Define "Superteam" and we'll argue from there

Last night, DeMarcus Cousins agreed to a one year $5.3 million deal with the Golden State Warriors. This caused an eruption amongst basketball fans who believed the Warriors have become even more unstoppable with this new addition. In the midst of the uproar, one word—or two, depending on who ask— has popped up more than others: superteam. 

The term “super team” has become a buzz word as of late. The truth is, super teams have become not a feature, but a direction that the NBA has shifted to as big market teams scramble in an arms race to become a juggernaut and guarantee championship contention.

Many blame the Miami Heat from 2010-2014 for being the first super team, others go as far back as the 60s Celtics and Lakers. Examples from the past decade include the 2003-04 Lakers with Kobe Bryant, Gary Payton, Shaquille O’Neal, and Karl Malone; the 2008-09 Boston Celtics with Paul Pierce, Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen; even the 2008-09 Los Angeles Lakers with Kobe Bryant, Pau Gasol and Andrew Bynum.

Now, every team with at least three all-stars is considered a super team, regardless of when those players were all-stars. The Oklahoma City Thunder is a super team because of Russell Westbrook, Paul George and Carmelo Anthony. The 2014-15 Cleveland Cavaliers were considered a super team because they had LeBron James, Kyrie Irving and Kevin Love. Even the Houston Rockets of this past season with Chris Paul and James Harden were deemed a super team despite being an all-star short.

With the debates intensifying on what’s considered a super team, who started it and whether this is ruining the NBA. It's time we clearly define a super team and its criteria. Here is a suggestion to start.

A super team must have all of the following characteristics:

1. Team must be already well-established, with a 50+ win record and a deep playoff run in the previous season.

2. Acquisition of at least one all-star in his prime.  

3. All the core players are in their respective primes.

Given those characteristics, the number of so-called examples has been substantially reduced. Let's also look into the word “super” which, in this case implies that the team was already great. An archaic definition of the word defines someone who’s super as an extra, unwanted person. This further proves the legitimacy of the first criterion. For someone who is extra and not needed to enter the frame shows that the original party was successful without its newest member. Thus, turning a great team into a superteam.

Moving on to the second and third criteria, what's important to consider with both is context. Context is something that is often lost in sports history, but it's critical for evaluation. 

Taking a team that was scraping the bottom of the barrel or keeping its head above water and suddenly giving it a couple of hall of famers isn’t a super team. Taking a team that already had a championship(s) and adding ring chasing, soon to be hall of fame veterans is not a super team. Taking a team that in two years won a championship and achieved the most wins in a single season and adding a superstar, that’s a super team.

This isn’t to single out Golden State, but in looking at what they’ve achieved before and after getting Kevin Durant, their case stands out from the rest of the “super teams” people have mentioned.

Had it been Tim Duncan who joined the Lakers instead of Karl Malone in the 2003-04 season, that would’ve been a super team without question. If any of the MVP versions (’05 and ’06) of Steve Nash joined the Lakers with Dwight Howard in the 2011-12 season, that would’ve been a super team. If the Cavaliers went 53-19 and made it to the Eastern Conference Finals before getting LeBron James and Kevin Love, instead of finishing 33-49 when LeBron came back home, that would’ve been a super team. If Carmelo Anthony was any version of himself from 2014 and earlier, the Thunder would be a super team.  

Since none of the scenarios I mentioned were the case, these teams weren't and aren't super teams, they're just teams with a stacked roster. There's a difference between being stacked and being super. Both of which need to be taken into consideration when looking at a particularly franchise's dominance. 

By these criteria, the Big Three Era of the Miami Heat was not a super team because the Miami Heat were not successful in the 2009-10 season. They were three wins shy of a 50 win season and they were eliminated in the first round of the playoffs to the Boston Celtics. 

The Big Three in Miami may have popularized stacked rosters and all-stars teaming up in the modern era, but even that is a laughable statement because the Celtics did it two years prior. The only differences are the Celtics did it on a smaller scale and they won one less championship. Attributing LeBron and The Big Three for starting the superteam trend is completely inaccurate.

