Article first published as BLACK-ISH Review on Seat42F.
BLACK-ISH,
as the title suggests, does not shy away from racial issues. In fact,
it goes right to them in the pilot, and sets them up as themes for the
show as a whole. Other series have touched on what BLACK-ISH does, but I
can’t recall ever seeing the debate about what makes a modern African
American family true to themselves and their culture as directly as this
one does on one of the Big Four networks, at least not recently. And
it’s decently, though not overly, funny.
I
really like Anthony Anderson (Law & Order), who plays Andre, the
main character. His humor comes from his suffering, and BLACK-ISH has
plenty of that. Successful at his advertising agency, Andre is excited
about being promoted until he finds out that he’s heading the new Urban
department and feels like he’s being used for his skin tone. At the same
time, he also deals with his kids acting “too white” with their
upper-middle class peers, and tries to help them remember who they are.
Basically, he’s beset on all sides, fighting multiple battles by
himself.
It’s pretty cool that the
rest of Andre’s family doesn’t worry nearly as much about race as he
does. His wife, Rainbow (Tracee Ellis Ross, daughter of Diana,
Girlfriends), is a successful surgeon, and she’d rather concentrate on
her job than perceived slights or stereotyping. His kids (The First
Family’s Yara Shahidi and lesser knowns Marcus Scribner, Miles Brown,
and Marsai Martin) are hilariously cute in their ignorance about the
simplest things pertaining to their skin color, such as that Obama is
the first black president. For children raised in this type of community
at this time, race just doesn’t seem an everyday factor for them. Even
Andre’s dad, Pops (Laurence Fishburne, Hannibal), who marched in the
Civil Rights Movement, or so he says, though I’m not sure I believe him,
doesn’t care as much as Andre does about their place in the world.
Being
a white man myself, I may not understand all of the complex emotions
and motivations that are part of being a black person in America these
days. But I do know humor, and Anderson usually has it. The topics
covered here may be touchy in certain company, but by putting something
like this on TV every week as a sitcom, it will surely contribute to the
breaking down of barriers. It doesn’t trivialize anything, but it gets
the conversation going through an accessible medium, something important
in the less-diverse-than-it-should-be network television landscape.
Unfortunately,
it’s not as funny as it could and should be. As I’ve said, Anderson is
good, but the material is weak-ish (hehe). BLACK-ISH has some great
moments, to be sure, but there are also some weird ones. Anderson
sometimes stretches just too far for a laugh, and it leaves the realm of
believability. Luckily, there is heart and familial relationships to
help push the show along when it lags between laughs. It could be better
than it is with the ingredients it already has, and hopefully it will
be.
I think the element of BLACK-ISH I
like least is Rainbow. As a wife, she’s a stock character, the career
woman aspect no longer being exceptional enough to rate attention, and
lacking anything else to define her, at least in the first episode.
Several times during the viewing, I found myself wishing Anderson’s Guys
with Kids TV wife, Tempestt Bledsoe from The Cosby Show, had been cast
instead. Not only did Bledsoe do something more interesting with a very
similar character, but she had oodles more chemistry with Anderson.
Sadly, it’s probably too late to correct that.
BLACK-ISH
isn’t bad, and because it serves an important purpose, being the only
current network sitcom with an all-black family, I hope it does well.
The show’s take on current perceptions is sharp at times throughout. If
the script could be cleaned up a bit, and often shows do improve past
the pilot, it could definitely be a good addition to any DVR lineup.
BLACK-ISH premieres Wednesday, September 24th at 9:30 p.m. ET on ABC.
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