Tonight’s outing of The Game was a sharp drop from last week’s highly improved episode and to frankly honest: I’m a little pissed about it.
Quick recap of events: Jason fell in love with Chardonnay and her ghetto ways, while Derwin and Melanie joined a new church that put the couple at odds on what really matters when serving the Lord. In short, both storylines were about experiencing culture clashes… within your own culture.
There are so many ways the writers of The Game could have went with that thorny subject topic, a topic that is not really as dumb as the show made it look tonight. Instead, The Game ramped up the caricatures of the most annoying (and overdone) black stereotypes, nullifying and smothering what could have been a great commentary on identity crisis within the black community. I’m not saying that The Game should be considered a textbook on black culture a whole. What I am saying is that there was an opportunity the writers could have taken with this issue, but they fumbled completely and lost me along the way.
One aspect of this disappointment comes from Jason Pitts, who is treating his newfound discovery of being black as if he just discovered he was a Jedi Knight. We got it in the third episode, Jason. You’re ‘black.’ We are happy for you. Now can you move on from that ‘apparent fac,’ because we sure as hell have already. In terms of character arc, I knew that Jason was going to fall for Chardonnay. It was inevitable. However, a girl/woman getting loud and talking through a movie does not an attractive woman make. Personally, I would have left her ass there, but that’s me and I digress.
While Jason tried out his ‘blackness,’ Derwin and Melanie joined a new church complete with a VIP section at the front and a coach section in the back. It can’t get any more outrageous than that, folks. On the subject of the characters, I highly backed Derwin’s attitude towards the circus Melanie had set up for them. Case in point, I’m still marveling on why Mel didn’t run for the door when she saw that the church was segregated by financial status! Where do they do that at? Then again, I don’t even want to know.
The sad part about the episode was that I saw what the writers of The Game were aiming for, but didn’t care too much on the execution. The episode lacked a lot of the wonder from the earlier years, which we got a nice glimpse of with last week’s outing, which makes it even more disappointing. Hopefully, next week’s episode will be a polar opposite than this one, becasue if Jason Pitts scream or utter the words, “I’m black!,” one more time, I’m done.
Your thoughts?
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I thought the episode (82, 5-5: Grand Opening, Grand Closing) used all the classic sitcom devices. It was over-the-top, formulaic and overall funny. Of course Jason's storyline about "finding his blackness" is repetitive and a little ridiculous, but I believe it will all make sense by season's end.
I honestly do like where the Jason and Chardonnay characters are going, and this episode was just another comedic lesson of how Jason is learning how to be with a woman (and she just happens to be black) who doesn't take any of his nonsense.
The whole storyline about Melanie, Derwin, and their new church was just another funny way to demonstrate how much "The Game" has changed them. In my eyes, Derwin and Melanie are playing roles that they think they should be playing given their status in the football industry and hierarchy; and not the roles of their true nature which "we" as the viewing audience know them to be having seen the first and second season episodes multiple times.
Overall, I enjoyed this episode. I'm laughing more this season, which is a very good thing considering this show switched to a standard four-camera sitcom to a single-camera dramedy (but still with canned laughter) over the course of five years.