escape, loading them up in his car to drive them away from the compound. \u201cThey\u2019re so important to him, and that\u2019s why he knows that he has to give them up at the end,\u201d says Butterfield. \u201cHe has to let them go because that would be the ultimate sign of love. He can\u2019t put them in any more danger, even if it means never seeing them again.\u201d<\/p>\n Adam and Rosie share a surprisingly tender moment before escaping, with the pair briefly clasping hands. \u201cAdam supported her leaving, which I think she didn\u2019t see coming,\u201d Windsor tells Tudum. \u201cI think [she feels] a sense of gratitude. Women can\u2019t get divorced in the fellowship, and it\u2019s quite uncommon for people to leave.\u201d<\/p>\n Adds Windsor, \u201cAdam has done some inexcusable things to Rosie, but I think because it\u2019s so raw, and it\u2019s happened so quickly, the threat of Sam and Grace takes priority. She hasn\u2019t had time to process anything, she\u2019s not had time to work out what that relationship is.\u201d<\/p>\n The family departs their home in the pouring rain, only to be chased down by Sam, who realizes that Rosie and Grace are leaving. Adam quickly tells his wife and daughter to escape and attacks Sam \u2014 a moment Butterfield found \u201ccathartic.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI remember reading the script and thinking, \u2018Yes, finally,\u2019 \u201d he says. \u201cAdam has all of this pent-up guilt and shame and rage. He\u2019s finally able to really stand up for himself and for his family. It\u2019s taken him a long time to be able to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n Sam is able to break free of Adam\u2019s grasp, and he chases Rosie and Grace through the woods. Furious that Rosie is leaving, he grabs her, pushes her into a tub of water, and begins to drown her. That moment, Fee tells Tudum, was the absolute peak\u201d of Sam\u2019s unraveling. Just when it seems like Rosie might not make it out of the forest alive, Sam relinquishes his grip long enough for her to run away, Grace in tow.<\/p>\n In almost killing Rosie, Fee notes, Sam is mirroring the very same action that put him in prison in the first place \u2014 murdering his girlfriend when he was a teen.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cSomething manages to get through the red mist,\u201d Fee says. \u201cWhether it\u2019s recognition of his actions when he was 16 that caused his life to be taken away from him, whether it\u2019s a voice of God that exists in the fellowship, whether it\u2019s the voice of Rosie, something manages to cut through the white noise of his mind and his anger.\u201d<\/p>\n Gearey thinks of that moment as a \u201cproper redemption\u201d for Sam. \u201cOtherwise it\u2019s like, what has it all been for?\u201d she says. \u201cThe Sam at the beginning of the show would\u2019ve just drowned her, but he\u2019s been through this experience, and he does want to be a better version of himself. There is some light within him.\u201d<\/p>\n As Rosie and Grace flee, a feeling of self-loathing washes over Sam. Fee describes what he was thinking while filming that scene: \u201cHow could I be doing this to another person I love? How could I be back at the beginning? Did those 16 years in prison mean nothing? Have I not changed a bit?\u201d And there were feelings of resignation, too.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI think [Sam was thinking], \u2018Enough now. You’ve tried to keep on top of this whole situation, but enough now. Your dream of going off to live a lovely, wholesome life with this woman is absolutely over. Just give up. Submit to it. Exhale.\u2019 \u201d<\/p>\n After learning that Rosie is leaving the cult, Sam, emotional, reveals that he loves her. But does he actually mean it? Or is this just another instance of him being a master manipulator<\/a>?<\/p>\n Fee, Windsor notes, knew how to keep her on her toes in moments like that. \u201cThere are a lot of scenes that we did where I\u2019d read it and thought, \u2018Okay, I know where this is going.\u2019 And then his performance just spins it on its head, and he takes you down a route that you\u2019re not expecting.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Windsor points to those final moments in the saw mill, when Sam reveals his feelings for Rosie, as one such scene. \u201cFra played it with a beautiful vulnerability, and I think I could see the boy in him, which just gives it an extra layer that I wasn\u2019t expecting,\u201d she says. \u201cI remember the first take of that scene where I was like, \u2018Whoa.\u2019 \u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n For Fee, there\u2019s a gray area when it comes to Sam actually loving Rosie. \u201cBoth of those people needed something, and they both represented what the other needed,\u201d he says. \u201cWas it love? I\u2019m not quite sure, but it was a need and a connection. I think Rosie represented a life that he had lost when he was thrown into prison. She\u2019s a young woman. Did she perhaps resemble his ex-girlfriend? [Regardless] she represented that innocence, that lost childhood, so the connection, the need, the desire was real.\u201d<\/p>\n It was important to Gearey that Sam wasn\u2019t a \u201cfull psychopath,\u201d but rather had \u201celements of sociopathy.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s not interesting writing a full psychopath as a character, because if you have full psychopathy, you cannot change, you cannot grow,\u201d the writer explains. \u201cWhen he\u2019s saying those things to Rosie at that moment, he means it. But that doesn\u2019t mean when he\u2019s outside the moment, he\u2019s not capable of doing really, really monstrous things.