The fourth and final season of the series about race relations at an Ivy League school is in part a musical. Ostensibly, it's about a group of African-American students putting together a musical on campus. As they do so, the characters also burst into song. It's kind of like
Glee (2009), but the songs are mostly R&B from the 1990's, as well as other various pop songs from that time period. Series creator, Justin Simien was a teenager in the 90's and probably had his coming-of-age in that decade, which explains the song choices here. That would make these choices more for Gen Xers and maybe some young Baby Boomers. However, the characters in this series are Millennials. They came of age presumably in the 2010's, if not late 2000's. Songs from Tevin Campbell, Mint Condition or SWV wouldn't necessarily be on their radar. Yes, thanks to the Internet, Millennials can explore music from any time period, but Simien eschews current music rather dismissively.
Toward the end of the season, he wants to comment on queer culture and queer sexuality using hip hop music. It's then odd that he wouldn't use music from artists, such as Lil Nas X, Frank Ocean, Big Freedia or Janelle Monae. It's been noted though that Black cinema or even Black television hit a lull after the 90's. There was a surge of film and TV that catered and centered itself around Black people. That surge waned around the time of the Millennials coming-of-age. This in a way has generated a need or desire for nostalgia of that decade.
Many Gen Xers who watch this season will get that sense of nostalgia when the various music cues from the 90's play here. Other than the nostalgia though, I'm not sure the musical numbers added much to the series. The framing device of the students in the future looking back on their senior year didn't add much either. It did allow Simien to comment on the coronavirus pandemic, but it ultimately felt more like padding than anything insightful.
Every season, Simien mocks or satirizes some TV series on broadcast television. The students will always gather to watch TV together. The TV show they watch is always a spoof of an actual show on some network. A previous season mocked ABC's Scandal (2012). This season mocks CBS' Big Brother (2000). Scandal is a series that was created by an African-American and features an African-American in the lead. Simien is always better when he's mocking or satirizing a broadcast show by African-Americans or with a predominantly African-American cast. Mocking a show like Big Brother isn't Simien at his best.
The series juggles about four or five couples. It's arguably a lot, but Simien did well by those couples in previous seasons. Not all of them get due diligence or full fleshing out that perhaps they should in this final season. The main relationship is that between Sam, played by Logan Browning, and Gabe, played by John Patrick Amedori. She's a biracial, Black woman and he's a White man. They're both aspiring film makers and there's always a push-and-pull between them about his white privilege and the opportunities and advances he gets over her. That push-and-pull gets heightened this season.
There are other great ideas in this series that get short shrift. There's an idea about an unfair law against sex workers that gets a song, but it isn't further explored with much depth. Wade F. Wilson who plays Michael Reynolds, the sex worker in question or former sex worker, introduces the idea, but the issue gets virtually abandoned. Marque Richardson plays Reggie Green, an aspiring tech developer who creates a phone app called "New Green Book." It leads to some ethical issues involving tech companies, but those issues are also given short shrift too. It's brought up and then quickly dropped.
The final season is entertaining for the most part. The framing and the pacing though aren't such that makes it all that satisfying as a conclusion to this series. It at times feels unwieldy with Simien spinning too many plates.
Rated TV-MA.
Running Time: 30 mins. / 10 eps.
Available on Netflix.
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