Dear White People directed by Justin Simien, was a 2014 indie hit film that went wild, from word of mouth at Sundance Film Festival. Critics applauded it and it garnered a massive fan base – so why wouldn’t we want to see it back as a hit Netflix series? Well, it’s here and it could be the new generation’s wonderfully culturally divisive version of Freaks and Geeks (cancelled way too soon)!
For those of you who have not seen the original film, Dear White People follows the lives and stories of a group of black students at the fictional elite Winchester University, after they witness a ‘Black Face Party’ held by the white students on campus. The students we get the pleasure of tagging along with are Samantha White (Logan Browning, who delivers a strong and mesmerising performance), Reggie Green played by Marque Richardson and Troy Fairbanks played by Brandon P Bell, both returning from the original film. Then there’s the wonderfully lovable Lionel (DeRon Horton), Coco Conners (Antoinette Robertson) and Gabe, Sam’s white boyfriend (John Patrick Amedori).
A few months back in February of 2017, a huge backlash was raised towards Netflix when they released the teaser trailer for the new series, without knowing exactly what the series had in place to show its viewers, no one was supposed to know and I admit, it wasn’t the best of teasers, not because of what it preached but because it had absolutely no context to the amazing show it would become. Not long after the outrage however, Justin Simien made it loud and clear when responding on his facebook:
“When the first trailer for the film dropped, I’ll admit the deluge of claims that I was a reverse racist and a ‘piece of [expletive] monkey that should shut up and go back to Africa’ really hurt. But now, I feel strangely encouraged. To see the sheer threat that people feel over a date announcement video featuring a woman of color (politely) asking not to be mocked makes it so clear why I made this show.”
The original announcement trailer here:
The all new, much improved trailer for the show is here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYKgHvPVACE
I am just going to throw it out there and say right out of the field, Dear White People has the courage to show what is still happening in a lot of schools throughout the world and in 2017, this shit should not stand. I applaud the cast and crew for showing us on such a brave format as Netflix. It deals with a lot of racial politics with such light and sometimes dark humour it would be easy to smile, laugh and move on, but then you don’t, because it feels real… you know it’s real! You are stopped in your tracks with some frightening scenes such as a black student being held at gunpoint by a white campus police officer for no reason other than the fact he is an African American, asking him for his I.D. when clearly, there are over 50 other students standing around that need to be asked the same thing. While it may feel on the nose for some, it shouldn’t. It shares not only the struggles of what these students must go through daily, but also looks in cleverly from the perspective of other white students such as Amedori’s character of Gabe.
The emotionally draining scenes are welded together beautifully by some fantastically fast and witty comments. In fact, if it wasn’t for some perfectly placed quips, this show would stand just as tall for a dark and dramatic piece of cinema. One of my favourite lines of the series is when Coco is arguing with some ladies and elegantly says to one of them “You’re a fucking slut, you screw so many freshman, you have a 4-Star rating on Yelp!” it comes so fast, it took me off guard and that is how humour should feel: not forced upon.
That is not to say Dear White People is all class, it loses itself far too many times in other satire that derives from shittier B-Grade straight-to-DVD sequel comedies. It shows a good amount of sex (almost every single episode) and often this feels out of place – we know what it looks like, why do we need to see this again and again? Brandon Bell’s character of Troy feels overly obsessed with taking off his shirt at any given moment (this guy has abs on his abs) which does not help his character. One moment you fall in love with him and the next, the writing completely contradicts everything you thought he stood for just to make everyone else on screen happy. I know that this is his character, but it feels wasted. Thankfully, later episodes make up for it and Troy comes out as one of my favourites along with Lionel. Coco is another downer for me, her episode revolves around her completely obnoxious and self-centred ego.
Also, are Jocks still really a thing? Are there really traditions at campus where the women dress to impress so they can line up in front of a frat and wait for sleazy guys to come up and pick them for sex at random? If this is a thing, I can’t bring myself to google such degrading crap!
Despite these minor cripes, Dear White People, as with its amazing cast of characters, stands beautifully tall and well enough apart from the rest of Netflix’s catalogue. If you give it a few episodes and let it, Dear White People will be your latest binge-worthy addiction.
Review Score: FOUR AND A HALF STARS (OUT OF FIVE)
Dear White People launches on Netflix accounts around the world from 28th April 2017.
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