Q: I did not understand the ending of "God Friended Me." Did Miles die and go to be with his mother? What was that? "Follow me. She's been waiting for you"? Who is she?
A: A lot of folks have written to me about that series finale, where Miles ended up reflecting about his faith on a mountaintop and being called to a meeting with an unnamed but apparently spiritual "she." It was not an unambiguous explanation of the God account which some viewers likely wanted, but something more complicated.
And complicated to make, since it started out as a season finale, only to be recrafted as a series ending when the show was going to be canceled — and the process hastened when the coronavirus epidemic led to a shutdown of production sooner than planned.
For example, the mountaintop scene had been shot but not included in a previous episode, executive producer Steven Lilien told Deadine.com, and a montage of scenes from previous episodes was added to set up the ending. But in terms of resolving things, the show is about what executive producer Bryan Wynbrandt called "the mystery of our own humanity and the mystery of where we come from and what guides us" in Parade magazine.
The show was not about answers, then, but about "getting Miles to the place where he was ready to hear an answer, because he wasn't ready for so long," Wynbrandt said. "Whatever that answer is was less important than the journey to get there."
E-mail brenfels@gmail.com.
