The Two Popes (2019)

Plotzle Original · O75 · May 16, 2026 · Drama / History

Six plot descriptions for The Two Popes (2019). One is the real plot. Five are convincing fakes. Read them and guess which is real.

1. A cardinal requests permission to retire in 2012, but the sitting pope instead summons him to Rome to reveal a secret that would shake the foundations of the Catholic Church.
2. Two cardinals from opposing factions meet annually in Switzerland to negotiate church policy reforms and gradually develop an unexpected friendship that spans three tumultuous decades.
3. After their mentor dies in 1978, two rival theologians compete for leadership of a seminary in rural Portugal while confronting their shared complicity in his embezzlement scandal.
4. Two aging Jesuit priests in 1950s Buenos Aires reunite after decades apart and discover that one has been secretly funding the military regime through diocesan accounts.
5. An American bishop travels to Florence in 1963 to investigate allegations against two monsignors but finds that the accusations originated from his own estranged brother's vendetta.
6. A historian researching papal succession in Vatican archives befriends an elderly archivist who reveals that his predecessor falsified centuries of ecclesiastical records to protect reputations.