Black-ish Season 1 Episode 8 Review: “Oedipal Triangle”

Building conflict within families can be difficult for comedies (especially young ones like Black-ish); the natural tendency to make light of everything for laughs can turn examinations of family tropes or misunderstandings into bitter affairs, ultimately undermining the always-cathartic conclusions with the pure amount of vitriol that precedes it. One might say “Oedipal Triangle” avoids this by refusing to resolve its central conflict – the friction between Ruby, Dre’s mother, and Rainbow – but it almost makes the rest of the episode even more bitter, turning the supposed lesson of the episode from “husband helps bridge the gap between mother and wife through compromise” into “people who don’t get along will never get along” – which may be a little more realistic, but is nonetheless an unsatisfying conclusion to a story that appeared to be building towards some kind of meaningful conclusion.

There’s not really much else to this episode besides Ruby and Bow’s burning resentment for each other, a conflict that mostly boils down to “overeager, but fed-up wife” argues with “Cranky, Set In Her Ways Grandma” over a myriad of topics through the episode. Honestly, it paints Dre in a pretty terrible light: not only is the man willingly ignorant to his mother’s obvious behavior, but he encourages their competition by putting the two women together at their “shared” special spot, and complains to them about how hard he’s trying to resolve their conflict, and how little he’s getting out of it. It’s a nice little touch that the two bond over Dre’s shortcomings – but it’s a short-lasing bond, one that’s forgotten in favor of a dramatic crescendo of arguments catalyzed by Diana (who doesn’t internalize things, something she thinks other people don’t believe).

And in the end, it ends up being all about Dre again, a disappointing turn for a story that seemed willing to put Bow in the driver’s seat for once. He negotiates the peace by putting his mother in his place, which of course does nothing to actually address the dissonance between the two women Dre inserts himself between. Yes, there’s interesting tension to be found in matriarchs fighting over territory, but the clunky, trope-laden way “Oedipal Triangle” plays out these ideas, render most of the episode pointless, a series of  shots contrasting Bow’s Big Eye Face and Jenifer Lewis playing a sassy African-American grandma with an afro (a wholly disappointing characterization, even if Jenifer Lewis has been great in that role since her days as Aunt Helen on Fresh Prince of Bel-Air).

And the B-story is an absolute disaster: while I love Andre Jr.’s misadventures more than anything else Blackish offers on a weekly basis (ok, Diana is really terrific), his sister walking him into another situation where he’s characterized as the dumb nerd is disappointing. It’s an easy comedic route to take, because clueless people do stupid things, and there’s always going to be a laugh in that. Always – but making Dre Jr. a more three-dimensional character requires scripts move beyond this, which they really haven’t been willing to do yet. He’s not even really interested in the girl at school, except that “she’s hot” – and without developing momentum to drive Andre Jr. toward the hot girl at school except “Zoey’s bored”, the whole conceit of the jokes in their story fall apart. It’s not very entertaining, even though Scribner’s always good for a few big laughs with his deadpan deliveries of Andre’s lines, underlining just how innocent and naive he is.

There isn’t much to “Oedipal Triangle” that isn’t disappointing or predictable; it’s nice that the show has moved to make Bow a breathing character on her own, rather than just Dre’s Mixed Race wife (aka the bridge between Andre and the “white world”), but those small moments characterizing her can’t outweigh the loud antics between her and Ruby, which suffocate every scene (plus where the hell is Pops? Is he dead? Nobody even mentions that he’s hiding away from his ex-wife, an explanation for Fishburne’s absence that this script gave them on a platter) and ultimately, make this week’s episode of Black-ish the worst since the pilot.

Photo via ABC