Emperor of Ocean Park

I had high hopes for this show with its solid cast but I was quickly let down.

First off, the lead actor, Grantham Coleman is a bland boring monotone actor with zero range on his acting skills. I saw him before playing Ronnie on Raising Kanan and unfortunately, on this show, he is still playing Ronnie just dressed up as a lawyer. His demonor is the same. His look and over grown mustache are the same. Even his portal of both characters are exactly the same.

Secondly, this show has a plot that just isn't entertaining and does a horrible job of keeping the viewer enthralled. There isn't much action, its mostly 85% dialogue between two mid range actors continuously discussing "the arrangements" which after 7 episodes I still have no clue what these "arrangements" are.

Save yourself the time and take nap. It'll be more entertaining than watching this.

The pacing was very good, for a drama. What starts as a mundane family tragedy steadily becomes more and more complex. Usually dramas are too slow for me, but this one kept it interesting with the quickly evolving plot lines.

The aspects involving race and class relations contain little commentary, but are primarily a portrayal of political climates over the past several decades. Some insight is provided on conservative Black politics, with acknowledgement of the nuance, complexities, and backlash involved.

The Judge himself is an excellent stand-in for a dramatized Clarence Thomas, but perhaps with stronger moral convictions which take him down a different yet still troublesome path.

I watched this hoping for something new but as it went on I just thought this is simply formulated to keep me watching. That fine when the storyline grips you in that way but all this was is holes in a very simple story which only got revealed in the last episodes. If you hadn't already worked the full story out by around ep 5 then perhaps this show was aimed at you.

You know when a show has very little to sustain it when it has to keep flashing back and forward in time just make more suspense. If this had just been play in real time not many people would have though it worthy of more than 60 mins in length.

Poor acting and forced character interchanges mostly based on coincidence didn't help either.

And of course it's left it with an option of another series but please save us from that.

Again another series that started off well but deteriorated rapidly, into a looong drawn out angst fest with very little happening. You put together a good cast that can act, then gave them a weak script.

Worst of all is the idea that jumping backwards and forwards in time for literally each scene one after the other, episode after episode, makes for a watchable story! What were you thinking???

To fixate on the phrase "do you have the arrangements" repeated ad nauseam all the way through like an 'omage to the Olivier/Hoffman "is it safe" scene from Marathon Man, only succeeded in irritating to the point where I was shouting at the screen.. NO and I don't care either!!!

Finally, a Hollywood TV series with black leads where, no one is selling drugs, no one is from the hood, no one is on welfare, in public housing or on government support and needs to be saved. It's a miracle. The casting is good, the actors have range, they're educated, well spoken and employed and actually own stuff.

Hollywood need to produce more TV shows like this. Here's a gentle reminder, that not all POC come from lower income backgrounds, are African American and have a connection to narcotics. More of this Hollywood and less of everything else. More recognition of the fact that your audience stretches far beyond people who like shows like snowfall, the wire, godfather of harlem and abbott elementary. It's about time that Hollywood ups it's game and widens the scope of its content in both TV and film.