What Black Lightning, The Pierce Family Means to Me

As I’m writing this post, it’s 9am on a Monday, a regular day for most people but for me, it’s a day I lose something that has meant a lot to me over the years. Today, Monday, May 24, the series finale of Black Lightning airs. After 4 seasons of Pierce family adventures, this journey is ending. Rather abruptly, I may add.

Anissa and Jennifer Pierce aka Thunder and Lightning. Courtesy of The CW.

It hurts thinking about all the potential Black Lightning had especially when they finally got to connect with the greater CW-verse. One of the best moments of my live-action-watching life is seeing Jefferson Pierce interact with Kate Kane, Barry Allen and the rest of the Super Friends.

The show is one of the only shows on television that depicts an all-Black, brown-to-dark-skinned family that love and support each other through thick and thin. We have lost something so deeply integral to our American culture.

I see people on Twitter lamenting the state of Black folks in television and how we've regressed in terms of colorism and featurism but this show got paid DUST by a large swath of those same people complaining. This show displayed Black Love in all its forms, including an out Black lesbian dating around before popping the question to her longtime girlfriend and a formerly married couple making their way back to each other.

This show featured mixed race couples WITHOUT WHITE PEOPLE. Do you know how hard that is for showrunners to contemplate these days? “DIVERSITY!!! But make sure white people are still centered.”

Black Lightning never ever ever gave in to that. Where other shows sprinkle in Black and brown characters for “flavor” or to guide the white protagonist on their journey, Black Lightning subverted that with the family’s support coming primarily in the form of their white “Uncle”/Jefferson’s father figure. Even the city of Freeland itself felt like a fully-realized character, something other cities in other CW shows do not feel like. It breathes, it suffers, it delights, it grows, its heart beats with every citizen that lives in it. No other show has quite made a mostly Black city feel like its own person quite like Black Lightning.

Having watched the series finale, I am left with deep sadness and a little bit of relief. It was clear all season that the weight of filming in a pandemic and losing cast members took its toll on the show but the heart of it, the Pierce bond, made it out in the end and that means a lot to me.

I want to thank Cress Williams, Christine Adams, Nafessa Williams, China Anne McClain, Chantal Thuy, Jordan Calloway, James Remar, Krondon, Will Catlett, Damon Gupta, Jill Scott, Laura Kariuki and the entire Black Lightning cast and crew for everything they have given to us over the last 4 years. This show was one of the best written, well-acted shows on the CW and it will be sorely missed.