Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Good Times’ On Netflix, A Profanity-Laden Update Of Norman Lear’s Classic 1970s Sitcom

There was a lot of controversy about the animated update of Good Times when its trailer came out in March, and Netflix didn’t give critics any episodes to review, which is always a bad sign. The trailer promised that this new version, one of Norman Lear’s last projects before he died last December, would be edgier and raunchier than the 1974-79 original. But is it funny?

GOOD TIMES: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

Opening Shot: Reggie Evans (JB Smoove) is in the shower, singing the old Good Times theme. The song is a duet with a nearby cockroach.

The Gist: Reggie lives in the same apartment — 17 C — where his grandparents, James and Florida Evans, used to live. It doesn’t even look much different from when they lived there 50 years ago. His wife Beverly (Yvette Nicole Brown) is busily trying to make the place shine in order to win a projects-wide beautification contest. Oldest son Junior (Jay Pharoah) was tasked to paint the walls, but instead paints a mural of Black Jesus.

Youngest daughter Grey (Marsai Martin) is out protesting the danger of processed foods pose to the community on the South Side of Chicago. And the baby of the family, Dalvin (Gerald Anthony “Slink” Johnson), doesn’t even live there anymore, even though he’s literally a baby; Reggie kicked him out of the house for dealing drugs.

Beverly desperately wants to win the contest, and prove to Delphine (Tisha Campbell), the officious older lady who is the judge, that this generation of the Evans family aren’t a bunch of screw ups. But when Delphine tells her that “Drug Dealing Baby” is an automatic disqualification, she promises that a baptized Dalvin will be in the apartment when Delphine comes by at 6 PM.

She prays to Black Jesus (Godfrey) for Dalvin’s return, and she suddenly lactates, meaning he’s around. Why he’s there isn’t exactly a miracle; he’s running from a group of toddlers who want to take over his turf. She speeds him to her bestie, Lashes by Lisa (Rashida “Sheedz” Olayiwola), who runs all sorts of businesses out of her apartment, so she can get Dalvan a quickie baptism.

In the meantime, the heat was shut off, right in the middle of Reggie’s shower, and Beverly spent his “secret stash” of money to decorate for the contest. Reggie tries to earn the heat money in his cab, but his passengers routinely stiff him with $24 bills and sobriety chips. So he tries to earn the money the honorable way: By hustling people at the local pool hall. He’s on a roll but doesn’t realize that Junior, whom he brought with him, is a pool prodigy. All of that goes by the wayside, though, when Dalvan is kidnapped by the rival toddlers. Grey, who was with Dalvan when he was grabbed, was too weak from her latest hunger strike; it gets so bad, flies buzz around her head as if she was already rotting away.

What Shows Will It Remind You Of? Ranada Shepard (Diary Of A Future President) is the creator and showrunner of this version of Good Times, but the late Norman Lear and Seth MacFarlane are listed as executive producers (Lear even voiced a small role before his death last December). In a lot of ways, this version of Good Times feels like a cross between Lear, Mike Evans and Eric Monte’s original 1974-79 sitcom and MacFarlane’s Family Guy.

Our Take: There was a lot of controversy about this animated Good Times update when the trailer came out last month, and Netflix didn’t give critics any episodes to review, which is always a bad sign. And, through the first two episodes, what people hated about the trailer was very evident.

The new Good Times is certainly absurd, and perpetuates a lot of negative stereotypes. It’s not afraid to push the envelope as far as language and nudity are concerned. And the character of Dalvan makes Family Guy‘s Stewie look like a real baby in comparison. But the show’s biggest offense, at least during the two episodes we watched, is that it’s just not funny.

The mistake that Shepard and her writers make is something that the producers of animated comedies have been making for 35 years, since The Simpsons hit it big. They try to push buttons and make things edgy; they push for the absurd at every turn. But in the process, they forget to concentrate on who the characters are and create stories that speak to where those characters are now and where they are going.

There are some interesting characters in this version of Good Times, notably Grey and Junior. Yes, they insult each other like J.J. and Thelma did in the original series. But Grey is smart and ambitious with concurrent streaks of both empathy and deviousness. In fact, she’s not all that much different than Marsai’s blackish character Diane Johnson. In the second episode, we see that Junior, like J.J. before him, isn’t dumb but is actually a pretty brilliant artist, and his creativity rules his brain at all times.

In essence, the new Good Times suffers from the same problem the original one did, the problem that led both John Amos and Esther Rolle to quit the series (though Rolle was persuaded to come back): Too much emphasis on the silly and absurd and not enough emphasis on characters and stories. What are Black families like the Evanses facing in 2024 Chicago, and how can the strength of their family unit help them deal with those issues? There’s a way to do this that still has room for silliness. There’s even a way to do this that still leaves room for a drug-dealing baby (there’s less Dalvan in the second episode, which is a good sign, as he’s a character that’s best taken in small doses, no pun intended). We’re just not sure we’ll see any of that in this show’s first season.

Sex and Skin: We see a lot of naked Reggie in the first episode. In the second episode, Reggie and Beverly have a two-minute round of loving.

Parting Shot: Dalvan has decided to move in upstairs (we’ll let you see how that goes down). Reggie’s reaction is a reference to the original series, one of a number of callbacks in that first episode.

Sleeper Star: If you listen carefully, original cast members Jimmie Walker and Bern Nadette Stanis voice a couple of small roles in the first episode.

Most Pilot-y Line: Is there anything in this episode that is more shocking than a drug-dealing baby? Probably not.

Our Call: SKIP IT. There is actual potential in the new animated version of Good Times, but Shepard and her writers are too busy pushing the envelope to take advantage of that potential.

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, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.