“The Chosen” breaks its own record after being translated more languages
“The Chosen” continues to chart new territory in Christian entertainment. This time, it broke its own record when “The Guinness Book of World Records” in February recognized it as the most translated season for a streaming series, reaching 125 languages worldwide, which surpassed its previous record of 86 languages.
“The Chosen” is the first multi-season series about the life of Jesus, focusing specifically on his impact on his disciples, followers and the wider community. Season six of the seven-season series will launch this fall. The Come and See Foundation is the faith-based nonprofit organization that helps fund and oversee the translation of the series.
“People are hungry for truth,” CEO James Barnett told Crosswalk Headlines. “They’re looking for answers.”
He described “The Chosen” as a phenomenon of its generation. Nothing else has touched people in the entertainment realm since the “Jesus” film in 1979, he said. The “Jesus” film has now been translated into more than 2000 languages.
“It really brings out the humanity of Jesus, and people connect with it around the world,” Barnett said. The world record marks a further step toward Come and See’s ambitious goal of translating the series into 600 languages, a goal that has been accelerated by the use of artificial intelligence “It’s fast-tracking” the process,” Barnett said of AI.
Just a few years ago, the target was 100 dubbed languages and 500 languages with closed captions. Dubbing replaces the original dialogue with voice actors speaking another language, while closed captions display translated text on the screen while the original audio remains unchanged. But now, Come and See believes it can reach several hundred dubs of the series.
The goal of 600 languages represents a massive undertaking of 33,600 translated episodes across seven seasons of eight episodes each. “We’re seeing people’s lives just being touched all around the world,” Barnett said.
–Alan Goforth
