how to lose a show on hbo max.
a few thoughts on black tv shows ending prematurely + reads & vibes for your weekend.
Hey friend! Happy *checks date* Saturday! We are delayed but not denied. It’s always the short work weeks that end up being the craziest. But I had to get a few things off my chest! Let’s jump right in!
thoughts at large.
I’m just going to jump right in and say that I am disgusted that HBO Max decided to cancel Rap Sh!t - especially since the second season ended with a few cliffhangers. Now I’ll never get to see Duke enter her villain era. I’ll never know what happened with Maurice, I’ll never see if Shawna goes to jail or if her and Mia will actually make it big in their rap careers. That is a TRAGEDY!
When you’re a viewer, you spend time with characters. You get to know them - if you’re Black you probably yell at the screen at them. For lack of a better word, you become invested, and when networks pull the plug - it’s like your friend moved away and blocked you indefinitely. You’ll literally never know what happens to them. The problem, for me - is that these abrupt endings with zero closure seem to overindex on shows that are driven by Black characters. Am I wrong? Think about it.
Pitch, High Fidelity, Run The World, Girlfriends, Southside, A Black Lady Sketch Show… I mean I could go on. These shows were highly popular, well supported and still cancelled by their networks. The common denominator is Black people.
Now don’t get me wrong. I understand the current state of media, and that shows in general don’t get long lifelines to be a smash success. Budgets are tight and there are way too many options for streaming now. Studios are looking at the bottom line. But two things can be true at once.
Do you remember back in 2020 when organizations of all kinds felt societal pressure to make diversity statements? You may remember the black boxes on Instagram as a show of solidarity for Black lives. Yes, very performative. Well the same thing happened in Hollywood. I think a lot of that pressure caused networks to greenlight shows to follow the trend, and that introduced a wave of shows in 2021 led, specifically, by Black women. But once DEI wasn’t cool anymore - they cancelled them.
I was wondering if there was any data to support my hypothesis and per usual, a Black woman on Twitter had my back. Check this out:
Men lie. Women lie. Data does not.
So with this knowledge I’m left with one question: Where do we go from here?
We know that the media landscape is changing. People are getting laid off left and right and Hollywood is back to telling the same stories over and over again. What’s the solution? If I could run this I would say that we need a real, viable network. I’d campaign for someone like Issa Rae to lead content, and Robert Smith or Byron Allen to help fund it.
I just worry about the danger of not having multi-faceted representations of Black people in mainstream media. What does that do for the next generation coming up? Lead them to find themselves through Baddies TV or Love & Hip Hop? It’s already doing us a disservice. There is so much value in our stories - it’s a part of our tradition and if we don’t have space to tell them, we’re literally losing recipes.
What do you think? I’d love to hear your thoughts.
reads + vibes.
A Death at Walmart - this is a story about a woman who died during her shift at a Walmart. Her death wasn’t reported to OSHA. It’s a deep story about our work culture in this country, and the negative effects it’s having on the most vulnerable people in our society.
It's Ugly: Tiffany Cross Spills The Tea About Her MSNBC Firing - Through her new podcast “Native Land” Tiffany Cross finally explained why she was fired from MSNBC.
Prime Video Cuts Funding in Africa, Middle East in Favor of Focusing on European Originals - More data to support this week’s thoughts at large.
No one sounds like Tems - a beautiful profile on Tems, who has made some of my favorites over the last year and a half.
Michael B. Jordan Set to Star in His Fourth Ryan Coogler Movie - doesn’t matter what it is I’ll be present for it. The people say it may be about vampires, FYI.
Malia Ann (Obama)’s debut short film is screening at Sundance this year. It’s called “The Heart” and while I haven’t seen a trailer, her Sundance artist profile gives a brief look at the film. Check it out:
Netflix has released the cast of the upcoming season of Love Is Blind and - I’m going to be honest, I think they should probably cancel the show at this point. I firmly belive that it was created for Lauren & Cameron to meet. It should have ended after the first season. That said… Strong Black Lead shared a the melanated castmates they are below - no telling how much we’ll actually see them when the season begins on February 15th.
While we’re on the Netflix train - they also dropped trailers for The Vince Staples Show, starring Vince Staples, and season 2 of Rhythm & Flow, with new judges Ludacris, Latto & DJ Khaled. That’s linked here, and the Vince Staples trailer is below. I’m looking forward to it - it looks like it could give us “Atlanta” vibes. We’ll see.
That’s all for this week, friend. I’ll see you on Friday. I’m heading out to go see The Book of Clarence and American Fiction. I’ll drop my reviews in my Instagram story so make sure you’re following me.
Enjoy your weekend!
It’s like shows are damned if they do, damned if they don’t these days. With 8 episode seasons, there’s only so much real character and plot development you can in do a season. To really tell an authentic story. I loved that they weren’t just an overnight success, for the sake of rushing the story. But shit, when you take your time with it. Seems like you run an even higher risk of getting the chopping block, in today’s culture. I feel like show creators need to somehow negotiate at least a 2 hour finale movie, like Being Mary Jane had, to wrap things up. Once you hit certain numbers of episodes, ratings or something. Like how 100 episodes used to mean syndication, I believe. Tired of getting invested in good stories, with no closure.
We knew the post George Floyd DEI was fake. But they aren’t even hiding it the switch up. Guess it’s times up for the equity. 🙄