Each week, William Lee and Nina Metz recap and discuss the second season of “The Chi,” which airs at 9 p.m. Sundays on Showtime.
School picture day saw Kevin taking the blame for that cafeteria food fight in an effort to keep Jake out of trouble, Papa channeling the Notorious B.I.G. and Maisha literally sparkling with confetti (yay!). Jada has to deal with two unexpected (and unwelcome) visitors — Ronnie at the hospital and her ex Darnell at her apartment. And Brandon and Emmett decide to team up on the business side (now that’s an interesting combo of personalities) prompting the question: If Emmett is selling bundles out of the back of the taco truck, wouldn’t the hair smell like whatever they’re cooking?
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Here’s what else happened on Episode 4: “Showdown.”
1. We learn who’s behind Miss Ethel’s attack
Will Lee: This week’s episode was a great one for character development on supporting players like Reg, who tried to balance the demands of gang leadership with single parenthood. We learn that he was indeed behind the violent attack on Miss Ethel, having hired toughs from outside the neighborhood so it couldn’t tie back to his crew. Of course it backfired in the form of Det. Toussaint, who let Reg know she was watching him.
Nina Metz: When she casually grabbed his coffee mug and poured its contents out on the lawn, I loved his stony reaction which was basically: “Was that really necessary? Let a guy have his morning coffee, at least.”
WL: We then got a great scene of him trying to keep his little brother Jake — who’s growing angrier at school — in check. Reg may be a negative influence but his performance, played by Barton Fitzpatrick, is endearing. Or did the attack on Ethel completely dry up your sympathy, Nina?
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Nina Metz: Not yet! Reg has done terrible, brutal things — but Fitzpatrick’s performance is a big part of why I still really care about this character. He’s a really interesting contradiction of terrible and tender/knuckleheaded and smart.
Reg is also a great example of: This person doesn’t seem innately cruel or selfish — but because of his life circumstances (you sense he was he left to raise himself) he found a sense of belonging and a livelihood through the 63rd Street Mob, and survival in that gang does necessitate a measure of cruelty and selfishness. He clearly loves his little brother but doesn’t have the emotional tools (or perhaps any previous example) that would help him be more of a parent than mere guardian to Jake.
So: Reg hired those men at the behest of Douda, huh? That man is cold as ice compared to Reg, who at least had the decency to be horrified when he belatedly realized the victim was Miss Ethel.
2. Jerrika is cornered at the open house
NM: Jerrika has a storyline independent of Brandon, woohoo! (And let’s just note: Actress Tiffany Boone has a new haircut this year and it looks sharp.) For some reason she gets reamed by the alderman because the condos she’s trying to sell have no units set aside for affordable housing. But the real estate agent, i.e. Jerrika, isn’t the one who’s making this decision — the developer is. And that’s a decision made long before the open house. This just felt too clumsy to make sense. Also: In Chicago many developers simply pay the penalty that allows them to not offer any affordable units (which is such a cynical loophole, in my opinion).
Even so, I’m glad to see the show address the reality of South Siders getting priced out of neighborhoods they’ve lived in for decades. The Chicago writer and sociologist Eve Ewing has talked about on this topic on Twitter over the years, and this is her take: “I think we often have really unproductive conversations about gentrification because we don’t have language/a vision for what it would look like to have quality services in a neighborhood *without displacing people*.” Will, what are your thoughts?
WL: This is an interesting topic for a TV series and one that raises a lot of issues without having to solve any. Yes, gentrification is an extremely deep, nuanced conversation, but the show does a good job of trying to show corruption on various levels — not just corruption of spirit and morality, but systematic corruption like last season’s corrupt detective, or this season’s real estate firm hiring toughs to intimidate elderly homeowners.
In a coincidence of timing, on Friday Jay-Z performed a freestyle at New York’s Webster Hall with the line “Gentrify your own hood before these people do it,” prompting a number of conversations and debates on social media that speak directly to this storyline.
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3. Ronnie begins to make amends — and Tracy’s his first stop
WL: A particular bright spot in this week’s episode was Ronnie’s return to the community and his confrontation with Tracy after their dust-up in the aftermath of their son’s murder. Ronnie challenges her cold-hearted comments from last season, but sees that her life and apartment have fallen apart. Kudos to Tai Davis, whose performance as a grieving mother (and grandmother) really resonated with me. Her line about being mad at smiling mothers touched me. What did you think?
NM: Ronnie is such a deeply moral person, even as he does all kinds of immoral things, and that’s part of what makes him so interesting. But I also think he’s been terrible about recognizing the way his destructive actions (be they directed inward or outward) affect people around him. At the hospital, when Ronnie tells Jada he doesn’t want her to feel uncomfortable around him, I love that she straight up calls him out: “How exactly should I feel around you, Ronnie? How should anyone who knows what you did feel around you?” The women in the neighborhood aren’t going to let him forget what he did.
Until next week: Let’s all consider investing in some white strips for our teeth, lest Papa get a look at them and sadly observe: “Man to man? They could be whiter.”
Twitter @MidnoirCowboy
Twitter @Nina_Metz
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