All right. So, I wasn’t expecting to make this video this week, but I think Dallas kind of forced us to talk about this now that he’s uh said something on the live stream last night and kind of furthered the story here. So, we’re going to be talking about Angel today. I’m going to be giving my absolute honest thoughts when it comes to everything in the realm of angel and that includes things like Testament and the Chosen and what I think about all that’s going on. how can I possibly justify talking about testament the way I have in the last few days uh when they are distributed by Angel uh and what that actually means and all that kind of stuff.
I’m going to be getting into all of that as well as what Angel has done, what are my thoughts about that, how am I involved with Angel uh all that kind of stuff.
So, first off, let’s kind of get to the facts, talk about what Dallas said last night on stream. I’ll just kind of play this through and we’ll give our thoughts as we go through with right now that I just wanted to keep you informed on. So, this is about our relationship with Angel Studios. So, checking my notes occasionally.
I want to make sure I’m totally accurate. I want to make sure that I don’t say that I say everything that I’m uh allowed to say at this time. But legally, he’s trying to protect himself here, which totally makes sense, right? So, forgive me if I’m checking my notes. But, as you know, you may know, we used to be in partnership with Angel Studios.
They were our original distributor of uh The Chosen, and uh they had a tremendous role in getting the first two seasons out to you.
Played a tremendous role in the gosh launching of this show and the launching of our crowdfunding that made uh season 1, seasons 1 and two possible. I’ll always be forever grateful to Angel Studios for their role in all of that. Yeah, remember from the start, Dallas wasn’t sure about crowdfunding and how that would even work. Um, and because Angel pushed him to do it, it became the number one crowdfunded show at the time.
Um, and raised a lot of money and helped The Chosen get off the floor. So, for sure, Angel had a huge part in starting The Chosen. Absolutely. I love uh those guys over there and I’m congrat I congratulate them on some of the other projects that they’ve been distributing that have had a lot of success and so uh bear no uh you know ill will towards Angel Studios but we’re no longer with them because in 2023 we actually entered into an arbitration with Angel Studios because of multiple uh significant contract violations.
And so we went into a private arbitration and uh fortunately as I announced last year uh the arbitrator ruled overwhelmingly in our favor.
Now I’ve talked about this at length um for the last few years for the last year and a halfish. Um and uh yeah the the judge very much seems to be like 1,000% on the chosen side. And you’re going to see more evidence of that in a second here. Um but back then, you know, we weren’t sure what was going to happen. Uh, but then it went in 24 hours from, you know, hey, this is an Angel show and we are distributed on Angel to nothing nothing on Angel’s website at all has anything that even hints towards the chosen because legally they had to take all of that down within a few minutes.
I actually watched it happen live. I refreshed my page, you know, minute after minute and saw that The Chosen was just completely deleted. Uh, which is crazy. Um, and so that made us free, allowed us to be free to pursue other relationships, other partnerships such as the partnership with Come and See, which is the nonprofit organization that finances our productions.
Shout out to Come and see and uh Prime Video, which is now our new uh third party distributor.
Yeah. And what he means by third party is that they’re the ones where the the content is most readily available, at least at first. Uh the first party distributor, I guess you could say, is Lionsgate. still Lionsgate is distributing everything, making these deals behind the scenes, and then Amazon becomes uh their their big distributor here. Um, now that may have changed with the most recent deal.
I’m not 100% sure about that. Um, but I know like for the movie, they’re they’re signing with uh Amazon MGM Studios in order to kind of push out the movie that’s going to come out in 2027.
So, uh, maybe some of that has changed behind the scenes, but they were with Lionsgate previously and obviously Amazon is a part of it now and, uh, where you can watch season 5 exclusively at the moment. Now, Angel Studios appealed that decision as is their right. That was expected.
And, uh, just last week, we got the fortunate news that three independent arbitrators uh, reviewed the case in depth and, uh, independently, all independently uh, upheld the original decision.
