Mother-Daughter Love: Great News 'Pilot"/"Bear Attack"

"Pilot"

Great News hits the mother-daughter relationship with a nail on the head in the best way possible. 

The series is about Katie, a producer at a local news station who does only puff pieces but wants to do more, but when her mother, Carol, whom she is very close to, comes in wanting to do an internship, it'll drive Katie to crazyvillie. When Greg hires Carol as Chuck's intern, Katie tries to get her fired, but it backfires when Carol has a connection with Chuck after forgetting his snack time. 

When Carol finds out about how Katie doesn't want her, she tries to convince her to come back, and also, after her hurricane lead story is downgraded, she gets her mother in a story as baby boomers returning to the workplace. 

The show makes fun of the inner and outside of the new media I enjoy. It's still got that 30 Rock vibe, but it's still perfect. The cast is fantastic, from Briga Heelan and Andrea Martin as Katie and Carol to Nicole Richie and John Michael Higgins as the two anchors of different ages. The writing was very, very good, probably an excellent pilot since The Good Place.
Overall, I give this episode a 9/10.

"Bear Attack"

When a dangerous story comes, and Katie wants it, Carol leashes out her helicopter parenting to take effect. 

When a bear escapes the zoo, Katie wants to chase the story, but when Carol learns about what happened to someone, she becomes the helicopter parent once again and tries to get Katie away from the story. 

Carol tries to get Greg, the executive producer, to stop Katie from covering the story. After Kaite learns that Greg took her out, she tries to protect it, but Carol tries to diverge the situation. Katie catches on and tries to get to the zoo on a bike, but she hasn't learned how to ride a bike. And after many attempts, Carol shows her how, and soon, she rides off. 

Meanwhile, with The Breakdown losing in the ratings against another news program, Greg thinks that Chuck and Portia should talk at the end of the news about something they have in common. After several meetings with HR, the two finally found common ground with a topic: lemonade. It's either the Beyonce album or the drink, but it's familiar ground for discussion anyway. 

Katie did get that story, but also part of the footage when The Breakdown showed her riding the bike and crushing as she tried to stop. 

This episode was terrific. I thought that Bear Attack was hilarious and was just another well-written episode. As much as Heelan and Martin were great, Richie and Higgins were hilarious in this episode. I love the scene when they are in Greg's office, and as they try to find shared topics, they find one that could ruin their program: talking about their rival program. Also, the scene with Chuck trying to speak with Portia at the anchor desk as a warm-up ended up with an HR meeting. Funny!! Overall, I give this episode a 9/10.

You can catch Great News on Tuesday nights at 9/8c on NBC.