The Game season 5: back in style

I’m going to be honest: season four of The Game was hit and miss. Expectations for the comedy were high after it was resurrected by an unprecedented fan effort and found a new home at BET — and while it started strong, it didn’t always feel like the one comedy I actually loved. (Most of the time it wasn’t even a comedy at all.) Tuning in for the season five premiere, I have to admit that I was nervous, because I wasn’t sure what to expect.

As it turns out, “Skeletons/The Truth Pact,” the double episode that started season five, was a strong template for The Game‘s future, and not just this season. Melanie (Tia Mowry Hardrict) and Derwin (Pooch Hall) dealt with the revelation that Melanie had an abortion, and the fact that the child’s father wasn’t Derwin but her ex-boyfriend Trey Wiggs, who was now married with a daughter. As is usual for them, there was a lot of drama, but they eventually made peace. We’ve seen them break up and get back together, fight and get married, so it’s safe to say that Mel and Derwin have covered a lot of relationship territory. Especially now that Derwin is a father, there’s an opportunity here for the two of them to make that transition from their tumultuous twentysomethings into mature adulthood.

Jason (Coby Bell) was called out for having issues with black women by a one-night stand and then proceeded to deny he had issues for the whole episode, before admitting them to Chardonnay (Brandy Norwood), the bartender that he got fired … and then woke up in Mexico married to. At the end of the episode, he showed up at DJ’s birthday party still wearing his wedding ring, confirming that he and Chardonnay are going to be a couple. I have to admit that I hope they don’t last, as I still want to see Jason back with ex-wife Kelly (Brittany Daniel). At least Jason was finally a parent to his daughter Brittany … even if it was a protective, overbearing one.

It was Malik (Hosea Chanchez) who really shone in the premiere. Self-obsessed to the point of being insufferable last season, he was determined to save his new girlfriend Jenna (Tika Sumpter), no matter what his mother/agent Tasha (Wendy Raquel Robinson) thought. When Tasha realized that Malik was serious about Jenna — he even said ‘I love her’ — she reached into her wallet to pay off Jenna’s drug dealer. Tasha was still struggling with having dropped Derwin as a client in favor of Malik, but it seems that her son has finally started giving a damn about someone other than himself.

I’ll say that I’m cautious because it is only the premiere, and season four started strong too, before it went off the tracks. But the episode opened up a lot of ideas for where all the characters could go. They’ve been around for five seasons now, and none of them are young kids anymore; they’ve all got to move forward with their lives. Last season we saw Derwin get the stardom he’d always wanted — is it time for Melanie to pursue her career? It might help her self-worth, since at episode’s end, she was still uncomfortable with being DJ’s stepmother.

Many of the fans are vocal in their want to see Jason and Kelly back together, myself included. Brittany Daniel has taken the season off for personal reasons (and I wish her all the best), so we know they won’t make up in season five. But when we last saw Kelly, she was leaving to work on herself. It’s clear that Jason’s going to tackle at least one issue he has this season. Wouldn’t season six be a great time to bring them back together? It’ll have been three seasons since their split, so there’s no sense in keeping the fans waiting any longer. And both having worked on themselves, they could reconcile as a stronger couple — a far cry from the pair who admitted that neither of them married for love.

Then there’s Malik and Tasha. Malik has always been a character, and a lot of last season was about him, but now he seems to have really changed. Sticking with Jenna would be good for him on two fronts: he’d finally be in a long-term relationship (that marriage to Robin Givens doesn’t count!) and he’d have someone that he could give something back to. And if Malik finally grows up, maybe Tasha can let him go, and get a chance to live a little more for herself. She’s always looked out for Malik — as she says in the premiere, “family comes first” — but her life can’t be all about him.

This was a premiere that captured the old magic of The Game. Here was the show where I loved all the characters, even when they acted like complete fools. Here was the show that made me feel like I went as far back with them as they did with each other. Here’s the show that made me feel a sense of community, made me laugh, made me smile and sometimes even cry. This was what The Game is all about.

It’s a promising start for The Game, and with possibilities like these, the show could go for seasons more. It’s perfectly paired on Tuesday nights with Let’s Stay Together, which started its second season on Tuesday. It’s another ensemble show about relationships, with an intriguing cast. (As the put-upon Jamal, RonReaco Lee pretty much runs away with the thing.) It’s really kind of neat to see the characters of Let’s Stay Together just start figuring themselves out as the characters from The Game are established and moving into new areas of their lives. And if the rest of season five is as good as the premiere, I can’t wait to spend my Tuesday nights with them for years to come.

Clacked by Brittany Frederick
on Jan 11, 2012 @ 09:59 EST5EDT