Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Mixed-ish’ On ABC, Where Rainbow Johnson Navigates The ‘80s As A Biracial Ex-Hippie

Kenya Barris is one of the best comedy writers on TV today because he’s fantastic at mixing rapid-fire comedy with touchy issues and dramatic moments to make a well-rounded show. Both Black-ish and its first spin-off, Grown-ish, have this quality. But what would a show about Rainbow Johnson’s life in 1985 as her family is forced off their commune be like? Read on for more about Mixed-ish…

MIXED-ISH: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

Opening Shot: The Johnson family sits down to watch Breakin‘, which Dre (Anthony Anderson) considers a classic. When Bow (Tracee Ellis Ross) says she’s never seen it, she reminds her family that she grew up on a hippie commune, which triggers a flashback…

The Gist: It’s the summer of 1985; Rainbow Johnson (Arica Himmel, with Ross narrating as grown-up Bow) is 12 and she lives with her family on a commune where race and any other differences don’t matter… that is, until the commune is invaded by the ATF, who finds an arsenal that would rival Jonestown.

So Paul and Alicia Johnson (Mark-Paul Gosselaar, Tika Sumpter) move into a rental home owned by Paul’s uber-capitalist father Harrison Johnson III (Gary Cole). The Johnsons determine that they won’t stop being themselves, that they won’t sell out to the suburbs; Paul is especially afraid of what might happen when his kids — Bow, Johan (Ethan William Childress) and Santamonica (Mykal-Michelle Harris) — turn on the “idiot tube.” Bow seems to want to keep those ideals, but as soon as they go to school for the first time, both Johan and Santamonica want to blend in, and fast. When Paul calls the people who conform “idiots,” Santamonica whines, “I wanna be an idiot so bad!”

The other thing that the kids at their school pointed out to them is that they’re “mixed.” “What are you guys mixed with?” is what one of the students ask them, right in front of everyone. They have no idea what the concept of being biracial is, because race wasn’t a topic at the commune. As much as Paul, who went to law school but didn’t graduate, keeps pushing the idea of not conforming, though, the tide of suburbia is hard to stop, especially when Alicia dons a suit, puts up her hair and gets a job at her father-in-law’s firm. You see, she has a law degree and license and someone needs to make money and buy groceries instead of waiting for Paul’s greenhouse to literally bear fruit. “I can’t wait six months to eat!” she says to Paul.

But Bow is on Paul’s side, and is ready to bolt — “I hear there’s a commune near Waco!” — but the family stays in the house because “We have to plan to adapt the best we can.”

Our Take: Mixed-ish, like its fellow Black-ish spin-off Grown-ish, has a baseline of quality simply because Kenya Barris is that good of a writer and producer, and he finds the right people to run his shows. Here, it’s Karin Gist, and she has her hands full trying to create new stories from characters Barris created and we’ve already been introduced to, albeit now it’s versions that are 34 years younger (Barris, Ross and Peter Saji are listed as the show’s creators).

Like Young Sheldon, we need to take the world of Mixed-ish on its own terms, not as an extension of its parent show. This way, the Johnson family can be written to go in directions that aren’t limited by their Black-ish counterparts. And, despite Ross’ narration as the adult Bow, the revised pilot does a good job of making the world of Bow’s family in the ’80s their own.

One of the most obvious changes between the original pilot and this revised one is that Gosselaar has replaced Anders Holm as Paul. It seems like a lateral move to us; maybe ABC or Barris wanted someone older, or maybe someone with more name recognition. He’s fine, but we’re more intrigued by Tika Sumpter as Alicia; she’s the one who is going to keep the family cohesive, bring in the bacon, and help her kids deal with their identity in a world that asks them to “choose sides.” It feels that Sumpter and Himmel as the young Bow will be the center of this show, and that seems to us to be the right way to go here.

As usual, Cole adds multitudes to any show he’s on; he’s the reason why Fam was any good last season. And this role as a typical ’80s rich jerk-off, will allow him to chew some scenery in ways that will likely remind people more of an unleashed Bill Lumbergh.

Sex and Skin: Nothing.

Parting Shot: Harrison brings water guns to a family picnic, and despite Paul’s objections, a great water fight ensues.

Sleeper Star: Christina Anthony plays Aunt Denise, who helps the kids deal with the real world. And she often has the funniest lines in the pilot. For instance, to illustrate how the kids need to deal with being biracial, she looks at Santamonica and says that the world has already determined that Santamonica is black because “she has edges.”

Most Pilot-y Line: Nothing stands out.

Our Call: STREAM IT. Mixed-ish has the potential to be as good as Black-ish if Barris and Gist let young Bow and her mother Alicia lead the way.

Your Call:

Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, VanityFair.com, Playboy.com, Fast Company.com, RollingStone.com, Billboard and elsewhere.

Stream Mixed-ish on ABC.com