S01.E07: Puttin' on the Ritz

[ElectricBoogaloo]

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The kids are excited to learn more about their grandad after Harrison invites the crew to family day at his country club. Although Paul thinks it's a bad idea, he is eventually overruled. Meanwhile, Alicia attempts to fit in at the country club but ends up fighting with Denise about keeping it real.

Original air date: 11/12/19

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Obligatory music video:

[AnimeMania]

I think there are places where you should be expected to "act" a certain way, despite how much it might go against your personality. I don't think anybody should be allowed to talk at normal levels while watching a movie in a theater, irregardless of how they were raised. These types of things make up the "social contract".

[Arcadiasw]

4 hours ago, AnimeMania said:

I think there are places where you should be expected to "act" a certain way, despite how much it might go against your personality. I don't think anybody should be allowed to talk at normal levels while watching a movie in a theater, irregardless of how they were raised. These types of things make up the "social contract".

Agree. It's called showing you have manners which Dee Dee severely lacks on a regular basis. 

[MadyGirl1987]

5 hours ago, AnimeMania said:

I think there are places where you should be expected to "act" a certain way, despite how much it might go against your personality. I don't think anybody should be allowed to talk at normal levels while watching a movie in a theater, irregardless of how they were raised. These types of things make up the "social contract".

Totally in agreement! I’m white and if my sister was acting like DeeDee was I would have had words with her as well. Situational awareness and knowing how to act properly in different settings is part of being an adult.

[Joimiaroxeu]

OMG, Paul is always doing the most. He's exhausting. I like that Santamonica seems to have him under her thumb though.

So the grandad quit the country club? I find that hard to believe unless he immediately joined a different one. People like him do a lot of potentially lucrative networking at those places. It might've hurt him financially if he was suddenly out of that loop.

Yuck, miss me with the watermelon sno-cones. That's one artificial flavor that I think is tough to get right.

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It's called showing you have manners which Dee Dee severely lacks on a regular basis. 

The whole time she was acting like she did I was wondering how many times her food and drinks would get spat in before they were served to her. When keeping it real goes wrong...

[LadyintheLoop]

All true. I remember Alicia dressing inappropriately for the office, and Harrison pointing out that he wouldn't bring deodorant to a sweat lodge.

At least the show finally straightened out the Jackson/Johnson puzzle.

[MadyGirl1987]

20 minutes ago, Joimiaroxeu said:

The whole time she was acting like she did I was wondering how many times her food and drinks would get spat in before they were served to her. When keeping it real goes wrong...

DeeDee uses keeping it real like people who say they are ”just telling it like it is” to justify being rude/a jerk.

[LucyEth]

Good episode IMO.  Why was DeeDee there anyway?  I don't feel she should have been included.  She is not really related to Harrison.  

When watching Black-ish, I have a hard time seeing Dre treat Johan so badly after seeing a cute young Johan on Mixed-ish.  

[tennisgurl]

I was on Denise's side at the country club, there is such a thing as situational awareness, and acting differently based on what is polite and appropriate based on where you are and whats going on. Besides, DeeDee was hardly sticking it to the man or sitting down at a segregated counter to protest injustice, she was just being rude to employees. 

I liked most of the episode though, especially Grandpa Harrison getting Paul to play tennis harder by telling him about the exploited workers of their opponent, and Paul and Denise getting hot talking about dismantling the patriarchy!

[vibeology]

Dee Dee was rude many, many times while at the club, but it's not her job to be the model black person for a white audience. Her rudeness shouldn't reflect back on all black people and that was why Alicia was worried and why their issues culminated in the fight over watermelon. There was nothing rude about ordering a watermelon sno-cone if that's what the kids wanted. It's just Alicia felt pressure to represent black people and didn't want to perpetuate an awful stereotype. Alicia needs some of Dee Dee's chill and Dee Dee needs a lot of Alicia's manners.

At the end of it, the rudest behavior was the manager trying to kick Dee Dee and Bow out and Grandpa Harrison making excuses for it.

