Scene from She’s Gotta Have It

My first expectations of She’s Gotta Have It were nothing like the reality of what She’s Gotta Have It really is. I was sort of introduced to this new series by a very good friend of mine in which I have done design work for her some years back, but she told me and reassured that I would love it out of all people. Now when she recommended it to me, I was hesitant at first to view it. I thought it was your typical television series where the first two episodes may be dope, but the rest of the series just falls off and I no longer have a desire to finish it, but this one……this one was the complete opposite. Learning that it was created by Spike Lee just put the icing on the cake for me as well, I absolutely love his work!

First and foremost, if you have not watched this series and have the intentions to do so, please do not continue to read this article post AT ALL lol.

To start off, She’s Gotta Have It features a young lady by the name of Tracy Camilla Johns who stars as Nola Darling in the hit series. I automatically fell in love with her character at first sight. She is someone I can actually relate to because she is shown as being a natural haired, African American female fine artist, an oil and acrylic painter while living in a beautiful, lavish Brownstone in Brooklyn, New York. Well, I can’t relate to the Brownstone part but can’t a girl dream ya know? Her profession caught my attention, but it was her looks that made her more relate to me personally. She’s dark skin for one and we all know us dark skin sisters are known for not getting leading roles, a majority of the time the women shown in films are either mid-tone brown skin or completely light skin. Her hair is completely natural and I’m not talking that stereotyped “good hair”, hers is a mixture of 4A through 4C, that real kinky and thick hair. The second thing I noticed about her hair which I don’t think a lot of people did from what I have read so far from previous articles is that she doesn’t have it dyed with those blonde or light brown tips like we see a lot of naturalists in films typically. She is rocking her own hair in its own hair color…. unapologetically. She is not super thick with a huge butt or breasts. She is portrayed as a normal and typical dark skin, cultured black woman.

But there is a slight flaw with Miss Nola Darlings ….. she has a collection of men …. three men in particular.

Episode #1: #DaJumpOff

To start off the series of course she gives us a background of herself and a background of the series. From what I took from her introduction, Nola is on a search for complete freedom. Most creatives are. No boundaries. No stereotyping. No limits. Just ultimate freedom over her life and everything that comes with it. One way she has displayed this desire to be free is through her sexuality. Now we all know in our typical society women are basically told we cannot have multiple men, or even date multiple people at one time. That it is seen as “unlady” like and frowned upon. Well, Miss Darlings just did away with that entire rule and stereotype throughout this series. She has three different men that she has set up sort of a sex and engagement schedule with including Jamie Streeter, Mars Blackmon, and Greer Childs.

Jamie Streeter is your typical expensive, wall street type of black man. Basically he is from the hood, but highly educated to the point where he got out of the hood. He’s that dark skin, even toned kind of brother. You know, the ones who have all of their shit together to a tee. The type that basically had a straight plan of where he wanted to go in life and stuck to it no matter what. He works as an investment banker in a corporate bank in the inner city of New York, always wearing the three piece suits and carrying a briefcase. Now what I automatically got from the first scene with Jamie, is that he is in fact married and I’m assuming has children. First indication of this was the wedding ring on his left hand, and during that first sex scene where Nola made it clear that she’s never been to his house and they have never made love in his bed at all, just hers, sad? Yeah, I know. Another indication that this man did not belong to Nola is that she mentioned to her friends that he “takes care of her” meaning he pays for a lot of things for her. He seems to care for Nola…..but he’s just lost in the sauce overall.

Mars Blackmon is probably the coolest one out of the three to me. He seems younger, more hip with the hip hop scene. He rides a bicycle from what I’ve seen so I’m not sure where his place of employment is exactly. He does however live with his sister in which they are partly Puerto Rican and African American. One thing I noticed about this particular man is that he made Nola laugh non-stop by just being himself. She seemed to be more open and relaxed with him. Just like Jamie, Mars looked out for Nola as well but not so much as financially compared to Jamie.

Now Greer Childs is a true character himself. This man is the most conceited out of the three. He seems to focus only on himself mainly but has a sweet spot for Nola. He has a very nice residence of his own, which I noticed was extremely clean. Like a show room clean. Turns out he is a professional photographer which is cool with Nola being a creative as well, whom is mixed in race with African American and Caucasian. He has just as much prestige as Jamie but with a slight artsy twist to it. I also noticed he’s very charming which leads me to believe he has a plethora of women as his disposal, but seems to be attached to Nola due to her non-attachment to him. Complicated right?

What’s so crazy about this arrangement of men is that they all know that Nola is seeing other men but they don’t know who is who. They all seem to be cool with it … in a way …except for Jamie. He seems to have caught feelings for Nola more than any of the other two men even though he is still in fact a married man having an affair.

Clorinda Bradford is Nola Darling’s best friend. Remember I told you Nola was living in a dope Brownstone alone right? Well, Nola was not alone in that particular Brownstone the entire time. She ended up there by herself after Clorinda moved out due to Nola having so many different men in and out of their place. Imagine you waking up out of your sleep in the middle of the night to use the bathroom just to walk in on about 5 different men in one week. Yeah that would drive you crazy right in a typical world. Well, that’s exactly what happened with Clorinda. Crazy thing is Mars is Clorinda’s ex-boyfriend. Whew. Crazy story line.

Shemekka Brown is a childhood friend of Nola’s that I feel didn’t get enough spotlight as she deserved. Her topic in the series was HIGHLY important as well. There were so many other great viewpoints from this series other than the sexual stereotypes of women and men including the pressures of just being a woman and how we look. Shemekka worked at one of the local area night clubs called Hot and Trot to make ends meet as she was a single mother of her daughter. I’m not sure if she was single at the time or not, but she made it clear that she did not want her baby’s father’s new girlfriend around her daughter at all. She also referenced her baby’s father’s girlfriend’s bigger behind as well. The biggest flaw with this particular friend though, is the fact that she was insecure about her body image. At the club she was working as a waitress at, there were dancers that worked here as well for entertainment. Not like strippers but more of just dancers to see and enjoy from afar with limited amounts of clothing on. Shemekka basically got caught up in the whole body cosmetic industry after her boss, which was the owner of the club, told her that she didn’t have enough booty to become a full time dancer at the club. From watching, this was the main thing that sort of hurt her self esteem and was the ammunition that ended up beginning her butt injection journey out of a cheap motel room from an unlicensed physician. Long story short, she had a tragic accident where her new booty popped…..literally.

I’m not going to give out too much of the tea on this hit series than I already have, but I would highly recommend any artists to check it out for yourself. I’m hoping that the great Spike Lee creates a Season 2 for 2018 for us all to enjoy. Check out my second article with Blasting News on this series as well below!

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SERIES UPDATE [01/18]!

Photography Provided By India Wire

‘She’s Gotta Have It’ is coming back for Season 2 in 2018! Read more information on when the new season will be aired!
Read More

Credits:
Blasting News: Spike Lee’s ‘She’s Gotta Have It’
IMDb – She’s Gotta Have It
Giphy
India Wire

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