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n That tightrope walk \u2014 between Sam\u2019s vulnerable side and his destructive side \u2014 is particularly apparent in the scene in the meeting hall, \u00a0when he reveals to Rosie, through tears, that he murdered his ex-girlfriend.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cIn the moment he feels it, but then we obviously have that shot at the end of the scene when his eyes flash, and they\u2019re dark, and you just think, \u2018Oh, well, now we\u2019re not so sure,\u2019 \u201d Gearey says. \u201cI wanted the audience to feel uncertain around him, but fascinated by him.\u201d<\/p>\n When we last see Sam, it\u2019s been a year since he almost drowned Rosie. During that time, he\u2019s weaseled his way to the very top of the cult\u2019s chain of command, and now serves as the community\u2019s leader. The reveal happens in the show\u2019s final moments, when Sam enters the meeting hall and, bathed in light, delivers a sermon to his rapt audience, dressed in the clothes that Mr. Phillips and Adam wore.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI think the key to Sam\u2019s character is he\u2019s an absolute survivor,\u201d Gearey says. \u201cHe\u2019s an arch manipulator, he\u2019s a survivor, and that\u2019s the power of him as an antagonist.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n The writer\u2019s decision to hand the cult\u2019s reins to Sam was born of her desire to give him the most complete journey possible. \u201cYou start with him escaping from prison, and then he ends where he ends in the series,\u201d she explains. \u201cIt\u2019s always [about] trying to give your characters the biggest arcs across the series, because that\u2019s really, really satisfying for the actor and, I hope, really satisfying for the audience.\u201d<\/p>\n When it came time to shoot that final scene, Gearey told Philippe Kress, the director of photography, to \u201cjust go for it\u201d and to \u201cshoot him like he\u2019s a rock star, have that sort of mystery, and that sort of majesty, and then have the reveal with the light that it\u2019s him.\u201d<\/p>\n First things first, Windsor hopes that Rosie gets a \u201cbig sleep\u201d after her traumatic experience in the forest.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cShe\u2019s done it, she\u2019s left, but I think there\u2019s the scary moment where she\u2019s safe, and then it\u2019s like, \u2018OK, what next?\u2019 \u201d the actress says. \u201cIntegrating into society will be tricky, learning to trust people again will be really tricky.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Adds Windsor, \u201cShe\u2019s got a whole other journey to go on now. I think, generally, when you go through something really scary or traumatic, you\u2019re in shock and just getting through it. It\u2019s not until after that you go, \u2018Whoa, that was a lot.\u2019 \u201d<\/p>\n Adam, meanwhile, has his own complicated feelings to unwrap. \u201cI would hope that he could find the strength to leave [the cult], but I think he\u2019s still got a journey ahead of him, an internal journey to really confront his own truth, to confront the loss of his family, to confront Sam,\u201d Butterfield says. \u201cIt\u2019s so deeply ingrained in him, this life and this world. Unlike Rosie, who needs the change and who\u2019s seen the chance to change, I don\u2019t think Adam\u2019s really opened his eyes to that yet.\u201d<\/p>\n As for Sam? \u201cHe entered the fellowship as a hero. He saved Grace,\u201d Fee says. \u201cThey all think of him as this hero, and he\u2019s going to allow that narrative to play out for as long as possible. I think he\u2019s very much on a high, high pedestal at the end of the show.\u201d<\/p>\n What Sam wants the most, Fee says, is peace. And he might just have captured that feeling at long last \u2026 with a slight caveat. \u201cSam has a version of peace, in the same way that the members of the community have a version of peace (that we see in the opening episode), but I think that the fear of not knowing what\u2019s around the corner, and the feeling of constantly having to look over his shoulder, hasn\u2019t dissipated.\u201d<\/p>\n After escaping prison, Sam set about reclaiming his lost childhood and picking up where he left off as a teen. \u201cI think he wanted to be with somebody and have a life that was filled with love,\u201d says Fee. \u201c[Maybe] he\u2019s replaced that love with the admiration and devotion of followers, but we all know that that\u2019s not real.\u201d<\/p>\n Watch all six episodes of Unchosen<\/i><\/a> now.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\nIs Unchosen<\/i> based on a true story?\u00a0<\/h3>\n
What happens between Adam and Rosie?<\/h3>\n
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<\/picture><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nWhy does Sam let Rosie live?\u00a0<\/h3>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/dnm.nflximg.net\/api\/v6\/2DuQlx0fM4wd1nzqm5BFBi6ILa8\/AAAAQYNjefIAt5KMFjz0S2ktPy8FgpccSq5yFflmHgmbuGYjbJn07fxpqLsAoPFJ921hizFVzjH1AzduuDHt_fIkgmTdQWDnHr1sxgMTeJvkwSIqdjuqbPbtOdUCq7sdOmWZREis7wFanPt5VFv4CJlwSccc.jpg?r=6d4\")
<\/picture><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nDoes Sam really<\/i> love Rosie?\u00a0<\/h3>\n
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<\/picture><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nHow did Sam manipulate his way into becoming the leader of the cult?<\/h3>\n
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<\/picture><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nWhat happens next for Rosie, Sam, and Adam?<\/h3>\n