'Black-ish' was a network TV rarity: A depiction of a prosperous, tight-knit family of color with Black people shaping their stories. With the final episode airing Tuesday, its creator and fans reflect on the sitcom's cultural impact.
“I remember when it first came out, I was concerned that it was going to be either serious and off-putting, or really sad and comical,” drawing on stereotypical characters that may or may not exist in life, said viewer Onaje Harper. The pandemic turned him into a binge-viewing convert, one who swats away online carping that the show isn’t “real.”
He cited an episode in which Dr. Rainbow “Bow” Johnson, played by Tracee Ellis Ross, is being a supportive parent and volunteers for a private school fundraiser. One of the white parents offers her help, which the show reimagines as code for, “I think you’re going to fail and you’re over your head,” as Harper recalled the scene.
He sees ‘black-ish” as akin to “the grandchild of ’The Jeffersons’ and the child of ‘the Cosby Show.’ You have Dre and Bow, a couple who truly care about each other. They parent their children. They run the house. The children are not overtaking them.” Her daughter, 19-year-old Emily Johnson, welcomed the show’s handling of issues, major and mundane, that are part of Black life but largely ignored on screen. One example: a teen’s quandary over whether to keep straightening her hair or go natural.
The goal is “telling stories that are about something, telling stories that have a point, that are actually trying to say something. It was what television for a long time used to be about,” Barris said — whether it was dad’s moral sermons in “Leave It to Beaver” or the social satire of Norman Lear’s “All in the Family” and “Maude.”
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