‘House of David’ episodes 4-6 are a weaker journey with a thrilling conclusion

By Ben Konuch

“It is not about the greatness of man, it is about the greatness of God!”

Prime Video’s “House of David” had a phenomenal first half of a season, with deep storytelling and characterization of its characters that brought a well-known Bible story to life. Filled with surprisingly intense action and intriguing political tension, “House of David” was off to a fantastic start across its first four episodes. Its second half, however, began to show some cracks that threatened to derail its momentum, although an explosive finale brought the whole season back on track.

This second half sees the newly-anointed David grappling with what exactly it means to be anointed while a king still reigns. When he’s brought to the king’s court to play his harp to calm Saul’s mind, he unwillingly gets thrust into the middle of the chaos that is Saul’s house. Political scheming amongst Israel’s tribes, witchcraft to heal Saul’s mind and a growing admiration and attraction to Saul’s daughter Mychal are but a few of the elements that David encounters, all while pondering what his destiny is meant to be and how to trust God with his uncertainty.

The full weight of the season culminates with Ascish, king of the Philistines, and his plot to entice Goliath of Gath to fight with his army. As the invasion of the Philistines approaches and David is forced to reckon with both his desires and fears as well as a trust in God, Israel’s future will forever be changed.

There’s still a lot to love in this second half of “House of David’s” first season, but there are quite a few rougher edges as well. The main struggle is that the series has now established almost all of its major players, but its pacing needs to give them enough things to do while allowing the threat of Goliath to arrive. Sometimes this is accomplished well, as in the examples of Eshbaal’s banishment, Jonathan’s seeking of answers from Samuel and the further degradation of Saul’s mind. At other times, “House of David” feels a bit like it doesn’t quite know what to do with some of its characters, and David unfortunately bears the weight of this the most.

It’s not that the character work with David isn’t good, it’s just unfortunate that in comparison to characters like Saul, Samuel and even Michal, David feels like one of the least developed characters in the entire show. At this latter half’s weakest moments, David wanders about Saul’s castle without much agency, pouting either about his destiny that he doesn’t know how to follow or his budding teenage romance that he can’t seem to spend enough time with.

When David is at his best, he’s grappling with the Lord’s calling, navigating uncertain conversations with Saul and showing bravery and courage in every step. It’s just unfortunate that for long periods of time, David has little to do in the story, and so his relationship with Michal begins to overshadow the narrative of him learning to seek and trust God. 

I actually did enjoy this romance and how it was portrayed, especially with Michal’s godly influence on David, but I really disliked that it began to replace David’s heart after the Lord with a heart after Michal.

When “House of David” reaches its season conclusion, David does end up the triumphant warrior who trusts God above man that he needs to be, but the way it happens feels a bit disjointed. Leaning a little too heavily into a “foretold chosen-one” trope instead of showcasing the extraordinary everyday faith of a man after God, it feels like there’s a twenty-minute section about David seeking after God between episode 7 and 8 that we just don’t get to see. As a result, David gets to where he needs to be, but it doesn’t feel as smooth or as natural as the rest of the character’s arcs.

Make no mistake, the reason why the awkwardness around David feels so evident is because nearly every other character in the series is written expertly. Once again, I have to praise Ali Suluman as King Saul and Indy Lewis as Michal in these last episodes, and the introduction of Martyn Ford’s Goliath is wonderfully menacing.

On top of these stellar performances and well-written characters, the budget shines much brighter in these last few episodes, with the final episode in particular flexing its budget in perfect ways. The series has a massive scale that Biblical-based stories on film seldom are able to accomplish, and the spectacle serves the epic confrontation at the series’ conclusion perfectly.

In short, “House of David” falters a bit in its last half, but that’s more a testament to the strength of its first four episodes than a failure of its latter four. Although these episodes do have a bit more uncomfortable uses of Biblical-gray areas (the fantastical account of where the giants came from comes to mind), the series never veers into unbiblical territory or blasphemy. At best, “House of David” uses scripture word-for-word in dialogue and fleshes out its epic tale of faith and the possible lives behind the “characters” that we disconnect from history. At worst, it takes a slightly more fantastical approach or interpretations of Scripture that may not be the strongest theological approach, but lead to competent and engaging television that still eventually hits the mark about God, faith and perseverance.

I give “House of David” a season score of 8/10

Season 1 of “House of David” is now streaming on Prime Video.

Ben Konuch is a senior Strategic Communication student who serves as a writer for Cedars A&E and as their social media lead. He enjoys getting sucked into good stories, playing video games and swing dancing in the rain.

Images courtesy of Amazon MGM Studios.