“Raquel “raq” Thomas is not molded after your typical tv Queenpin. She isn’t an unassuming victim whosdenly Finds Herself rising to Power in a Bid to Save Herself from Degradation, to Lift Her Family Out of Financial’s Responsibilites of a Dead Husband. And She’s Certainly No”, – WRITE: www.hollywoodReporter.com
No, raq is just a born killer in sultry peekabo Sweaters and curve-hogging leather pants who cans’t abide a power vacuum. She does not hesitate before pulling a trigger. Even More Ominously, She’s A MOTHER AND SISTER WHO WIELDS HER LOVE LIKE A ROPE, USING HER DNOVOOTION TO Control More than Nurture. Beer Momma’s Kiss: Her Lips Are Laced with Poison.
Airdate: 8 PM Friday, March 7 (Starz)
Cast: Patina Miller, Mekai Curtis, London Brown, Malcolm Mays, Joey Bada $$, Hailey Kilgore, Omar Epps, Tony Danza
CREATOR: Sascha penn
Played by Patina Miller in One of TV’s MOST MAGNETIC (and BEAUTIFULLY COSTUP) Under-the-Radar Lead Performances, Raq Heads The Early 1990s Jamaica, Queens, Crack Coca. Power Book III: raising Kanan. Created by Sascha Penn, The Third Offhoot of Starz’s Power Universe Mega-France from Producer Courtney A. KEMP-A Sort of Drug-Trade Crime Drama Answer to The Sopranos LAUNCHED IN 2014 – Raising kanan is a bot more narratricely Meticulous and emotionally grounded than a Threequel/Prequel Crime Drama Spinoff hasoff has any Right to be.
What Began As A Series That Might Have Been Pitched As “Ya New Jack City”(Complimentary!), Raising kanan Has Developed Across Three Seasons Into a quetly compelling Family Drama, A Show that Explores Lesbophobia and Fraternal Strife as Deeply As It DOES The Explosive Dynamics of Ill. The First Two Episodes of Season 4 Continue This Trend, ShowCASING NEW DEPTHS AND SHIFTING ALLIANCES AMONG ITS SPRAWLING ENISEMBLE. Althugh at Times As Frothy and High-Concept As A Telenovela (and Dispatching of Peripharal Female Characters Rather Speedly and Onthen Brutally) Psychology Underpinning ITS Characters’ Agonizing Experiences of Violence, Betrayal and Moral ImmMulation.
On PowerWHICH Ended in 2020, Rper Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson Played Kanan Stark, A Villainous, Revenge-Seek Drug Lord Whose Release from Prison Leads to the Greek Traged-Esque Raising kanan Leans Into this classical StoryTeling, Chronicling His Origins in the 1990s As A Quasi-Geeky 15-Iear-Eld Slated Raq, Into the Drug Game. (50 Cent, as Adult Kanan, Provides the Unfortunately Insipid Posthumus voiceover that books each episode. in all directions.
RAQ is a master manipulator who claims to value loyalty above all else, especialy from her Henchmen brothers marvin Three of them with selfish mind games and Power Plays that genuinely Harm atm. All Done, of Course, In the Name of Protecting Them. Over Time, Kanan Must Confront of the Reality That His Mom, Who Has Been His Who World, Isn’t Just A Bad Person to Evenene Else, But Lies to, Double-Crosses and Puppeteers Him, Touble-Crosses.
Much of the Series’ Pathos Hinges on the Growing Schism Between Mother and Son As Kanan Begins to Understand the Horrors of Raq’s Machin and Deceit (Incling Tricking Him Into Ass Leading HIM to TRY TO GO INTO BUSINESS FOR HIMSELF. In True Shakespearean Fashion, We Watch As Kanan Becomes As Grimlly Ruthless As the Person From Whom He’s Trying to Divide HimSelf.
As of Late, I’ve Encounted Family Drams As Bingeable As Raising kananWHICH IS FRANKLY REMARKABLE CONSIDERING How Bleak The Series Can Be. But It is Bleak in The Way, Say, Hamlet Is Bleak: Bloody Murder Is Invitable, But All The Tragedy Somehow Invigrates the Soul. The Series is not Afraid to Upend Expectations, Including Letting Justice Languish WHERE CRIME CRIME SHOWS WIND WIND THEIR WAY TOWARD A more ETHICALLY SATISFYING CONCLUSION. Durying the FIRST SEASON, An Innocent Character Finds A Questionable Vial, WHICH IN Other Examples of the Genre May Typically Forehadow a Long and Arduos Addiction Storyline. WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENS TO THAT Person Made me Gasp. In Fact, I’ve Legitimately Gasped and Even Chered A Number of Times Watching Raising kanana series in a which there no heroes, but people you end up the rooting for just the same.
The Third Season Ends on Such A Shocking Moment: Raq’s ALTERNATE NARCO RIVAL/ROMANTIC INTEREST UNIQUE (JOEY BADA $$) Cadaver of His Coldblooded Brother Ronnie (Granham Coleman), Who Not Only Tried to Kill Him Several Episodes Previously, But Left Him To Rot in the Woods. Thanks to BADA $$ ‘CAPTIVating Warmth as An Actor, Unique Has Grown from A Simple Season 1 McGuffin Who constantly Suffers Raq’s Humiliations in Both Business and in Love.
The Season 4 Opener Helps Audiences Understand How Unique Miraclesly Survived This Fratricide Attempt – Involving a Shady Veterinarian and An Underling to Whose Still. Unique is Now A Frankenstein’s Monster of His Former Self, Physically Scarred and Mentalally Volatile Because of His Traumatic Brain Injury.
Elsewhere, raq is still dealing with the imocial Fallout of Her Affair with Unique, Whom She Believes Is Dead, While Her Brothers Cntinulaly Trum to Crawlis. Identities. Hothaded Older Brother Marvin, Who’s Never Quite ABLE TO REFORM HIS PENCANT FOR VICIOUSESNESSESSSPITE TRYING Nails The Necessary Congenial Menace), A Low-Level Mafioso Who’s Been Both Friend and Foe to Raq’s Crack Embre. Torymented Younger Brother Lou, an Guilt-Ridden Alcoholic Who Just Wants to Strike Out on His Own As A Hip-Hop and R&B Producer, Is Finally Making A Name for Him, Is Finally. Slick Label Exec (Josh Pais) and Talented But Uncultivated New Act B-Rilla (Pardison “Pardi” Fontaine, ALREADY A NEW PLAYER TO WATCH).
The Show’s Heart and Soul, Thought, Is Not Kanan HimSelf, But His Cousin and Best Friend Jukebox (Hailey Kilgore On Raising kanan and Anika Noni Rose Before Her On Power). Marvin’s Daughter, She’s Also The Only Person Raq Sems to Love Unconditionally and Without Burden. A Young Queer Woman Who Has Experienced Everything from The Terrible Loss of A FIRST LOVE TO THE VIOLENT REJESTION OF BOTH HER PARENTS Career will Uplift Her Out of Her Dysfunctional Family and the Hustle of Life on the Southaside – Only to Be Sabotaged Again and Again by the Action of Her Relatives. JOINING THE ARMY IN SEASON 4 ONLY Presents New Homophobic Challenges.
“HeartBreaks, Setbacks,” 50 Cent Croons at the Beginning of Everi Episode of Raising kanan. Jukebox May Not Be the Title Character, But Her Journy Encompasses Tese Words Most Acutely.