Out of all the Arrowverse shows that currently out, only The Flash stood out for me as my all time favorite. I tried watching the other series but I ended up dropping them for various reasons. Sure The Flash has had it’s ups-and-downs but for the most part it’s a great show with a great cast. However, that might change if we get the more of whatwe saw at the Black Lightning pilot premiere. My God, I wasn’t expecting the first episode to be this good.
So without spoiling anything, the entire episode centered around Jefferson Pierce and his goal to help his community, protect his daughters and making a return as Black Lightning. As a younger man, Jefferson Pierce donned the suit of a vigilante and protected the streets of his city. However, because the been Black Lightning cost him his marriage, he decided to hang up the mantle for good and chose an alternative means to help his community.
He learns that life doesn’t always work out as planned when his daughter, Jennifer — a star student who is determined to achieve justice at any cost — gets recruited by a street gang. In order to protect his family, Jefferson sees no choice but to once again become Black Lightning.
I loved how Black Lightning tackled issues of Police brutality, racial profiling, and gang violence. It’s direct, to the point and didn’t hold any punches whatsoever. It made it loud and clear that this is the unfortunate reality of being Black in America. I also loved the fact that most, if not all the characters in the first episode was Black. It’s something that I honestly was not expecting going into the series. It’s so cool seeing all this representation aka “Black Excellence” in media.
Black Lightning was never a very prominent character in the DC Universe, being mostly a C or D ranked character but this CW show may very well change that. If this keeps up, it will definitely boost the characters popularity. It’s already the made history by being CW’s most highest rated TV premiere so you know the demand is there and people loved it.
According to Variety:
Airing at 9 p.m., “Black Lightning” drew a 0.8 rating in adults 18-49 and 2.3 million viewers. It retained all of its lead in in the key demo and more than 90 percent in total viewers from “The Flash” (0.8, 2.5 million), which aired at 8 p.m. Those numbers also put “Black Lightning” on par with the Season 2 premiere of “Riverdale” (0.8, 2.3 million) in October. It was The CW’s highest rated original series premiere in two years since the launch of “Legends of Tomorrow” (1.2, 3.2 million).
On NBC, “Ellen’s Game of Games” (2.2, 8.8 million) ticked up in total viewers. “This Is Us” (2.5, 9.8 million) was even and was the top-rated and most-watched show of the night. “Chicago Med” (1.5, 7.9 million) was up in total viewers.
For ABC, “The Middle” (1.4, 6.1 million) was up slightly in viewers, while “Fresh Off the Boat” (1.0, 3.9 million), “Black-ish” (1.0, 3.8 million), and “Kevin Probably Saves the World” (0.6, 2.6 million) were even.
On Fox, “Lethal Weapon” (1.2, 5 million), “LA to Vegas” (0.9, 2.8 million), and “The Mick” (0.8, 2.3 million) were all up in both measures.
Anyways, overall I was very impressed with the quality of writing, story-telling and presentation. The cast did an amazing job with their respective characters and I’m really looking forward to seeing more in the future. Black Lightning has definitely sparked my interest.
