Johnson Family Gets Serious in Important 'Black-ish' Episode

by Julian Spivey
ABC’s “Black-ish” brought a message episode to network television on Wednesday, Feb. 24 and though it was a little too heavy-handed at times, as all message episodes (particularly from sitcoms) tend to be (which is why it’s good they are rare), it was certainly a message well worth hearing/seeing.
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The Johnson family on “Black-ish” confronts the problem of police brutality, especially the police brutality of minorities in this country. It was an episode that when I first saw the promos for it I thought might be controversial, but then it occurred to me that it’s highly unlikely many people who watch this show would find the topic controversial. “Black-ish” seems like a series that would mostly have a liberal or apolitical audience.

The episode entitled “Hope” saw the Johnson family in their living room surrounding their television as CNN was waiting to break the news on whether or not police officers would be indicted for brutality. To really nobody’s surprise, because the show was being realistic, the officers weren’t indicted and protests ensued. The Johnsons were tasked with explaining how this has been commonplace for their race to their children, who’ve grown up in a wealthy family and haven’t really been experienced with such things.

Using real life examples of police brutality that have led to the deaths of people like Freddie Gray, Sandra Bland and others really gave an impact to the episode as to how serious the topic was and how important it must be for African-American families to have these same, necessary conversations with their families. This was a good inclusion from episode scribe and show creator Kenya Barris.

It was also the absolute right decision for Barris to have her characters completely strapped to one location – living room in front of the television – for the entire episode and just let the dialogue of this real-life scenario conversation play out. While not necessarily wanting many message episodes on sitcoms, this is a technique I’d like to see more shows toy with.

What made the episode a little too heavy-handed was the fact that in all of the seriousness of the episode’s subject the show didn’t have the same quantity of laughs as it usually does. This should probably be expected from a message show – especially when the message is as serious as this one was, but you still expect the same amount of laughs for a show to really stay true to what it is and “Black-ish” is consistently one of the two or three funniest shows on network television.

All in all, police brutality is something that really hits home for African-American families, and is something all families regardless of race should care and think about and work to change. The Johnsons on Wednesday night ultimately gave us a message worth hearing. 

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