Okay, so they sent it to three more judges essentially uh three more arbitrators in order to see if this is actually the case, see if they could appeal it. And all three of them sided with the chosen. Meaning that meaning that just to be clear, Angel did breach their contract. It is it’s not even a question anymore.
Uh it’s not a question of, oh, this judge just sided with the chosen for whatever reason. No, four different people now have sided with the chosen, meaning that Angel absolutely breached their contract.
And so the this uh arbitration case is officially closed. We are off the contract is officially terminated uh for a forever essentially. And so this was wonderful news that we were able to kind of put that episode behind us.
Um Angel actually reached out to me um this past week and said, “Would you like to collaborate on a statement once the ruling comes through?” Kind of a public statement about the ruling, which typically I would want to do in the spirit of cooperation. But at the same time that I was being asked if we wanted to collaborate on a statement, I was also finding out that Angel has filed a new arbitration against us. I wonder what this is about, if it’s a different contract, a different type of thing uh in terms of distribution or something else.
Uh I don’t know what this next arbitration is about.
Uh but of course, Angel is going to try absolutely anything they can in order to get the chosen back because it’s such a huge money maker, right? Um it’s such a giant project that of course they’re going to try to get that project back which makes sense from a business perspective. Is it a little bit shady? We’ll talk about that.
Uh this is not uncommon.
There have been multiple uh legal uh situations that we’ve dealt with uh over the last couple years with Angel. And they actually have said in the past that this would be the case that there would be lots of legal action taken for a long time. And so when I heard that news at the same time that I was being asked to collaborate, I think that made the decision to collaborate uh to not collaborate an easy one.
So no, there will not be a collaboration on statements while right, you can’t shake my hand while you’re kind of stabbing me in the back, right? That’s kind of unfair.
There’s also currently uh an arbitration build being filed against us yet again. So, uh, I can’t give details on that, but obviously we are extremely confident that this will result in yet another decision against Angel and in our favor and nothing should change for you or the show.
It’s uh, par for the course when it comes to watching the show, how to watch it, how to support us, all of that thing, all of that. Um, but we’re obviously very confident that this will just be yet another decision in our favor. Angel has been involved in multiple legal uh, battles over the last many years with multiple people.
Yeah, we’ll talk about this in just a second.
Uh, and companies you can look online for how those have gone. So, we don’t anticipate this being any different. Uh, what I what I would just want to ask of you is just to pray that eventually that this stops. Um, it’s extremely taxing.
It’s extremely timeconuming. It’s extremely distracting and uh it’s also extremely expensive to do these even when we win. Um the cost uh over the over the months or sometimes even year plus that these things take uh uh is is very um I mean everything that I just said it’s it’s yeah imagine paying all the lawyers for that long to do that and taking away from all the other stuff that you have to do for this company. There’s a lot on Dallas’s shoulders for sure. I’m sure this weighs on him.
very it’s a very heavy weight while we’re trying to uh produce the show.
And so um we just ask that you continue to pray for this and other distractions that um as much as possible want to be able to be focused on the work that we are doing. We want to be able to continue to do it without being strained financially. And so, um, that’s one of the reasons why, um, I do these live streams and one of the reasons why even when you guys sometimes say, “Well, please get the the the the episode going or Dallas talks too much or whatever.” Yeah, that can sometimes be true.
I’m definitely a talker, but these live streams are how we actually one of the main ways that we operate as a company.
Come and see finances the production. Every dollar uh, is that is an accurate way to put it, Brad? Every dollar that is donated to come and see goes to uh the production and the translation of translations and and a lot of the marketing. Um but come and see covers their own overhead.
Correct. They do. Yeah. So your dollar goes directly. That’s one of the reasons why our partnership with come and see is so valuable and important is because we you can know that your donations are not only taxdeductible but So anyway, we can talk about come and see another time, I’m sure, but let me kind of dive into all my thoughts on this because I have a lot.
