I’m sure you all remember the satirical, action-comedy Blaxploitation film, Black Dynamite, which was released in 2009? Well, the minds behind the film have never stopped, Michael Jai White, Scott Sanders, Byron Minns, and Adrian Younge, their hustle when it comes to promoting the property. The Black Dynamite Sound Orchestra (featuring C.E. Garcia, who created and performed the WORLD OF HURT theme song, “The Black Fist”), has racked up an impressive and steady series of tour dates. Last winter, the comic book, Black Dynamite: Slave Island, was released through Ars Nova. Michael Jai White and Scott Sanders remain popular, and entertaining, convention and podcast guests. The Black Dynamite team also secured a deal with Cartoon Network to create a cartoon based on the film. The animated series is scheduled to debut on Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim, however, the 11 minute pilot was released online this week.
The plot of the 11-minute pilot involves Black Dynamite and his crew being recruited by the CIA to recover a group of rogue psy-ops operatives who are plotting to take over the world by controlling its children. The operatives just happen to be foul-mouthed, gun-toting analogues to the beloved Sesame Street characters. Their ringleader, and the highlight of the show, is one T.F. (”That Frog”) Curtis, a spaghetti-limbed puppet played with lisping, pimped-out, expletive-laced gusto by J.B. Smoove.
Black Dynamite, the movie, was anything but restrained and prudish, but the animated pilot boasts a tone and sensibility that is even more raucus than the film. Unfettered from the budget restraints of live action, and seemingly unmoored from the influence of the MPAA, the animated Black Dynamite is more violent, sexy and profane than his movie counterpart. While it was not above (below?) the movie version of Black Dynamite to exploit his sexual prowess in order to extract the secret of Colonel Sanders’ fried chicken recipe, we never saw anything close to the giddy raunchiness of a puppet slapping Black Dynamite’s sidekick, Cream Corn, across the face with his “frog dick.” Visually, and in its sensibilities, the animated Black Dynamite feels like the fever dream of The Boondocks’ Riley Freeman after a bout with the fried chicken flu. (This may stem from the fact that the cartoon boasts some of the same creative team as The Boondocks, including artist, LeSean Thomas.)
One of my favorite pull quotes was found on the back of Frank Miller’s Elektra: Assassin, which read “…I think we need to protect our children from this.” The quote was attributed to the Fort Worth Evening Star-Telegram. I’m inclined to believe the reviewer intended for the line to denigrate the book, but it just served to celebrate the work’s rebellious, manic, sexy and violent spirit. To me, and I’m sure that to whoever authorized its use on the Elektra: Assassin compilation, the line was the highest compliment. Well, I think we need to protect our children from Black Dynamite: The Animated Series.
- JEP
