Are You Black Enough for The Blackening?

(WARNING: Contains spoilers for both "The Blackening" and "Undercover Brother")

(This will be fleshed out and reformatted into a video for "Readus 101" relatively soon, so I'm presenting the editorial exclusively for Patreon as it was originally intended)

There was no doubt in my mind that when I finally watched it, I would absolutely love The Blackening. Because I was familiar with the original 3Peat sketch, I knew exactly what to expect from the movie and I got it. I can’t bring myself to say that it was a perfect film, but it did a good job providing a satirical look at both blackness, and our stance in non-Jordan Peele directed films in the horror genre. Yet even though I knew the story it was telling was satirical the moment I sat my black ass down on my couch to watch it, I couldn’t help but think by the time it ended:

Damn, I wish this took itself more seriously.

What separates parody from satire is that parody is a deliberate exaggeration of something to comedic effect, whereas satire uses humor, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize vices; behavior that some can see as self-destructive. The Blackening, despite it ticking the boxes one would need to justify calling it a parody of the horror genre, falls under the latter because the entire basis of its story is using humor to provide criticism of a specific vice; mainly how we as black folk police blackness within our own community.

While it comes full circle with the film’s villain Clifton, we’re initially introduced to this concept being the main focus of the film before he confesses his motive for bringing everyone together in this cabin in the woods in order to kill them; even before the board game he forced them to play had them eliminate someone based on who they thought were “the blackest” amongst them (I honestly think he only said he voted for Trump twice because he knew that would get them to eliminate him). While we get a chance to see aspects of black American culture that this group of friends share among themselves, specifically in exaggerated ways that highlight the truth of the tropes with comedy -- the looks that we tend to share with one another that allow us to have silent, almost telepathic conversations with each other for instance -- there’s an instance with almost every character that would and could be used against them regarding if they deserve to hold on to their black card.

Allison and King’s blackness is contested due to being mixed with a white father and married to a white woman respectively. Shanika debunks the popular stereotype of black folk not knowing how to swim when the group splits up and she has to show off her training in order to try and find help. Lisa and Nnamdi’s actions aren’t necessarily foreign to some people’s definition of blackness -- Lisa tending to take advantage of her friendship with Dewayne as the stereotypical “gay bff” whenever she got her heart broken by Nnamdi’s just as stereotypical fuckboy antics of the past -- but it’s still a negative reflection of it.

And let’s not forget that every one of the core group admitted to watching at least one episode of Friends in their lifetime.

However, the hypocrisy comes to play when the film’s villain Clifton is excommunicated from the group for not knowing how to play Spades during college; an offense they deemed worthy of stripping a black person of their “Black Card” according to both the movie and certain real life circles. He even gives them a chance to show that they’ve changed by asking to teach him during the night of the crisis, only to be secured in his decision to kill them when they refused to do so, and saw that none of them had changed.

None of this is to say that Clifton is a victim in the scenario that The Blackening presents, mind you; him drinking and driving and offing a woman as a result of it was one hundred percent his fault and said ridicule for not knowing how to play Spades shouldn't be the blame for his poor decision-making process. But thanks to The Blackening being more satire than parody, we’re given a much needed critique -- from our own most importantly -- about how we as black folk, despite it not being a monolith, tend to treat others for not achieving a specific level of blackness for others within the community and what it tends to do to those who are alienated as a result.

Undercover Brother is another satirical comedy that touches on this same topic. The character, played by Eddie Griffith, was rooted in 1970’s blackness in everything from his drip, to his ride, to his home décor and initial personality, throwing off everyone he regularly encountered -- white and black alike -- during the early years of the 21st Century. And thanks to his Robin Hood complex for the sole purpose of redistributing wealth from white-led multinational corporations to low-income black families and neighborhoods, the film was 13-year-old me’s introduction to socialism without knowing it was actually socialism.

So when UB is forced to go deep undercover as Antoine Jackson, the “respectable” black marketing agent designed to be a token minority to infiltrate white spaces, he starts to be seen by the other members of the BROTHERHOOD as a sellout after becoming a bit too engrossed in the amount of whiteness he’s allowed proximity to, thanks to his persona’s tokenism. It also has a lot to do with the film playing up the trope of cishet black men seeking female companionship from a cishet white woman the moment they get an inkling of success, in the form of The Man’s best agent White She-Devil, brilliantly played by Denise Richards (whom I wouldn’t be surprised if we never heard from again).

