I don’t know what to call his new soap opera or are they webisodes? This is not to demean web series, in fact, some of the best TV today are online. Notably, if Osiris, ABG, Diary of A Single Mom, The Adebanjos, The Girls Bathroom, to name but a few, even The PuNanny Diaries and The Lebrons – even for their shortcomings, perhaps due to their humble beginnings and meager budgets – are not on TV, why is For Better Or Worse on TBS? I used to like Madea’s cooking but whatever it is Tyler Perry is boiling right now, I am afraid, I’d have to pass.
Whether in sickness or in health, For Better Or Worse, should not be part of anybody’s vow or vocabulary! And I don’t mean that in no nice way. If you defend Tyler Perry more than I do, you’ll be arrested. I defend this guy tooth and nail and debate his critics ’til dawn. But this meshing of Diary of A Mad Black Woman, a film he did not direct, with the wonderful Waiting To Exhale, is not Tyler Perry’s territory. When he ventures directorially into unchartered waters – stuff he has no experience with – especially without his fat suit, his product sweats like pregnant fish out of water!
What in the world is this lackadaisical TV show in For Better Or Worse? First there’s Angela (Tasha Smith) who is always dressed up like Michelle Obama at dinner with Queen Elizabeth, as if all Michelle ever does in her life is play dress-up. Angela is supposed to be a hairdresser but she never touches hair, she never gets her palms wet. Of all the money rolling into TP studios I cannot but languish in despair. Can’t a couple of your folks get a hairdo for free?
Then, there’s Marcus (Michael Jai White) and together with Angela, the two have been married for as long as the 25-year-old looking son passing for thirteen. Bobb’e J. Thompson for one reason or another does not look 13! Maybe a couple years back. But then again it could just be shoddy and cheap makeup. A 13-year-old with grandfather-ordained-dialogue oozing out of his mouth every second is a failure of the script and paints TP’s lack of experience with kids.
Marcus supposedly works at C-Sports Now but I’ve never seen a so-called highly rated television network that had but one office for three high-ranking black men who own luxurious apartments and cars, and never talk about Sports or the news! What’s worse, all they do is talk about Angela!
Not to mention the women, and how together with TP himself, they are so fascinated with guys in muscles, it’s ridiculous. For Better Or Worse proves TP cannot do dramedy.
This TV show is probably supposed to spread the red carpet for Mr. Tyler Perry’s upcoming movie about which he claims will be a firm opportunity for him to unveil his true talent from behind the fat suit. But, it mocks my excitement and particularly, my childhood over-exuberance at the sight of a TP film without the suit. I keep asking myself why can’t TP give some young black folks the opportunity to shine a little?
There are so many young, fantastic up and coming actors, why can’t he use som’a dem to play alongside the great Thandie Newton? If you haven’t seen the trailer for Good Deeds yet, I entreat you to check it out. It is not because I ridicule it, but I want to forewarn you about yet another disaster to befall us since he wrestled For Colored Girls from that poor girl’s hands and threw it under the bus.
Day in and day out, Tyler Perry has proven to me that he is awesome within his unique niche! But he’s barely sticking to that corner. Ain’t nothing wrong with that! But what’s the thing with ‘I don’t wonna be shy anymore; I want to act in a serious movie; I want to be fifth generation in the family to graduate from some Ivy League?’ What is Good Deeds? Fifth generation? Where has he been? Africa? Does Tyler Perry think this is how to answer his critics; some phantom fifth generation Harvard graduate run into and fix a broken family?
If Tyler Perry’s empire is going to survive and maintain the momentum it has gathered in only 6 or so years, it seems it’s gonna take one of two things. First, he cannot possibly relinquish his fat suit. Second, and this is the more sensible thing to do, at least in my opinion; stop writing those TV/movie scripts by yourself. Stop coming up with screenplays in a month, all by yourself. Honey, nobody cares how much time you spent in your office and certainly, nobody in the world writes a TV show all by himself. It’s moronic almost, no matter how much hard work you put into it!
Tyler Perry dearly needs a mentor, Neema Barnette, Julie Dash or Spike Lee perhaps. But he needs to concentrate on the niche he has discovered for himself – within that fat suit if he has to do anything at all – and leave the rest for his 34th Street Films. That I, together with some millions of African Americans sometimes find refreshment and entertainment in such Madea movies is no mean achievement. But he ought to produce some talent and leave behind a real legacy! Otherwise, doing all these by himself, he exposes himself – his lack of expertise and decorum in the art.
I believe what’s best for us to do for him conceivably, is to keep reminding him and other such folks, that legacy is not lands and gold, nor is it found in popularity, it’s cultivated in people! I am not seeing the people, just TP. And his new TV show, For Worse, carves the picture of a sorry ass fish out of water.
