I think Aziz Ansari is hilarious, and I enjoyed season 1 of Master of None. So I was looking forward to season 2, and knew I would enjoy it just as much. But I was wrong! I enjoyed season 2 even more than season 1!
It was obvious this would be a completely different experience when it became clear the first episode was never going to transition from black and white with mostly Italian and subtitles to color and mostly English. And I loved it!! It set the tone for a unique experience worthy of me dedicating my Friday night, Saturday morning, and Sunday afternoon to watching! With episodes exploring things such as religion and using dating apps with the same level of great comedy from season 1, season 2 of Master of None still manages to pull the audience into the blooming forbidden romance between Dev and Francesca (Alessandra Mastronardi). It plays out masterfully, not being too quick or easy; but rather just as complicated, passionate, and frustrating as in real life.
Staying in the romance realm, in addition to season 2 showing love to Black women by centering full storylines around them (more on that later), it created storylines that include them as love interests. Interestingly enough, in the "First Date" episode, Dev notes how both Black women and Asian men tend to fare the worst on dating apps (which is something I've heard before), and at the same time throughout the season pairs Black women with Asian men romantically. In the first episode his first love interest was a British Black woman. On the "First Date" episode, where he goes on a number of dates with women from the dating app, he goes on a date with his friend Diana (Condola Rashad). In a later episode, Brian (Kelvin Yu) and his dad return to the series, as his dad struggles to decide between two women he is dating. He specifically describes one as Korean and the other as Ellen with a dog named Coco. I was surprised when Ellen was a Black woman, because I somehow just assumed she would be White. And though these women had smaller roles, the season did not stray away from delving into the Black woman's experience.
One of my favorite episodes was written by Ansari and Lena Waithe (who plays Dev's longtime friend in both seasons, Denise), Thanksgiving. As a huge fan of Bey, I must mention this episode is directed by Melina Matsoukas, who has directed several videos for Bey, Lady Gaga, Rihanna, and even Whitney Houston! Last year, she directed 4 episodes of another one of my fav shows, Insecure! And with this episode of Master of None she finds herself directing THE Angela Bassett, who plays Denise's mom, and Kim Whitley who plays Denise's aunt. Dev is invited to join Denise's family for Thanksgiving as a child, and it becomes a tradition for him to have Thanksgiving dinner with them. The episode brings us into Denise's family home around Thanksgiving over the span of decades, including 1995, 1999, 2006, and each year from 2015-2017 (not a typo...it's a few months into the future from now). We see the hair and fashion trends over time, specifically for Black women (with Bassett starting off the episode with a hairstyle that screamed Claire Huxtable to me), but overall it is subtle. Family dinner consists of Dev, Denise, her mother, her Aunt Joyce, her grandmother, and her girlfriends at more recent Thanksgivings. The episode explores Denise opening up about her sexuality and her family's, as a Black family, response to that over the years. But beyond even that, the episode touches on both general and time specific Black experiences, especially experiences of Black women. For example, Denise's mom tells Dev and Denise at a young age that as minorities they will have to work twice as hard to get half as far, and Denise, as a Black woman would have to work three times as hard. At Thanksgiving in 1995, they talk about OJ, Michael Jackson, and Clarence Thomas. At Thanksgiving in 2015, Denise's girlfriend share's her experience as a Black woman who lived overseas in China, and how many people thought she was Beyonce despite looking nothing like her. At Thanksgiving in 2016, they all discuss Sandra Bland and the "Indian Grandfather" in Alabama (Sureshbhai Patel, a 58-year-old Indian man who was left paralyzed after police injured his neck, resulting from him simply walking around his son's neighborhood, who he came to stay with to help care for his grandchild).
Another one of my favorite episodes from the season is "New York, I Love You." We barely see the main cast in this episode, and instead follow the lives of other New Yorkers in three different storylines that eventually all collide with the original cast at the end of the episode (well maybe not collide, but rather all enter the scene together at the conclusion of the episode). The first group we follow is a group of mostly Latino men working as doormen. Then we find ourselves in a store where a Black woman, Lauren (Ito Aghayere), is the cashier. When we discover Lauren is deaf, at the same time as the customer, our screens go silent! But it's not our speakers! Ansari, Alan Yang (co-creator and co-writer along with Aziz Ansari), and Cord Jefferson (writer of the episode's story, Ansari and Yang wrote the teleplay, who is known for his writing on Survivor's Remorse and The Nightly Show with Larry Whitmore, as well as being a correspondent on HBO's Vice's "Black and Blue & Our Bionic Future" episode) have given us the audio experience of Lauren, silence. In addition, we only get subtitles for things said in sign language!! And this kept up for all of Lauren's storyline, which was a significant 1/3 or so of the episode and covered various scenes and interactions. Then sound returns as a few White girls enter a cab. But there's yet another twist. Just when I think we are going to finish off the episode following these girls through their experience of New York, the Rwandan cab driver begins speaking on his phone in another language. And before you know it, you realize the episode is actually going to be following him (and his Rwandan friends/roommates) as they go for a fun night out. Yep, the White girls were just the the transition tool from one Black experience to another, a reminder of sorts that Ansari, Yang, and Jefferson made the intentional decision to create and share stories that do not center around White people. And beyond that, with both Ansari and Yang being Asian, it also shares the sentiment that stories centered on minorities 1) can be focused on universal experiences, and 2) therefore can be explored by writers who may not look like them. Now that should be done within reason, and certainly stay away from stereotypes, but what I love about it is it further opens the door for people in Hollywood to be more open to having multi-dimensional Black characters with their own storylines instead of just creating White characters or choosing White actors for roles. Having an open mind to this can create even more opportunities for actors of color and better representation of people of color in the media, in addition to those opportunities we already create for ourselves!
I really enjoyed this season of Master of None, and I highly recommend it! Opportunities, stories, and characters like these for Black women is exactly why Black Media Review Collective exists; to show support to shows like this and get the word out that we want more like it!