Post-Coby Show Era and the case of "Suits" series

The time when black people are portrayed as not qualified to have equality in the society might have partly gone, as we are trying to achieve the “post- racial” society. The progression could be seen on TV shows and movies. There is a time when enlightenment racism (Jhally) promotes the myth that the black could not achieve the equality is because they have not worked hard enough and they have just themselves to blame for that. One of the remarkable point in the film history with a “new” black representatives is the TV's biggest hit in the 1980s - The Cosby Show- an American television sitcom about an upper middle class African- American family. The Post-Cosby era witnessed a lot of changes in how the black are represented on TV and today I will take “Suits” Tv Series by Universal Cable Production  as an example.

Jessica Pearson is a character in “Suit” series. She is portrayed as a black lawyer who appears cold- hearted and strong. Working as a Managing Partner in Pearson Hardman- a law firm in New York city, Jessica Pearson is the most powerful and smartest woman on the show. She helped to built the firm and try to protect it as her own family. She is the women who is not just driven by money and power, she acts to be respected by people. Jessica Pearson is a typical example of representation of the black in Post-Cosby era when there are more African American characters on network television than before. Those characters are represented as people from upper middle class. They might be lawyers, doctors, etc, but they are rarely from the working class. The images of large African American families on TV are now replaced by the image of individual characters. Most of the African America characters on TV show now do not involve in intra-racial romantic relationship and pairings or exist in positive relationship with family. (For example, How to get away with murder or Scandal series or Grey's anatomy.) In the case of Jessica Pearson, she has divorced with her husband Quentin Sainz and kept fulfilling her ambition alone. She has the familiar relationships with Harvey Specter, Louis Litt and Mike Ross who are the three white lawyers of the firm. We could see that the workplace of Jessica is disconnected from other African America.The problem is that in the Suits show, the connection between race and class is obscured when in reality that’s not the case. Another problem is that the show reinforces the idea that the black could do things well when they have worked hard and do it in the separation with their community. By doing this, the film series do not portrayed the real experience of African America which might fit into the stereotype of black women.With 4 seasons from 2011 till now, Suits has received approximately 8.2/10 rating scores. This means that the series are confirming the stereotype of black women with unreal images to a large number of audience over time. More series with the same stereotype of black people might make the audience lose their interest in the film because it is supposed to make a progression in portraying the true image of African America in particular and the society in general in comparison with the previous era.
We might turn back to the familiar issue of the media about stereotype. Is it fair to the African American people to be portrayed apart from their own community to be successful? Is it really progressive to reinforce the myth that the black could make their dreams come true by just working hard and class and race do not have any impact at all? It’s high time Universal Cable Productions (UCB) to make the real progress to speed up the development of company. The media is supposed to bring the truth to audience, you know, and that’s what film producers should focus to put it on their products. So the question is what could UCB do? One suggestion is that the black female characters should be “on aired” with a variety of representations, ranging from married to single characters, and their family and communication should also be portrayed more frequently. Another suggestion is that the divorced characters such as Jessica or other single ones need to be married or find their new sources of happiness along with their current jobs in upcoming episodes. Their characteristics could be displayed their more clearly and the character could become more attractively. A variety of characters with different types of personalities portrayed will make your movies more interesting. I think that that’s enough to show the characteristic of black women who are just good at their jobs. Black women do well than that, you know, and alienating representations of various types of them should be avoided.