INSECURE: A SHOW THAT’S MORE THAN SECURE WITH ITSELF

Insecure is an American Comedy-Drama Television Series created by Issa Rae and Larry Wilmore, and is partially based on Issa Rae's acclaimed Web Series, Awkward Black Girl. The original series premiered on YouTube in 2011. Insecure, a show that is similarly about the awkward experiences of a contemporary African-American woman, premiered online on September 23, 2016, via HBO Now and HBO Go, before airing weekly on HBO from October 9, 2016.

Insecure has received critical acclaim since its debut in 2016. In 2017, the American Film Institute selected it as one of the top 10 television programs of the year. In 2020, the series received eight Primetime Emmy Award nominations for its fourth season, including the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Comedy Series. For her performance on the series, Rae received two Golden Globe Award nominations for Best Actress – Television Series Musical or Comedy, in addition to three Primetime Emmy Award nominations for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series (2018, 2020 and 2022). Yvonne Orji received a Primetime Emmy Award nomination for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series in 2020 for her performance in the series.

The show currently has an impressive 97% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, with an Audience Score of 82%. It also has a Metascore of 84 (based on 63 critic reviews) on Metacritic, with a User Score of 7.3, and an 8/10 on IMDB (based on 20,000 reviews).

From the moment Issa Rae burst onto the Hollywood scene, starring in the pilot of the show she created, she has been a creative force. She created a show (in Insecure) that was unapologetically honest about dating, friendships and life as a modern black woman trying to get through life in a big city, and she managed to tell her tale with a hilariously fresh perspective. I personally think that the reason Insecure worked so well was because the show felt extremely personal to Rae, like the whole thing was written specifically for her (which, of course it was). That’s a television or film best case scenario, and not very many people walk into a situation that was tailor-made to fit them.

Issa was fantastic in the role of the main character, again I think because she was basically playing an exaggerated version of herself, which we’ve seen work wonders in comedies of the past like The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air or Martin. I think that the supporting cast was also well chosen, each of them doing an amazing job bringing their particular characters to life, while working well with the rest of the cast to bring a sincerity to the show that you don’t often see in comedies these days. And speaking of the comedy, the comedic situations in the show were funny, because they were expertly written into the storylines and they were extremely relatable, and it never felt like Rae was trying too hard to get a laugh. The jokes were well set up, and the punchlines were spread throughout the cast evenly, in a way that made the show feel more natural, instead of having a character or two that’s just there to be “the funny one”, like we see on some shows.

Issa Rae went a different way in route to breaking into Hollywood. Despite that fact, I have to say, she made the absolute most of her moment. And while I wonder if she may have peaked in her first at bat, because the table seemed perfectly set for her to succeed, I continue to root for her because I think she is one of the most important black voices in film and television today. This show was brilliantly conceived and expertly written, with a wide range of characters, all of them feeling extremely authentic. The stories from episode to episode were engaging, I think mostly because Rae had a creative way of making even the most mundane activities funny and interesting, and the season arcs were all handled extremely well. I do have a pet peeve about ending TV Shows with significant time jumps, because it usually means you didn’t write to a natural ending point, so you have to “cheat” to get to a good stopping place, but there are many reason why that may have happened, and quite honestly that’s the ONLY issue I had with the show. I never give a show a 100%, because to me that means that as a filmmaker you did everything exactly right, with no room for improvement, and I just don’t believe that’s a thing. But this show comes close, a highly commendable effort by Issa Rae and her team, and I certainly recommend it to anyone who has yet to see it.

You can watch Insecure on HBO Max, Hulu, Amazon Prime Video and YouTube TV (with subscription). It is also available on Apple TV, YouTube, Google Play Movies and Vudu (for $1.99 per episode).