Scott Foley is front and center in Prime Video’s new faith-based family drama It’s Not Like That, a series that opens on the first day of school in Atlanta and quickly settles into the aftermath of a death that has already reshaped every relationship around it. Foley plays Malcolm, a Grace Community Church pastor raising three children after the recent death of his wife, Jenny.
The eight-episode first season puts Malcolm’s family story at the center, but it does not stop there. Jenny’s best friend, Lori, is pulled into the same orbit when her husband, David, files for divorce shortly after Jenny’s passing, leaving Lori’s children, Merritt and Casey, to absorb the fallout in different ways. Justin is being bullied at school, Penelope and Casey are dealing with a fractured friendship, Merritt is devastated by his parents’ breakup and turns to destructive coping mechanisms, and Flora is struggling with the pressure of being a preacher’s kid while still grieving her mother.
The series comes from creators Ian Deitchman and Kristin Robinson and arrives as Amazon Prime continues to expand its faith-based slate after the success of The Chosen and House of David. That matters because the genre has long been split between viewers who want the faith element to be central and those who worry the stories can become either preachy or closed off to anyone outside the congregation. This show appears designed to bridge that divide.
According to the review, Christianity functions as a guiding light for the characters, but the storytelling is neither preachy nor exclusionary. That balance is important to how the series works. The faith is present in Malcolm’s life and in the way the family processes loss, but the drama also leans on grief, parenting, friendship and romantic tension, giving it a wider emotional frame than a simple sermon on screen.
There is also a small but telling detail in how Malcolm handles Flora. When she refuses to attend church, he does not push her. That choice says as much about the character as any homily could. He is a pastor, but he is also a father trying to keep his family together in the wake of Jenny’s death, and the show seems to understand that the harder work is not always in the pulpit. It is in the house, at school and in the conversations that happen after everyone has already been hurt.
The question now is not whether It’s Not Like That has faith at its center. It clearly does. The more consequential point is whether Prime Video can keep making room for dramas that speak plainly to religious viewers without shutting everyone else out. On the evidence of this eight-episode season, the answer is yes.
