No Sophomore Slump - grown-ish Season 2

In the very first minute of the second season of grown-ish, Freeform’s often quite wonderful spin-off/companion series to black-ish, lead Zoey Johnson (Yara Shahdi) talks quite openly about the idea of sequels being better than the original. In traditional Johnson fashion, she relates examples like Childish Gambino’s second album and Meghan Markle’s second marriage. She has prepared herself for a sophomore which is going to be far better than her freshman year, with a better living situation and a solid boyfriend. But because this series comes from the mind of Kenya Barris, it takes all of two minutes for things to begin falling apart.

Grown-ish had the double obstacle last season of becoming not just a spin-off from a brilliant comedy series, but being shown on a spinoff network. But over the past couple of years, freeform has managed to delight and even inspire with it’s own spin on original programming. As I’m sure Zoey would tell us, there’s an advantage to being on basic cable. And in a way, grown-ish has managed to be a part of this change. I’m not a hundred percent sure that ABC would’ve allowed Zoey to get addicted to uppers, let alone let one of its central character be a drug dealer.

And as always, the second season begins with that same kind of chaos. Everybody says that they had a hellacious summer, and now they’ve come back to an off-campus housing that’s barely acceptable, and a new set of problems. For Zoey, her main issue is trying to build a relationship with Luca (Luca Hall), who she managed to have a fine relationship with while he was in Paris, but the moment they’re on the same continent, things immediately start going badly. Of course, a lot of this is in Zoey’s head, as she’s more concerned with how things look on social media then trying to build an actual relationship. But in a way that I’m not sure even black-ish could embrace, social media is what manages to help them rebuild.

Everyone else is having their own level of difficulties. Aaron (Trevor Jackson), the student activist has now been promoted to RA, but his ideas of team building really leave something to be desired. (His idea of a movie involving black empowerment is 12 Years A Slave.) Nomi is still trying to deal with how to be bisexual, which kind of backfired last season. Jazz and Sky are now on an all-carb diet which let to real problems in the first episode. Frankly, the only person who seems to be doing well at all is Charlie, who somehow managed to get promoted to dean of students at the end of last season. (Dre would probably not be shocked that Charlie continues to fail upward.)

grown-ish still isn’t quite as hysterical or game-changing as its parent show is. But in a funny way, that’s actually an argument for it. black-ish had its own obstacles to get through in order to be come (as Aaron would put it, despite the constant objections) ‘a pillar of black excellence’ as well as a brilliant comedy. This series, by contrast, with less pressure from the censors, has been able to stake out its own turf, and has become as quietly entertaining and subversive. And since it has been guaranteed a Season 3, it may in its own way become as much a powerhouse as black-ish without the pressure of the world on it.

My score: 4 stars.