Uh, so stick around for sure. Um, real quick before I forget, he also mentions at like 1:45 about Chosen Con. Chosen Con is going to be next year, February 19th through the 21st, so set your calendars for that. Uh, quite interesting there. We won’t get into Chosen Con today.
Obviously, we don’t have much information. It’s right near my birthday, though, which is really, really nice. Uh, but uh, that should be a ton of fun. Next year, beginning of next year, February 19th there. Anyway, let’s get into my thoughts here.
So, let’s talk about the facts before we get into my opinions. First of all, Angel is a a huge company, right? They’ve been around for a while.
Obviously, Angel Studios kind of came out of what Vid Angel used to be and then they started Angel Studios. Uh, and that was really started with The Chosen as their frontunning product.
Uh, they have a lot of different stuff now, uh, that’s on their their site. Um, a lot of stuff that people like. Um, but here’s how Angel operates. Angel is like Netflix. You can kind of imagine them as the the the faith-based Netflix, right?
Um and so they want a lot of content to be able to put on their platform. Now, the trouble with that is that they want Netflix exclusives, right? They want Angel exclusives, meaning that these are shows that are produced and made uh with money that Angel is giving to the projects in order to help them get off the ground. Now, in doing this, it seems as if Angel has had a lot of instances of taking advantage of early on successes of these, you know, new shows.
So, for example, The Chosen, they breached contract with them, kind of overstepped their bounds and overstepped their ownership of The Chosen, and that is why they eventually got cut off from The Chosen because of these breaches of contract.
Now, I would say, hey, this is just an isolated incident. They just overstepped their bounds. They made some mistakes, but now they’re good on all their other projects. But I can’t say that because there’s at least four or five other arbitrations that are very similar to The Chosen.
Some of them are even way worse than The Chosen in terms of breach of contract and some stuff that’s been uh said that they’re doing uh with these other companies.
And so things like the David movie, for example, is in jeopardy of being taken away from Angel. Uh we’ve also seen this with a lot of the other uh shows and stuff that they’ve been going on with. Um, and so you guys have heard about that behind the scenes. We’ve talked about that. I’m not going to bring up the articles right here.
Um, but you can look it up very easily. There’s a lot of different um, a lot of different, you know, groups, a lot of different studios, a lot of different production companies that have all been kind of taken advantage of by Angel and all saying similar things that they oversteppp their bounds on contracts that they were taking ownership of things when they when they can’t legally take ownership of them.
Um they were kind of doing things in order to put more money in their pocket rather than the studios pocket uh and kind of cutting them out of specific deals or doing things that they just didn’t have the authority to do within this these contracts. And so um it’s kind of sketchy, right? And so for me um I I’ll hold off on my opinions.
One more thing that people are worried about with the company uh as a whole, Angel Studios is that it’s founded by LDS members. Now, some of you are not going to care about that. Uh, some of you are really going to care about that because it’s a faith-based website. You’re really going to care that the people behind it have the same beliefs as you. For me, I don’t really care as much that it was founded by Mormons or LDS.
Um, what I really care about is who is making the content, right? Um, and so, uh, for me, it’s not as big of a deal, but I know a lot of people have a lot of struggles with the the company’s founders being um, Mormon.
Now, personally, how am I involved with Angel Studios? Let’s start there. I have been talking to Angel Studios for the last four years, uh, really since we started talking with the Chosen.
Within that first year, I had someone reach out to me from Angel Studios. Um, and then we really didn’t work with them until about 2022. 2022 when we first moved to Tennessee during season 3’s release.
Um, basically like 2022 into 2023 during season 3’s release is when we first worked with Angel. And that was the first big sponsorship we had ever done with any company.
