Even after seven seasons, ABC's Black-ish remains must-see viewing.
Its stellar production and performances have earned the show 19 Emmy nominations,
an impressive feat considering the show also combines laugh-out-loud humor
with thought-provoking issues surrounding race in America.
As with any family show, it's heartwarming to see how the children in the cast have grown
over the years. The oldest kid characters, Junior and Zoey, are young adults now,
and the middle Johnson children, twins Jack and Diane, are in their teens.
Filming of the new season was delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic,
but Black-ish finally came back in October of last year. As the new episodes aired,
fans started to worry that one character — Marsai Martin's Diane — was noticeably absent.
Diane has become a fan favorite, although Martin doesn't like to call her loyal viewers fans,
as she told PopSugar. She said in an interview,
"They're more supporters or even family members because
they help you grow and feel supported and loved."
Distractify posted some representative tweets from concerned viewers, such as
"Ummmm.... where's Diane?"
and
"Yooo Diane ain't been [in] the last two episodes of Blackish."
Could it be that Martin had left the show and her fans-turned-family-members for other projects?
Or had the writers run out of ideas to highlight the show's middle children?
As it turns out, neither is true.
You could hear a collective sigh of relief when Diane reappeared in
an episode that aired on February 16th. Titled "High Water Mark," the episode's
primary plot line follows Dre's reaction to catching oldest son Junior with a joint.
But Diane and Jack have a fun subplot in which they help the seniors at their high
school pull off a class prank involving spray paint and the football field. Spoiler alert:
of course it's Diane who spray paints the football field, leaving Jack alone
as the lookout. And while the preview for the next episode doesn't highlight Diane or Jack,
there's no indication that the twins will be featured less often in future episodes.
Off the set, Marsai Martin is close to her castmates. On her Instagram feed,
she calls her TV siblings "big brother," "bruh," and "sis," and cites her TV parents,
Anthony Anderson and Tracee Ellis Ross, as her, quote, "favorite people."
And it's not just the cast that Martin has a good relationship with.
When Martin was 10 years old, she pitched the idea for the film Little to Black-ish
creator Kenya Barris, and Martin ultimately received an Executive Producer credit when
the film came out in 2019. Barris has always been impressed with Martin. Barris told NPR,
"From the moment we met her,
it was this pint-sized little ball of talent with these amazing glasses."
It looks like Martin is still very much active on Black-ish.
She's appeared in four of this year's episodes, including "High Water Mark."
If she doesn't appear as often on the show moving forward, it will be with good reason.
Martin may have become the youngest-ever executive producer in the business at 14,
but she isn't resting on her laurels. Her company, Genius Productions,
is coming out with its first film, StepMonster.
Pretty impressive for such a young star, but she told Jimmy Kimmel it's really a family affair.
"Not just me. It's my parents."
"Okay, so your parents are involved."
"Yeah, even though I'm, like, the boss."
The 16-year-old prodigy signed the deal with Universal to produce the
comedy about a teenager learning to live with a new stepmom in 2019.
Martin has also been busy as a voice actor in the upcoming Paw Patrol movie,
and as if she didn't have enough on her plate already,
Martin is also set to host ABC's new prime-time, six-episode series,
Soul of a Nation, which explores "authentic realities of Black life" in the United States.
Martin isn't just working for the sake of working. The actress told PopSugar that she has a mission:
to help other Black girls embrace their beauty. She said in the interview,
"We can do anything. We can change our style, our skin is beautiful
and comes in all different shades. Our inspirations, music, and culture are amazing.
There's just something cool about being Black. We're dope, and people should see that more."
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