‘God Friended Me’ Season 1, Episode 1 ‘Pilot’ Recap: The Grand Design

Can everything in the universe really have a logical explanation? Or is there something or someone out there that can have power over fate in a click of a button? CBS creators take on that idea with its latest series God Friended Me. With a touch of comedy and a splash of drama from the get-go, this new series takes on the world of spirituality through the world of social media.

The series follows Miles Finer (Brandon Micheal Hall), an outspoken atheist with the agenda to share his beliefs through his podcast, called “The Millennial Prophet.” He then gets a strange friend request on Facebook from an account named “God.” Through the account, Miles meets people it suggested him to send a friend request, including online journalist Cara Bloom (Violett Beane). A large string of events and coincidences caused by the account stirs up his beliefs and leaves him questioning everything.

Big G got Facebook

Miles opens his podcast with an interview with an old friend of his, making a clear argument of his belief that there is no God. He’s been eagerly pitching his new podcast to a podcast channel for a long time, and just when he gets the show-us-what-you-got signal, he gets a friend request literally from God. Miles brushes it off and thinks it’s funny until a bush that was set on fire by kids caught him off-guard. After reluctantly accepting it, he gets a friend suggestion from the God account of a guy named John Dove, who he coincidentally bumps into at the very moment in the middle of him and his girlfriend breaking up. Miles follows John down the subway where he saves him from getting run over by a train.

After the incident, he turns to his buddy and low-key hacker Rakesh (Suraj Sharma) to ask if he could help him figure it out. Sadly, the miserably single guy is too occupied with dates set up by his own mom. Miles then gets another friend suggestion by God of Cara Bloom. With the belief that it’s some hoax made to mess with his head and these people getting suggested to him are in on it, he attempts to confront Cara. He finds her on the street but gets shut down by her.

Holy shit gets real

Miles decides to ignore everything that’s happened, unfriends God, deletes the friend suggestions, and refocuses on his podcast pitch. That night after his presentation, his alarm wakes him up 2 in the morning, his thermostat’s been set to 100 degrees and a song which sings the lyrics “I’m only human” plays on and on for some reason. The presentation on his screen then started glitching. When he tried to open it, a couple of short religious videos pop up on the screen, and everything he made was gone. To top it off, Facebook won’t shut up about Cara Bloom.

He finds Cara Bloom in her office. For an online journalist, she hasn’t written anything in six weeks, and her job hangs in the balance. This time, Miles explains everything that’s been happening, and she takes a sudden interest in his story. He takes her to convince Rakesh to hack the account to find an IP address. Rakesh finds the account difficult to hack but promises to work on it. Cara and Miles head out to the bar where Miles’ sister works to get an insight on his family dynamics. She finds out that he was a pastor’s son. In the middle of a heated existential argument, they get an update from Rakesh.

God is in Jersey.

Looking for Meaning

Miles and Cara find the address of a house for sale. After miss journalist picks the locks on the door, they went inside only to find one light on in a room with an angel painting on the wall. Outside the house was a porch bench swing, which reminded Cara of her own bench where she used to sit all the time as a kid. They get another phone call from Rakesh. The sneaky bastard broke into Miles’ apartment to hook up with a date when suddenly Miles’ computer went haywire. Pictures began flashing on the screen while the same song played the previous night played on a loop. Even Rakesh couldn’t make it stop. They head back to the apartment. When they get there, the pictures on the screen stopped on one picture. It was one of the Finer family in the hospital accompanied by his mother’s doctor and nurse. Cara rushes off.

Miles figures that Cara knew someone in the photo. He reluctantly goes to his preacher father to ask if he remembered the names of the doctor and nurse in the picture. He gets into a brief and awkward confrontation with his father before leaving.

It turns out that Nurse Susan Albright was formerly Susan Bloom, which meant that she was Cara’s mother. Miles confronts her with this, and she reveals that she came to New York for college as well as look for her mom. She did find her six weeks ago on the subway and followed her to the park but never dares to go up to her. Miles shares his heart-wrenching past of how his mother survived cancer but died in a car crash on the way home from the hospital, which led to him losing his faith. He convinces her to confront her mother, and so she did.

Hit me up

Cara confronts her mother in the same park she sees her in. She asks for an explanation but then gets upset when her mother’s daughter shows up. Cara runs off and gets hit by a car by accident. From out the street comes John Dove, who turns out to be a doctor. He performs CPR on her, and she makes it out alive. In the hospital, John Dove thanks Miles for saving his life in the subway. Miles brings in Susan to her daughter’s hospital room, and she was given a chance to reconnect with her.

CBS

Miles shared this story in his podcast and captured the attention of the podcast channel once more. Cara submits an article on her story of how she got hit by a car. She asks Miles to keep in touch so they can use the God account to make an actual change. He then gets another friend suggestion: Katie Brooks.

‘God Friended Me: Pilot’ Season 1 Premiere Overall Verdict

There is no reassurance as to where the show is going with its religious theme. It is leaning towards it,  which could certainly hinder its appeal to a non-religious audience or those with different religious belief systems. The show also comes with the typical characters of any series, whether it be drama or comedy. You’ve got the confident and almost too cocky dude with a sad backstory, the smart hacker best buddy that somehow always has also to be a desperately single guy who lives with his mom, and the tough cookie journalist that puts the cocky guy in his place. It also has some millennial humor mixed with modern-day reality drama. Just add holy water and bam! Television series.

On the plus side, the combination of humor with religious references and modern pop culture inserts add to its charm and the way the plot connected the stories was intriguing. The show is also a light drama which may appeal to an audience that wants to laugh and cry at the same time. It’s hard to tell a good series just from the pilot alone, and the series does show potential to expound on other stories that may not just center on spirituality. So if I were you, I’d keep that accept or decline choice pending.

God Friended Me continues next Sunday, October 7th, with “The Good Samaritan” at 8:30/7:30c on CBS.