Um, but that’s what we did with Angel is we we, you know, pushed people towards the Angel Studios app. Now, during that sponsorship is when we found out about the arbitration and everything that was happening with the Chosen. And so I felt slightly taken advantage of in that moment uh as well. kind of, you know, almost I was I was put in a position where I was almost against the new chosen app that was coming out because I had signed this deal to push out the angel app instead of the chosen app before the chosen app had even been announced or existed. Uh, and I I had already signed that contract.
And so for me, I was put into a weird position there. But, you know, I did it. I I signed the contract. I’m going to do my job. and I pushed the Angel app as much as I possibly could for season 3.
Uh, this is before I knew any of the details of what was going on with the arbitration or what was happening there. Um, I had just kind of heard about it and I knew about it through the through the uh different sources I have around me and the the public information that was kind of out at the time. Now, past that, I’ve had great great relationships with Angel. That’s been the only sour point that I’ve ever had in terms of the people that are around me or the people that I’ve had uh interactions with. uh the people that I have contact with within the angel company and I’ve met all the way up to the top.
I’ve me I’ve met Jeff. I’ve met Neil. I’ve uh I haven’t met Jordan, but he’s been in my comment section more recently. Um and so these these are kind of like the main members of the people who founded and created Angel Studios and who run it today.
Um and so, you know, I’ve met all those people.
I’ve been very kind to all those people. They’ve been always kind to me whenever I’ve talked to them. Um and I’ve never had anything that’s gone wrong, right? if they wanted to sponsor a video, it was always, you know, sort of like this uh, you know, contract. We would sign it and then we would go and we would do do the videos that we needed to do.
So, that’s the only way I’ve ever been involved with Angel.
I I don’t have uh anything behind the scenes where I’m connected to them and I haven’t done a sponsorship with them since that time with the Chosen App versus Angel app uh situation there. And so, I haven’t done a sponsorship with them except for one maybe for uh uh Possum Trot. I think I did I did one video there. Uh and that’s the last time we’ve ever had any interaction in terms of a sponsorship.
Um and so for me, that’s kind of where I’m sitting with Angel. I see the sketchiness that’s happening with all of these other companies. I’ve been warned by several people uh kind of behind the scenes to be like, “Hey, you might not want to do business with them.
You might not want to um you know, uh like be a part of what’s happening here. uh just be careful basically is what I’ve been told.
Um and uh and I have been, but I also want to keep the relationship open because there are specific things that are that are coming out in my world of biblical media that are really important to me as well. And so it’s a balance for me, right? How am I supposed to navigate this world? And and again, I don’t have to make this video, right? But I’m trying to be 100% honest with my audience because a lot of you are asking me, “Hey, Brandon, it seems like you’re kind of talking out the side of your neck or you’re you’re you’re, you know, kind of double double speaking here when it comes to Testament specifically,” which we’re going to get to in just a second.
Um, so that’s where I am with Angel Studios. That’s that’s my overall thoughts there. Okay. Uh, do I trust Angel Studios 100%. I can’t, right?
Logically, I I can’t because of everything that’s happened. Um, do I hate Angel Studios and think they should burn? No. Just like Dallas Jenkins would say, you know, there’s a lot of people over there that I that I really love and that I think are doing some great stuff. Um, within the company itself, let me let me keep that clear.
Within the company itself, I think there’s a lot of great people within Angel that are just doing their job, you know, like literally, um, they’re just working and they’re trying to do their best to build this thing.
Right now, how Angel operates outside of that is Angel is a distribution company. They are the Netflix. They are trying to push out shows and yes while they want to have their own sort of Angel Studios originals the people who are making those things are not affiliated with Angel in any way right so for example Roarlight or Monarch media or Testament all those you know Mark media and and Roarite are the people who are making Testament uh you know Paul Cersad his wife Faith as well as Kenneth are the writers behind Testament um all of these people are not attached to Angel Studios like they don’t work for Angel Studios they work for their own production company and then they happen to be distributed by Angel. And so a lot of people are freaking out about Testament and how I’m talking about Testament because I think it’s really really good.
