Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Thursdays, I will be reviewing South Central, which aired, for 10 episodes, on Fox in 1994.  The entire show is currently streaming on YouTube!

Having just spent a year reviewing City Guys, it only seems appropriate to devote a month to looking at South Central.  Both City Guys and South Central were sitcoms about growing up in an urban community and being forced to deal with grown-up issues at a very young age.  However, in many ways, South Central was the anti-City Guys.  Whereas City Guys always ended with an easy solution and some words of wisdom from Ms. Noble, South Central was a frequently bleak show and one in which there were never any easy solutions.  Perhaps not surprisingly, as opposed to the five seasons that City Guys received, South Central ran for only 10 episodes.

South Central revolves around one black family living in South Central Los Angeles.  Joan Moseley (Tina Lifford) is a divorced mother, working hard to support her family and ending almost every day in a state of exhaustion.  Andre (Larenz Tate) is Joan’s son, an underachieving high schooler who is continually at risk of flunking out of school and whose attempts to act hard cannot hide the fact that he’s essentially a sensitive soul.  Tasha (Tasha Scott) is Joan’s daughter, who is intelligent but resents all of the responsibilities that have been put upon her.  Deion Carter (Keith Mbulo) is Joan’s foster child, an autistic three year-old who was abandoned and who Joan brought into the house.  Looming large over the family is the memory of Marcus, Joan’s oldest son, who was murdered shortly before the series begins.

Episode 1.1 “Pilot”

(Dir by Stan Lathan, originally aired on April 5th, 1994)

The pilot of South Central opens with a chaotic morning.  Deion wakes up Joan by screaming.  Tasha begs Joan for the money to buy a new jacket.  In a scene that reminds us that, while South Central dealt with timeless issues, the show was definitely made in the 90s, Andre wants to get a beeper.  Joan says that there is no way that her son is going to have a beeper and become a target of every gangbanger in the neighborhood.  Joan says that only drug dealers carry beepers and she’s not willing to lose Andre the way that she lost Marcus.

What the family doesn’t know is that Joan is even more stressed than usual because she has lost her job.  After working for the school district for 13 years, she has been laid off and she has not been able to find another job.  (One potential employer is interested until he learns that she never graduated college because she dropped out after her husband left her.)  When Joan goes to Ujamaa, the local black-owned co-op, she discovers that she’s been put on a list on people from whom checks can no longer be accepted.  She gets into an argument with Lucille, the cashier.  If Lucille looks familiar, that’s because she’s played by a young Jennifer Lopez.

Returning home, Joan discovers a message on her answering machine (another reminder that this pilot is from the 90s) from someone who works at a beeper store and who is checking to make sure that Andre gave his correct address.  Andre comes home and refuses to surrender his beeper, accusing his mother of treating him like a child.  Ray McHenry (Ken Page), a doctor who is obviously in love with Joan and who volunteers to mentor teenagers like Andre, comes by and reveals that, as a doctor, he carries a beeper of his own.  A frustrated Joan accidentally calls Andre “Marcus.”  Shaken, Joan announces that she doesn’t care what happens to her ungrateful, irresponsible children and then goes next door where she talks to her friend, Sweets (Paula Kelly).  At first, Joan is upset when Sweets says that Joan is acting just as irrationally as her children but then Joan breaks down into tears, saying that she wishes that “it could all just stop.”  Joan returns home, tells Tasha that she put her coat on layaway and makes peace with Andre.  Bobby (Clifton Powell), the head of Ujamaa, calls the house and leaves a message that he thinks he can help Joan with her problem.

“What problem?” Tasha asks.

“We’ll talk about it tomorrow,” Joan says as the episode comes to a close.

As far as pilots go, the first episode of South Central did exactly what it needed to do.  It introduced the characters, it told us enough about them to make them individuals while still leaving them room to grow and develop over the next few episodes, and it established everyone’s relationships.  That said, the pilot’s dialogue was a bit more jokey and the laugh track was a bit more intrusive than they would be in later episodes, as if the show’s producers really wanted to make sure that everyone understood that, despite all of the serious stuff being discussed, South Central was a comedy.

Episode 1.2 “Money”

(Dir by Stan Lathan, originally aired on April 12th, 1994)

“Money” picks up the morning after the pilot.  Joan tells Tasha and Andre that she has lost her job and has been unemployed for a month.  Tasha asks if they’re going to have to go on welfare.  “No!” both Joan and Andre snap at the same time.  Andre announces that he’ll steal money from someone before he goes on welfare.  Joan reprimands him and then heads down to Ujamaa in order to see what help Bobby was going to offer when he called the previous night.

Joan is expecting Bobby to offer her a line of credit but instead Bobby offers her a job.  Bobby explains that he needs an assistant manager, who will do bookkeeping, community relations, and “bag groceries.”  Joan is not happy to hear that, after all her years of experience, she’s being offered a job bagging groceries.  She’s even less happy when Bobby tells her that the job only pays $350 a week.

“Embrace the Ujamaa spirit, sister,” Bobby tells her.

“Then I’m going to need more money, brother,” Joan replies.

Considering the fact that her family is struggling and Andre’s friend Rashad (Lamont Bentley) keeps coming by the house and eating all of their food, one might be tempted to think that Joan needs to set her pride aside for a moment.  I certainly thought that the first time that I watched this episode.  My mom worked a lot of jobs that she hated but she did it because she had a family to support.  But, upon rewatching this episode, I found myself sympathizing with Joan.  Joan was an administrator, someone who everyone agrees did a good job for 13 years.  Now, she’s nearly broke and Bobby is offering her a position as a glorified cashier and he’s offering to pay her considerably less than she made before.  Bobby’s offer not only comes across as being charity but Bobby’s reaction, when he hears that Joan wants more money, is to smugly tell her to suffer for the good of the community.  The sensible thing would be for Joan to set aside her pride but, at this point, pride is about the only thing that Joan has left.

However, when Joan returns home, she discovers that Andre is mysteriously $500 richer.  Andre tells Joan not to worry about where the money came from but Joan says that there’s no way that Andre got the money legally and that she won’t have it in the house.  She attempts to flush the money down the toilet.  Andre rescues the money and then admits that he got the money from Spoon, a gang member who was close to Marcus.

Joan drags Andre down to Spoon’s apartment building, where she discovers that, while the building may be covered in graffiti, Spoon’s apartment is full of expensive electronic equipment and furniture.  Spoon lives with his mother, who explains that her son takes care of her.  When Spoon comes out of his bedroom and says, “Marcus was my boy,” Joan snaps, “No, he was my boy!” and throws the money back in Spoon’s face.  After telling Spoon’s mother that she should be ashamed of herself, Joan goes down to Ujamaa and accepts Bobby’s job offer.

More so than the pilot, this episode is a good representation of the show that South Central would become.  None of the characters are idealized.  Both Joan and Andre are stubborn.  Tasha is too quick to get upset.  Bobby can be condescending.  But they’re all trying their best to make it through hard times without selling out their beliefs.  The scene with Spoon and his mother was a bit heavy-handed but, at the same time, it also allowed Joan to make clear that she would rather be poor than make money off of the suffering of others in her community.  It also revealed that the reason why she is so protective and strict with her children is because she feels that she failed Marcus.  In the end, Joan shows that she’ll do what she has to do to feed her children, even if that means bagging groceries.

Next week: A bus ride leads to Andre not only getting mugged but also falling in love.