But soon it got to the point where Sistah Girl, one of the BROTHERHOOD’s best agents before UB came on the scene -- and also one that initially judged him for being a walking talking cutout of a black man from the 70’s in the year 2002 -- noticed that while him being lost in the Antoine Jackson persona was part of The Man’s plan to keep him out of the way, how others have been looking at UB since he got lost in Antoine was how she was looking at his genuine self. This prompted her to, thanks to UB’s past displays of personal identity and pride, reexamine and reevaluate who she was in order to get the courage to affirm her own personal blackness. That way she could properly pull UB out of the at-the-time unnamed Sunken Place and help him reconnect with his own via reminding him of his own personal code. This was why it was incredibly important when showing up to White She-Devil’s home, she told him that she doesn’t, and I quote, “judge people by how they dress, or what music they listen to. But I remember a brotha that wasn’t afraid to be himself. Who taught me to follow my own funky path.”

The only difference however, is that while Undercover Brother began to lose his affirmation to his sense of blackness when those in his circle began to accuse him of abandoning it, that never happened with Clifton in The Blackening. Just like with those he had a vendetta against in the film, Clifton was always personally affirmed in his blackness despite not knowing how to play Spades. Not only was this proven in the black trivia he forced the group to answer for the board game that he clearly knew the answers to, but also in the fact that he was just as capable of understanding Lisa, Nnamdi and Dewayne’s silent conversation they were trying to have in front of him. And they only attempted to do so because they instinctually thought that he wasn’t black enough to be able to hear it.

Because just like Clifton has shown -- as well as the others that were showcased in the movie -- there are multiple ways black folk can personally affirm to their own sense of blackness without subscribing to the myth that it’s monolithic, and have.

Y’know, without having to kill anyone to prove it.

I, for example, have had immediate family members ask me to turn in my “Black Card” for not meeting their standards of blackness plenty of times. Among other things I was given side-eyes because, like Clifton, I don’t know how to play Spades or Dominos. And also like Clifton, I had friends and family that never even bothered to teach me. Others, like a few of my black friends, were into skateboarding and other things that were branded as “white people shit” and were looked at funny by their black peers because of it. It wasn’t until Lupe Fiasco entered the scene that those who classified at least the likes of skateboarding as such stopped doing so.

Hell, the same can be said about our presence and fandom in things that we as a people initially founded but was appropriated to the point of whiteness being the face of it, such as rock and alternative rock music. You’d be surprised how many people didn’t know black folk were a staple in punk rock until they were introduced to Hobie Brown for the first time in Across the Spider-Verse (shout-out to Lil’ Bill for his video on punk rock’s black presence).

The irony is that most of those individuals who were casting judgment on others like Clifton regarding another individuals’ level of blackness, had their own meters that matched the levels of the Cliftons that they were judging in one way or another. And despite The Blackening being 80% comedy and 20% horror, seeing this problem being satirically addressed and critiqued in a film starring, written and directed by black folk so that we know the message is genuine was incredibly refreshing. So much that it kinda made me wish that the take of this premise wasn’t made initially for laughs; that it was taken more in the direction of a thriller that took itself a bit more seriously so that there were more ways it could be explored and fleshed out among the narrative.

Does that mean all skinfolk are kinfolk, or that everyone who hasn’t been deemed black enough by their peers are worth saving? Absolutely not. Thanks to what America was founded on, the alienation one feels upon not being deemed black enough can push those into seeking the acceptance of whiteness via tokenism, or just use the separation to justify their internalized racism in their journey to be in proximity to whiteness. I should know. Through my Baby Boomer upbringing, my lack of street smarts and eventually my queerness, I spent my mid to late teenage years both seeking white acceptance and isolating myself from most of my black peers because I felt I didn’t belong; that I was better off without them.

While it didn’t take me long to realize that I was in my own sunken place and affirmed my own personal blackness once I was able to pull myself out of it, I can’t say the same for those who still seek it. There are people who refuse to see the warning signs that they're too deep in the tokenism of the Antoine Jackson persona because they KINDA have an idea of what whiteness feels like. No matter how many times they have to deal with white folk freely saying both the light and hard “R” around them because said white folks know they can get away with saying it in front of them. Or making sure they’re the only black person in the room. Or even denying others that look like them the same opportunities in life just because they got theirs. It’ll get to the point where they’re gonna have to come to the realization on their own because nobody no longer has the patience to help show them otherwise.

Was Clifton that far gone? I have no clue (once again, I truly believe he only said he voted for Trump twice because he needed them to vote him out). It’s another reason why I’d love to get a treatment of this plot that was taken more seriously and did a bit more development with its characters. But for what it’s worth, I’m definitely grateful The Blackening -- as it currently stands -- exists.

Even though I, personally, would’ve IMMEDIATELY drove my black ass back home after seeing that the getaway was in a cabin in the woods.