I think that you guys should check it out. Um but people are really worried because they’re they’re basically saying on one hand um they they want to watch the show, but on the other hand they cannot trust Angel and they don’t know how they could ever support something that’s coming from Angel.
Um I would say the chosen is in the was in the same you know situation earlier uh you know when they were tied to angel as well and so it’s just a difficult thing for me to navigate right how am I supposed to navigate um I really love Paul and what he’s doing with Testament at the same time that Angel maybe can’t be trusted as much as we would hope they would right um it just seems like over and over and over again there’s just more smoke that is pouring out of Angel and where there’s smoke, there’s there’s fire. And so, uh, man, you have to understand how much I am I am just trying to be as honest as I possibly can.
Um, both with you and with Testament and with Angel, uh, and with the chosen, right?
I’m trying to be as honest as I can of where I sit with all of those things because I have relationships with everybody within that sphere, right? particularly I have the most relationship with you, my audience, the people who watch these videos, the people who help to support me on Patreon, the people who uh allow me to do this for a living. Um, and so that’s kind of where I am in the whole situation here. Um, it’s hard for me to balance all these things because I truly truly truly believe that Testament, for example, is an amazing piece of Christian media.
And I say that very specifically, right?
But I also know how you guys feel and the perception that is around Angel. And I have a similar perception. And that just comes from the logic of my eyes looking at what’s going on. Right? There are too many people that are saying the exact same thing that are not tied together.
And so for me, it’s a hard thing for me to navigate. I wish Angel the best. I I hope that they can build something that is amazing. Um, while I don’t agree with the founders beliefs, I do agree with some of the shows that they are that they are helping to create, right? Testament I know has a really solid biblical base behind it.
Um, same thing with the chosen, right? A lot of people were worried about the chosen from the very beginning because of the ties to Mormonism through Angel as well. Um, and some other people within the the kind of founding of the chosen uh company itself. But anyway, these are my thoughts overall. It’s hard for me to navigate.
I’m trying to go and and do the best that I possibly can to talk about Christian media.
I don’t want to be talking about arbitrations. I don’t want to be talking about how a company is taking advantage of people. I don’t want to be talking about how, you know, these drama things that are kind of going on. I want to be talking about biblical media.
I want to be talking about how a Tyrion shekele is 14 g and a dinarius is four grams and how the different silver purities are important to the temple because of this, this, and this. Right? That’s what I want to be talking about. That’s what I nerd out on. That’s why I do this channel.
Uh, is because it’s fun to look at those things, to sleuth out those things that are in biblical media.
And I can do that through Testament. I can do that through House of David. I can do that through The Chosen. And so, these are the main avenues in which we’re going to do that.
Um, now that being said, I’ll be 100% honest with you. I get it if you don’t want to support Angel. I also get it if you think it’s worth it to go check out Testament on Angel. I also get it if you just want to catch the free live streams that Testament is doing for the rest of the season that drop on Monday. I also get it if you have a friend in the guild that can give you a free link to go watch Testament so you don’t have to support Angel.
I get all of those things and I know you guys are all in completely different areas, right? Um uh it’s hard. It’s hard for me to navigate.
It’s hard for you to navigate. Some of you are just black and white and you’re going to shut it off completely.
Some of you are never going to trust this company again. Some of you are going to be willing to give it a chance. Some of you are fighting for it to be better. Um, man, there’s a lot of things that I have I have uh thoughts about for sure, but I don’t want to just ramble forever. I don’t know.
Let me know your thoughts about this. I know a lot of you have some pretty intense thoughts about it overall. Um, it’s just where I am. That’s my 100% honest open like here’s here’s what’s going on in in my head right now.
A lot of you guys are asking for my thoughts and so those are my thoughts.
Uh let me know what you think in the comments down below and we’ll see you guys in the next one. Hopefully a more positive video. Peace. [Music].
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