Work Text:
With millions watching, the first broadcast of Holy Word’s sixteenth season began. All eyes were waiting for the discussion of the greatest religious revelation since the time of Christ to be discussed by the show's panelists, but many were specifically excited for the show's iconic introductory sequence to receive its update, changing with the revelation but still reflecting the eternal truth espoused in the show.
The show started as it had for fifteen years prior, on a map of the ancient world as a golden thread of light flew down from off of the top of the screen. What very few failed to notice, however, is that the map now did not extend all the way to the edges of the screen. Instead, the map was frayed and framed by wood.
Aside from this, however, the intro continued as it always had. The light flew to near where the Tigris and Euphrates met, before pooling into a circle. For two seconds after, a short video played in the center of the screen of the first woman on earth biting into the forbidden fruit. After the video finished playing, the golden thread moved once more, settling in the Armenian highlands. Another clip played, showing a massive ark coming to rest near a mountain, after which the thread moved again and a clip of a man raising a knife to his son showed. The thread then moved to the Red Sea, showing a clip of a man parting the waters. The process repeated with the thread moving to Mount Sinai, where the same man brought two stone tablets down from the mountain. This was followed by three more scenes, these being a teenager with a slingshot shooting down a gigantic man, a massive temple being erected in Jerusalem and prophets shouting out to the people of Israel.
What happened next was also familiar as well, although the viewers knew that the broadcast would soon change forever but were unsure in what way. A baby lay in a manger in Bethlehem. That same baby was baptized in the River Jordan three decades later. The golden thread then moved to Jerusalem, where the man delivered a sermon from a large hill, attracting a massive crowd. The following scene was pivotal but did not carry a sense of finality, as the man cried out to God while being crucified amidst a darkened sky. In the scene after that, however, the tomb presumably belonging to him lay empty.
The clips then continued with that same man ascending up to Heaven, a miracle by any stretch of the imagination. This was then followed up by his supporters preaching his name far and wide, a man who had died and risen again, destined to cleanse the world of its sins. Finally, in what would have been the last clip before the show’s title card in any previous season, an old man on an island had a vision of Heaven and Earth being made anew.
This would not be the end of the show’s legendary intro, however. Not this time.
Instead, the camera zoomed out once more before cutting to two men looking at the map, which was on the right side of a wooden table, inside of a rough-hewn stone chamber. Although only the backsides of the men could be seen, both were easily recognizable. The man standing beside Jesus, however, whom all of the viewers knew as Nathanael, had come to prominence much more recently than his companion, having only a bit part in the Gospel of John before his meteoric rise to fame after the discovery of a Gospel of his own.
As the viewers held their breath, waiting for what was to come next, Jesus unfurled a second map, putting it to the left side of the table before pointing at it. A quick cut back to the map revealed that it was a map of Britain, one much more modern in origin than the one laying beside it.
What came next would be nothing short of blasphemous to someone who had not heard of what was being heralded as the most recent revelation of Holy Scripture. In fact, it was still blasphemous to many who had.
The thread of light from before jumped from offscreen at Patmos to a point in Somerset, before pooling once more. A clip then began to play that would once be dismissed as mere children’s entertainment but now was a part of the eternal Scripture.
A cottage with its front steps framed by Jack-o’-lanterns lay still for a moment, before a shadow blocked out one of the upstairs windows. Silence stretched on for what the viewers perceived as an eternity. Then the whole cottage was enveloped in a flash of green light.
The clip then dissolved, before the golden thread moved to Essex, where a giant of a man broke down a door. It then moved all the way up to the Scottish Highlands, where three clips played one after the other at a remote location. First came burning hands laid on a turbaned man, followed by a ruby-encrusted sword being jammed into a giant snake’s throat. Then came a guardian of pure light in the form of a stag, which charged several shadowy, otherworldly creatures.
The golden thread then moved to South Yorkshire, where a web of light illuminated a graveyard. The thread then flew back up to the Scottish Highlands, where only the second man to die and be resurrected walked through a forest to what he thought would be his death, only his back visible as ghostly figures guided him onward. One final clip then played, showing two jets of light, one red and one green meeting and bouncing against each other, before a wooden stick flew into the air.
After the clip finished playing, the golden light disappeared as Jesus and Nathanael rolled up one map each and left them on the table. A quick fast-forward then showed nearly two thousand years of the cave aging, although the scrolls remained perfectly preserved.
In the next shot, the viewers recognized events from their own time. The dark cave suddenly was illuminated not by heavenly light but by modern high-powered lamps. The scrolls were carefully unwrapped by new pairs of hands, but instead of showing maps they showed text in Koine Greek.
The sequence then cut to a newspaper, the headline proudly proclaiming, “Lost Gospel Discovered!” What came next was also familiar to the viewers but still shocked many. The newspaper and headline changed to one reading “Prophecy In Gospel of Nathanael Resembles Popular Children’s Series, Scholars Baffled”.
After this came the penultimate shot, the only shot of the entire sequence to not be made for it. Three middle-aged adults stood in front of the camera. A man with black hair streaked by gray stood in the middle, having appeared in the sequence before. This time, however, his face was visible for the first time, showing bespectacled green eyes and a faint scar in the shape of a lightning bolt above his brow. Standing on either side of him were a red-haired man with blue eyes and a woman with bushy brown hair with brown eyes.
The weight of history and divine revelation settled upon the viewers as the most important moment in broadcasting history repeated itself for them, the unveiling of a world once thought of as mere fairy tales for children.
The three then called out in unison as the music swelled, releasing three beings of pure happiness and joy from their wands. From the left came a Jack Russell terrier. From the right came an otter. And from the center came the same stag from earlier. The creatures then raced towards the camera, just before the shot changed to that of the title card, gold on black reading Holy Word, with a subtitle reading Third Testament.