The Messenger's commission was announced in May 2022, as part of a suite of new original programming for ABC's 90th anniversary year, with production beginning in June 2022.
New card: the Heart of Diamonds; initially blank, then titles The Dirty Dozen, Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and War and Peace.
The chaos of the sledge match cements the significant of both Ed's card with his friends' names upon it, as well as bringing to an end the problems that plague them - for his own sake and sanity - with he the one having placed them in the positions they are in.
Ed's attempts to help, and to restore the bonds between, his friends have ended up tearing them apart, potentially irreparably; Marv is back at square one - locked up for the assault on Audrey's father, precluded from visiting his child - Audrey's internal conflict over whether she is of as little worth as her father told her causing her to flee lest she harms anyone else, while Ritchie teeters on the edge of losing whatever remaining freedom she had in her grasp, everyone unreceptive to her pleas.
In a four-star review of the first four episodes, The Guardian's Luke Buckmaster said that it took him time to "get accustomed to The Messenger's idiosyncratic rhythms, but soon I relished returning to this world", noting a "strange alchemy between setting and character", with "lean and uncluttered" plotting.
He praised the directors and screenwriters for "deftly balanc[ing] comedy and drama, creating a subtle and strange quirkiness", and for "trust[ing] in the nature and strength of the story and the cast, allowing scenes to breathe while keeping things progressing at a good pace", as well as the efforts by the programme's cinematographer to ensure "retro flavour is baked into the show's aesthetic".
[12] TV Tonight's David Knox, in a three-and-a-half star review of the first two episodes, said the series "effectively asks you to leave your logic at the door and go with its heightened mix of drama, dark comedy and magic realism", praising McKenna as a "likeable lead", and that the series impressed upon him an attempt by ABC to appeal to younger viewers, doubtful it "will connect with core ABC viewers, and perhaps it might be best framed as premium YA content".