[ItCouldBeWorse]

21 hours ago, vibeology said:

At the end of it, the rudest behavior was the manager trying to kick Dee Dee and Bow out and Grandpa Harrison making excuses for it.

I would hope that if a white person who wasn't with a club member was as loud and disruptive as DeeDee had been, a club employee would have approached her to ask who she was, and if she had responded in a similar fashion to DeeDee, a manager would have come over to ask further questions. I also think that letting Johan and Santi run free in the club was incredibly inappropriate.  Were there even any other kids present?  Putting that issue aside, if DeeDee hadn't been there, I think it likely that nobody would have bothered the family at all. DeeDee got what she was looking for.

Edited November 14, 2019 by ItCouldBeWorse

[kazza]

1 hour ago, ItCouldBeWorse said:

Putting that issue aside, if DeeDee hadn't been there, I think it likely that nobody would have bothered the family at all. DeeDee got what she was looking for.

This episode felt out of place from the others this season. This show has done a great job with nuance and being subtly sweet, but this felt cliched.

DeeDee's behavior was obnoxious. You can be true to yourself and still respectful to others. 

[Aileen]

What was the grandpa doing at the end during the montage? It looked like he ripped a valet ticket and handed an attendant his keys. I was lost as it seemed like whatever was happening was a “big deal.”

[AnimeMania]

52 minutes ago, Aileen said:

What was the grandpa doing at the end during the montage? It looked like he ripped a valet ticket and handed an attendant his keys. I was lost as it seemed like whatever was happening was a “big deal.”

Ripped up the membership card to the country club and handed back his locker key.

When places exclude a large majority of the people, the customs they hold tend to lose their importance. How many people would know the rules if invited to a truly formal dinner, the kind with multiple courses and multiple forks.

[elle]

4 hours ago, ItCouldBeWorse said:

I also think that letting Johan and Santi run free in the club was incredibly inappropriate.  Were there even any other kids present? 

That really took me out of the episode.  There are safety issues involved.  Where were the other kids?  At a family day, I would think they have activities just for the kids. 

It also surprised me that Johan and Santi were dismissed in that manner when it had been emphasized by Rainbow that this was a way for them to get to know their grandfather.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

9 hours ago, ItCouldBeWorse said:

letting Johan and Santi run free in the club was incredibly inappropriate. 

ITA - they are still pretty young so they should have been supervised/accompanied by one of the FOUR adults who were with them. What makes it even worse is that this was their first time there so they were just running amok in a strange environment.

My parents had a time share back in ye olden days, and even in that very safe closed environment, my sister and I were not allowed to run off by ourselves until we were almost in high school.

16 hours ago, Joimiaroxeu said:

Yuck, miss me with the watermelon sno-cones. That's one artificial flavor that I think is tough to get right.

The other fruit flavor that I think is usually not done well is banana. But maybe that's my bias from too many Runts as a kid. Those banana ones have a very fake banana flavor.

For me, there are certain flavors that just go with certain things. Even though cherry isn't my favorite flavor, that's my default sno cone flavor.

[ItCouldBeWorse]

15 hours ago, kazza said:

DeeDee's behavior was obnoxious. You can be true to yourself and still respectful to others. 

They need to dial DeeDee back,  She's as one-note as Dre, and usually winds up apologizing at the end also.

[mtlchick]

There was a lot of bad behaviour coming from several adults.  Dee Dee was the most obvious (and she's slowly becoming the "token" that Rainbow was afraid of becoming), but Paul, Grandpa and Alicia all had some issues.

But since I'm also shallow...hey middle aged Zack Morris in your 80s tennis shorts.  Me likey. 

[iLoveNny]

On 11/14/2019 at 11:22 AM, ItCouldBeWorse said:

They need to dial DeeDee back, She's as one-note as Dre, and usually winds up apologizing at the end also.

I completely agree, I think that character could be used to great effect to show what the black community really has to put up. Because we have to remember Alicia has been as much out of the loop of black culture as the kids have been since join the commune. 

With Harrison we see the white side of the outside world much more clearly than black side with DeeDee