The Last O.G. Advance Review – “Pilot.” Second Chances

Season 1, Episode 1

Air Date: Tuesday, April 3, 2018, 10:30/9:30c on TBS

Rating: ★★★★★

“I’ll be right back.” – Tray

The Last O.G. opens with a flashback to 2002 as Tray (Tracy Morgan) and his beloved girlfriend Shay (Tiffany Haddish) prepare for a romantic evening in front of the television in their Brooklyn apartment. Just as the evening gets going, Tray decides to run across the street to the corner store for a blunt and candy bar. The impulsive decision turns tragic as Tray suddenly finds himself arrested on a drug charge. Refusing to snitch on his friend Wavy (Malik Yoba), who was also there, Tray is convicted and sent to prison.

Fifteen years later, Tray is released for good behavior. Eager to pick up where he left off, Tray is shocked to discover his beloved Crown Heights neighborhood has become gentrified. The once gritty streets are now filled with coffee shops, yuppies walking their dogs, and selfie taking tourists.

Turns out the neighborhood isn’t the only thing that’s changed, though. Instead of being a damsel waiting for her man to come home to her, Shay has moved on. She is now married to a successful white guy named Josh (Ryan Gaul). The chemistry between Morgan and Haddish is a riot as the two constantly butt heads every time Tray tries to find a way to fit into Shay’s life.

Just when things seem like they can’t get any worse, Tray discovers Shay and Josh are raising 15-year-old twins, Amira (Taylor Mosby) and Shazad (Dante Hoagland). Given Tray was in prison for 15 years, well, you do the math.

Abandoned by the neighborhood he once called home, Tray checks into a halfway house run by Mullins (Cedric the Entertainer), a wannabe comedian. Once the king of the neighborhood, Tray finds himself working a minimum wage job at a coffee shop. Morgan is hilarious as Tray, especially when Tray tries to navigate in a city that’s foreign to him. It’s hard not to laugh any time Cedric and Morgan appear on screen together. Morgan’s personality is infectious, making it easy to root for his character.

Tray’s only real connection to his old life is through Bobby (Allen Maldonado), the younger brother of one of Tray’s gangster friends who died when he was in prison. Tray sees a lot of himself in Bobby and takes the young man under his wing. Maldonado is a talented actor and I can’t wait to see where the writers take his character. Will Bobby follow Tray’s advice or will he take a path closer to his brother’s?

My only complaint about The Last O.G. is the writers miss an opportunity to make Tray more relatable by using only a brief flashback to show his life before prison. It’s difficult to gauge how reformed Tray is, if at all, because the audience sees so little of his life prior to his incarceration. Scenes that should be powerful, like Tray telling Shay, “I’ve changed,” don’t carry emotional weight because the only change viewers see in “Pilot” has to do with Tray’s hair. Hopefully, as the season progresses, the writers will continue to use flashbacks to show not only how far Tray has really come, but how much his neighborhood has changed in the past 15 years.

While watching The Last O.G., I had a hard time telling whether I should laugh or cry because of the masterful job Morgan does conveying the isolation of life as an ex-con. His performance is heartfelt and doesn’t glorify serving time. While we don’t see what prison was like during those 15 years, it’s clear the experience has had a profound impact on Tray. Not only does Morgan demonstrate a nice range of emotions in “Pilot,” but the writers do a great job finding a balance between drama and comedy.

As a white guy who grew up in a suburban town in Minnesota, it might be easy to write off The Last O.G. as a show where I doubt I’m the target audience; I would be wrong. Co-created by Jordan Peele and John Carcieri, The Last O.G. is an entertaining series that goes beyond race and its inner-city location. It’s a story about redemption, family, improving your lot in life, and snitches getting stitches. Ok, maybe not so much the last one. Regardless of your background or where you grew up, The Last O.G. is worth checking out.

Check out my SXSW interviews with Haddish, Maldonado, and director Jorma Taccone about the series here.

Tweet me @staffaroadtrip or leave a comment below to let me know what you think about The Last O.G., “Pilot.”

Tune in to The Last O.G. Tuesdays at 10:30/9:30c, only on TBS.

For more on the show, go to http://www.tbs.com/shows/the-last-og

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Greg Staffa

I provide testosterone to the site. You won’t be reading about how nice a actress looks in a dress or how much of a hunk Matt Bomer is in my reviews. I describe colors using words like brown, not taupe. My twitter name is @staffaroadtrip because I love road trips and have done two different 48-state road trips since 2008. My favorite show is White Collar.