“The Jerrod Carmichael Reality Show” is brutally honest

OPINION: It’s fascinating to look at comedian Jerrod Carmichael try to attach along with his best friend, Tyler, the Creator.

Since Jerrod Carmichael appeared on the scene, his profession has modified from performing comedy to only being himself. Today he comes on stage, sits down, symbolically opens a vein and becomes as honest as possible. It’s not all the time funny, nevertheless it’s absolutely compelling. His latest show on HBO “Jerrod Carmichael’s reality show”, is exactly in this spirit. It gives us Carmichael both on stage and throughout his life. It’s like an honest look at Carmichael’s life without the artifice. It’s so messy how life is messy.

A film crew showed up to document Carmichael’s real life. Unlike most reality shows where the crew is invisible, in this show they are part of the show. We see and hear them discuss what being in the room means to them. The making of the show is part of the show, and as Carmichael kisses multiple guys he met a few hours earlier on Grindr, the fact that he’s touching and practically juggling men in front of the HBO cameras is brought up.

Carmichael’s mother’s struggle to accept his homosexuality is also part of the series. Of course, this cannot be clearly resolved at the end of the episode. That wouldn’t be true: this matter had been going on between them for some time. Things like this can’t be tied together nicely. But, like in life, nothing in this show is resolved, not even the main plot of the episode: Carmichael has fallen in love with his best friend, and honestly, he’s letting his best friend know about it. It then allows us to see all the stress and anxiety that comes with opening up to someone like that and waiting to see how they will react.

Of course, Carmichael’s best friend is Tyler, the Creator, and if you know anything about Tyler, you know he’s not going to make this easy for Carmichael.

I like the idea of ​​their close relationship – they are two black, cool, brilliant, rich and hyper-creative artists. I would love to participate in a group chat or live call with these two, whether they are friends, dating, or whatever.

But anytime someone tries to take the relationship to a romantic level, things can get awkward. And Tyler seems to like the awkwardness. They talk about Carmichael’s feelings, but it doesn’t really end there. Tyler says he doesn’t know how to react. This is clearly not the end of the discussion. It’s powerful, it’s sad, it’s relatable, it’s real. This is amazing TV.

But he’s not entirely honest about one aspect of this attempt at a love connection. There is one layer they don’t touch, at least not in the first episode. Tyler has previously said that he dates white men. I’m not going to criticize Tyler for only loving snow bunnies. To each of his properties. But I can say this: I know how Carmichael feels when he meets someone who doesn’t want to date him because he prefers white partners. This is a deeply painful microaggression. Loving a black person who rejects you because they prefer white partners can make you feel insignificant. This is a uniquely racist experience that I do not recommend. Zero stars out of 10.

But after watching one episode, I can see that Carmichael’s show is powerful, subtle, intelligent and true to the core. I generally hate reality shows, but I love Carmichael and his approach is fresh. I can’t wait to see what mess he gets into next.

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