Yara Shahidi in ‘Grownish’ takes the sitcoms we loved in the ’90s to a new level
PERSPECTIVE | The ‘Blackish’ spinoff is important for today’s teenagers
Yara Shahidi’s inauguration into teen royalty was cemented on Wednesday.
Black Twitter was abuzz in the lead-up to the show, centered on “Blackish’s” popular girl-next-door Zoey Johnson’s (Shahidi) first year of college. She’s as witty and smart as her advertising executive father, Andre Johnson (Anthony Anderson), and her mother, Rainbow Johnson (Tracee Ellis Ross), a doctor and mom to five whose character addresses the realities of working mothers.
Many were quick to draw comparisons to the NBC cult series “A Different World” from 30 years ago. But the anticipated airing of “Grownish” revealed a more sophisticated, witty view of college.
In a fashion similar to our love for the effortlessly cool fashion icon Denise Huxtable (Lisa Bonet), the Hillman College freshman that “A Different World” was based on, “Grownish” takes our favorite character from “Blackish” and drops her into college.
But unlike “A Different World,” which is the only long-running sitcom to portray the historically black college and university experience and a first look at college life for many of us, we watched with loving caution and wisdom. We saw our beloved Zoey uncharacteristically leave her new friend and drunk roommate Ana Torres (Francia Raisa) alone at a party during orientation. We see her take Adderall more than once to finish a paper on Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. We watch her go after her sophomore crush, Aaron Jackson (Trevor Jackson), who texts, “U up?” after she “coincidentally” bumps into him. Then she pops another Adderall, we are left to presume, to go see him.
The reality is, that though nostalgic in nature, the late 20 and 30-something “Blackish” fans who tuned in to watch Zoey attend college are looking at our cheerful star with wisdom and life experience, instead of the longing and hope we looked to “A Different World” for.
The mother in me wants to scold Zoey for being a terrible friend and pill-popping. It’s a different experience watching young adult shows as a full blown adult, especially when the character has grown up before our eyes on a family-friendly sitcom.
Today’s teens will have a shero to look up to the way I looked to Moesha and her friends for life lessons about navigating school, success, life and love. Better yet, “Grownish” is already adapting real-world scenarios that the most popular shows of the ’90s only briefly addressed, like bisexuality, race and culture.
Shows like “Sister, Sister” and “Moesha” would touch on race and class occasionally, but it looks like it will be a major theme on “Grownish.”
The “Blackish” team has nailed the realities of black upper-middle families in 2018, and I expect the same accuracy in portraying a realistic college experience for today’s black teenagers in “Grownish.” They’re already off to a great start.
