Let's talk a little bit about Washington Black. Washington Black, of course, is a series that debuted on Hulu earlier this week. I think it dropped like Wednesday, right, and adapted from ec Eddie you Gan's acclaimed novel, Washington Black is a richly imaginative, emotionally resented eight part mini series that blends historical fiction, adventure, romance, and speculative realism to tell a story rarely seen on screen. Charles Executive produced by Sterling K.
Brown.
The series transcends familion narratives of slavery by centering hope, connection and the trans transformative powerpart.
Now, let me talk a little bit.
About this, which I found to be fascinating because I watch a lot of stuff, and I'm not discounting anybody else's watch experience, but I'm telling you, I'll watch a lot of stories about enslaved people, and generally, whenever we tell these stories, no matter how hopefully they are, there's always subjugation, there's always pain, there's always disrespect, You're always
being felt less than. And I'm talking about when I say we talking about the audience of people of color who have to sit through these stories, to sit through the pain and the trauma to get to the hope and the inspiration on.
The other side. Well, guess what in this story with sans place trauma.
Well, no, no, in this story that happens in the early part of the nineteenth century, Yes, he is an enslaved guy who's working in the sugarcane field somewhere over in the Barbados for a hateful plantation owner.
Right.
The one thing that the movie doesn't show out outside of a couple of instances where people might get smacked or some stuff like that, there's nobody getting whipped. There's not an overabundance of trauma of you know, even though they're slaves. It reminded me ironically of a Dave Chappelle skit, Right, Dave Chappelle once set in his skit and I'm paraphrasing that black men don't ever have we don't ever have.
The ability to just be and just dream.
And exists, right, because you know, we always are dealing with with some sort of trauma. Well, this is a story that happens doing slavery. With the story of a kid who's young, he might be five or six, but he's you know, he's got a vivid imagination, and he's
really really smart. And everybody in the community sees that this kid could be something special, and they protect him, nurture him, hide him, and do whatever they need to do to make sure that this kid can be allowed to be who he is, which is radically different than anything we've never.
Watched that in terms of that kind of story, In.
Terms of that kind of story, like, this kid was a dreamer who wanted to fly, right, and when when they said wanted to fly, he was an inventor who wanted to create a machine that could fly.
Instead of somebody going, boy, just sit your butt in the corner, man, anybody got no time for that? Man. You coulda picked You coulda.
Picked it better, chopped his sugar cane and stopped playing.
He gets, he.
Meets and and also I called it the Psalm twenty three six. Goodness and mercy followed this kid all his entire life, his entire life. It was it was fascinating to watch. I went, huh, I haven't seen this one before. So he you know, he even though that he's on a plantation with a hateful slave owner. The slave owner's brothers an abolitionists who understands the sees how special he is, and the slave master says, you go in on, you can take this kid, So him and the kid start
all these adventures. Now, the thing is interesting about it, because I couldn't figure this out myself, is they only it's an eight part mini series, but Hulu only gave you four episodes to review. So this review that I wrote the first four episodes at the pictures non stop. So I'm looking at the pictures and I'm trying to download the pictures and I'm like, and.
What point of the story is this kid? Because this kid travels all around the world. Now we can't remember.
This is the early nineteenth century, so it's not like, you know, there were plays and he can just jump on.
No, this story happens.
He's in the Arctic, like, oh, of course, eight l's He's in the Arctic, He's in Morocco, he's in Nova Scotia.
This is this is truly.
An international story that I think is so good.
You literally should take the these eight.
Episodes, put together a curriculum and just taking the schools and just show it the kids.
Because by the eighth episode at the end, I was like that what's happening.
It is deeply emotional. I thought Washington Black was brilliant. Washington Black is so brilliant, shan, Ain't you ready. The first four episodes I watched it, I said, I'm gonna give it.
A B plus.
By the time I got to the end of the eighth episode, the B plus got bumped up to an A. I was like, Wow, Washington Black, which is on Hulu right now, is frigging amazing.
Executive produced by Shirt I mean Sterling K. Brown.
There are and then you can go go to the film Gordon and just read the review. That's all I'll tell you. Because I poured some stuff into this review because I was feeling this show and I just kept on writing and couldn't stop writing. I was like, some more because there's now let me also say because one of the things, and there was one thing I had to add after the end, there's a there's a backstory for Sterling K.
Brown's character that's in here.
That is deeply touching. It is deeply touching and and and I'm not gonna spoil it. Just watch the mini series when you get to that. Remember I told you how deeply touching that that whole thing is and there are so many great moments of people who are kind. Dude, just don't have to be kind, who just kind to this kid. I don't know what it was about this character, but people just wanted to help this guy out because they kept looking at him, going, you know, he's the one,
he's like neo, he can be somebody. So it is a very interesting mini series and for us, since we also run the Black Real Awards for Television, this will not last time you hear about Washington Black.
I got a feeling that when.
Nominations come for next year's Black Real Awards for Television, Washington Black is gonna.
Be in the mix.
That's a good if they don't forget Ernest Kingsley Junior.
Yes, he was absolutely amazing man, and he was the young I'm sorry that was the older version of Washington Black. The younger version is played by Eddie Karanja.
So yeah, really funny because you hear stories like in the hood where you got a football player, basketball player, and everybody protects him, make sure he makes it out.
And becomes good.
That was our generation. Yes, that's our generation. But to see this happening in the early nineteen no, this is the early eighteen hundred. Oh it's eighteen eighteen twenty something like that.
Wow, I gotta see this. Yeah.
So, so Washington Black Man is on Hulu right now. Once you finished listening to this and you turn this podcast off, just go and check it out.
I promise you grabbed the family.
Matter of fact, I grabbed mine last night and I think we got through the first two episodes, so we still got six that we need to go through. So that is Washington black So any questions on