Spidersecu Don't Believe the Hype

HeadlinesExotic Boring

Onlinewsma Absolutely Brilliant!

Darin One of the film's great tricks is that, for a time, you think it will go down a rabbit hole of unrealistic glorification.

hnanziri I liked how Paul utilized being a brother to mary jane to make business negotiations with David, mary jane's EX. The power of "Brother in Law" relationship.

amandacheatham-99324 You can stop watching after season 4. She show gets messy and repetitive. I was upset when I heard this show was ending until I watched season 5.

Allison Scates I decided on a whim to watch Being Mary Jane. I was a little reluctant at first since this is not typically the kind of TV drama that I watch, (I watch a lot of crime and historical dramas) but I decided to give it a shot anyways since it got pretty good reviews on Netflix. I just finished watching Season 3 and can say that I really like this show.The show follows Mary Jane Paul, respected news anchor for SNC network, and the trials and tribulations associated with her highly profiled life. The endless pursuit of love + sex, family drama and the advancement of Mary Jane's career are tackled each episode. More importantly, each episode addresses an issue that affects the black community, especially relating to black women.Being an African American woman, I find myself being able to relate to a lot of topics discussed in Being Mary Jane. Are black women beautiful? What does a beautiful black woman look like? There was a noteworthy episode where Mary Jane's niece, Niecy, got pregnant with her then Filipino boyfriend. Niecy was days away from giving birth and confesses to Mary Jane that her daughter is going to be beautiful because she will be biracial. Niecy then talks about how she is not pretty because she is dark skinned and overweight.There was another episode where Mary Jane takes out her weave and her hairstylist is not available to give her a new weave. She becomes frantic because she does not want to wear her natural hair on camera and as a last resort calls Niecy to do her hair. Niecy's comments and Mary Jane's confliction with her hair represent the discomfort a lot of black women feel about their appearance and their disguised hatred for their blackness.More than anything I like Mary Jane's confidence. She is confident in her sexuality, frequently having casual sex and masturbating. She is also not afraid to speak her mind or give her opinion even if it wasn't asked for. There was an episode in which the news anchor for primetime was unavailable and Mary Jane was selected as the replacement. This was a huge opportunity for Mary Jane as prime time has more viewers and the overall tempo is much faster than her afternoon show, Talk Back.The guest for the show was Elizabeth Foy, a conservative white author. Elizabeth goes on to talk about her bestselling book about charter schools and at this point Mary Jane decides to stop listening to her producers and decides to ask Elizabeth her own questions. Like how Elizabeth's book publisher supports neo-racists authors. Elizabeth gets flustered by the barrage of Mary Jane's questions and calls her a 'race baiter' and how she thinks black people are always the victim, always misunderstood. Mary Jane then responds back by saying that they both have a lot in common and that Elizabeth Foy is a ugly black woman too.Mary Jane can be bold and vocal but also she is compassionate and willing to expose her vulnerabilities. There was a series of episodes in which Mary Jane tries to freeze her eggs on air with the assistance of fertility treatments. She then discovers from her doctor on air that she has a below average egg count and may not be able to bear children in the future.The show is not afraid to tackle serious issues. It challenges the existing stereotype that black people do not commit suicide or suffer from mental illness. Mary Jane's longtime friend Lisa has struggled with mental illness throughout the course of the show after having attempted suicide in season one. She finally took her own life in season 3.The reason I gave this series a 8/10 is because there are a lot of episodes where it feels like things are just happening and there is no context or backstory as to why. For example, one of Mary Jane's "sex buddies" has a seizure after they are finished having sex. There is no explanation as to what caused him to have a seizure. He just says, "I started having these 2 weeks ago." That could have been an opportunity to address health issues. There are a lot of little instances like this that plague the series.Overall I really like Being Mary Jane. I think that the show is tactfully done to challenge what it means to be a black woman in America and the struggles that we continually face.

Chanel McCaskill First off, I must commend the show's producers for having an entire ensemble of people of color. The story line may bit off of Scandal just a tad bit, however like Kerry Washington. Gabrielle Union does an awesome job as she fearlessly leads this cast to television success. Not to mention the supporting cast does a wonderful job of making up for the show's comedic reliefs. The men on show are extremely attractive and talented actors in their own right like Omari Hardwick. I also love the emotion behind each scene that is accompanied by an array of music that fits each scene perfectly leaving the viewer to feel exactly how it was intended for them to fee. Being Mary Jane is a 2014 must see, although if they plan to take home any Golden Globes or Emmy's then the writers had better turn up the heat.