It just happens to be set in a jolly version of a workplace whose real-world counterparts engender fear and anger within marginalized communities. But in the main it functions as a droll workplace sitcom with a low-stakes mystery of the week. Such plots enable "Brooklyn Nine-Nine" to critique the way cop dramas unquestioningly lionize men and women in law enforcement. Other episodes peek into Holt's past struggles as a gay Black man rising through the department's ranks. One memorable installment features Terry being harassed by a fellow officer while he's off-duty for simply being Black and looking suspicious. "Brooklyn Nine-Nine" earned critical praise for building episodes around hot-button cultural issues such as sexism and homophobia while maintaining its comedic integrity. Still, for all of the writers' and cast's earnest attempts to find a way into the show's 10-episode farewell, there's simply no way for the show to avoid the awkwardness surrounding what it signifies. McGinley's Frank O'Sullivan is this season's example of that: The head of the patrolman's union and dedicated to covering up officer malfeasance, O'Sullivan comes off as an authoritarian boob with an Oedipus complex, easily defeated by exploiting his soft spot for Billy Joel. While the writers never pretended the larger New York Police Department isn't corrupt, the antagonists representing the worst aspects of the force are generally as feckless as the criminals Jake and the gang pursue. "Brooklyn Nine-Nine" always led with its kindly nature, exhibited by a crew of understanding good cops dedicated to doing the best by their community. They spend the rest of the episode finding out whether that's true and if so, to what extent. Jake's right hand Charles Boyle (Joe Lo Truglio) still gambols after him like a faithful pup, and Sergeant Terry Jeffords (Terry Crews) hasn't stopped obsessing about his physique or portraying a "suck it up" version of demonstrative masculinity.īut Rosa drops a bomb that marks a distinct beginning to the show's end, which flattens the tone, coloring everything that follows: She and Jake team up on a case that delivers a hard lesson about that systemic injustice to which Rosa refers, presaged in Jake confidently reassuring her with, "You know the system can work sometimes when good people are involved!" In turn, Captain Holt remains comically unreadable, equally poker-faced in moments of elation, rage and despair. "Ĭhalk up "Brooklyn Nine-Nine" return to us at a time of debates about police reforms and defunding – and in an era where new video recordings of police brutality against people of color emerge and circulate on a near daily basis – an unfortunate circumstance as opposed to bad timing.Įverything about the comedy that people loved before is still present: Jake's still too much of a try-hard with bizarre daddy issues he assigns to his boss, Captain Raymond Holt (Andre Braugher). "Well, yes, obviously those," Jake says, his chipper tone never flagging. "Mass death? Economic collapse?" she responds, adding, "The way the disease has exposed the systemic injustice at the core of American life?" He's posing the question to fellow investigator Rosa Diaz ( Stephanie Beatriz), who annoyedly rattles off a list of sensible answers. "Question: What is the number one problem with the coronavirus?" asks Andy Samberg's always upbeat detective Jake Peralta, the Nine-Nine's self-styled hero cop. It still feels out of place, and the show's co-creators Dan Goor and Michael Schur tacitly acknowledge that with the opening gag in "The Good Ones," the premiere of its eighth and final season. Little wonder that people sought out comedies to counteract the darkness – however, one show that didn't pop up on many comfort TV lists was " Brooklyn Nine-Nine." It had no place in 2020's feel-good catalogue. Suddenly getting out of bed became a Herculean feat. Hundreds of thousands took to the streets to march for Black lives. If pandemic quarantines weren't getting to us, the horror of witnessing George Floyd's murder surely did. Depression afflicted the world around this time last year.
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