While my criteria isn't canon, a definition must be agreed upon in order for any debates or conversations to progress. With it, we can pinpoint the real originators of this phenomenon and possibly use their history to predict the fate of the Golden State Warriors and all of the other "super teams" to come. 

Power seasons 3 and 4 recap with Sunshine

We are hours away from Season 5 of Power. If you haven’t watched or re-watched the show to get yourself up to speed, Sunshine and I have got you covered.

Things we left out from Season 2

- There’s a new chief in Angie’s department, Mike Sandoval. He’s brought on to lead the pursuit on Lobos. At first he’s adversarial to Angie, but they soon come to respect and trust each other.

- One of the men in Ghost’s syndicate, Carlos Ruiz, has a worker (Nomar) who is secretly in a relationship with his under aged daughter. Angie sniffs this guy out and uses him as a mole in an attempt to nab Ghost.

- Ruiz finds out about Nomar and his daughter and he contacts Tommy to have him killed.

- Tommy and Lobos get locked up. Lobos on various charges, Tommy for killing Nomar.

- Ghost and Angie realize the truth about each other.

- Angie clones Ghost’s phone and Ghost uses 

- Angie’s witness account (Ruiz’s daughter) against her in court which leads to Tommy being free. Lobos is still in jail and an assassination attempt leaves him bedridden for a while. 

- Lobos calls Tommy and gives him an ultimatum, either kill Ghost or be killed.

- Simon Stern, some sort of nightclub mogul becomes Ghost’s adversary in the business world. Ghost wants working with him as partners, Stern simply wants to own Truth. They go back and forth trying to get what they want. This gives Ghost an added challenge for his business ventures.

Season 3

Ghost is “out”

After killing off everybody in the syndicate except for Ruiz and Tommy. Ghost is out of the drug game. Or so he thinks. He believes Lobos is dead after the assassination attempt in his cell. Little does he know that Lobos is alive and he’s trying to turn Tommy against him. But hey, at least Ghost tried. Once a drug dealer, always a drug dealer, right?

Ghost and Angie *smh*

Tasha and Ghost split up and tell the kids… I would say this was a sad moment, but not really. It wasn’t even set up to be emotional. It was just a “heads up, Mom and Dad aren’t going to be together anymore. Dad’s moving in with his side piece he's had on the sideline for 20 years now. But we still love you guys and it has nothing to do with you!” Angela and Ghost try to have a real relationship, but there's no way it will actually work because her office is legit looking him.

Things move fast as Ghost’s kids stay at Angie’s place. It was like he moved in and was like “ok, you need to meet the kids right this second.” During their stay Tariq finds Angela’s gun in her briefcase and takes it to school. This is lowkey the beginning of Tariq jumping off the porch and losing his ever loving mind. Tariq had no business sneaking and looking around her apartment, but at the same time, she should have had it locked up…she knew they were coming over.

Tommy’s calling shots

Still, not on good terms with Ghost, Tommy is in charge of the syndicate, but it soon becomes clear that he isn’t the level headed leader Ghost is. It could be because of the lingering fact that if he doesn’t kill Ghost, Lobos will kill him and Holly. Holly finds out about this and she tries to encourage Tommy to go through with it.

Unfortunately for Holly, Tommy’s unyielding loyalty can’t bring him to kill his best friend. Holly is devastated and takes matters into her own hands by ordering a hit on Ghost. The hit is foiled by Ghost’s top notch security led by a mysterious, cock eyed man named Dean. {Sidenote: after learning that Lobos is in fact still alive, he beefs up his security. Thus enters Dean.}

Upon hearing about the hit and assuming that it was successful, Tommy kills Holly by choking her to death. This is SO crazy and unexpected. Tommy was obsessed with this girl and wanted to give her the world and live in this fairytale, but sus just couldn’t hang. She wanted to be in SO bad! She wanted him to go against someone he’s been rocking with since childhood. She really thought he would choose her over Ghost?

Ghost finds Tommy in the apartment with Holly dead on the floor. They reconcile and agree to kill Lobos. As part of a “deal” with the Mexican federales, Lobos is supposed to be transferred from prison. Ghost uses this transfer as the moment to strike. Things go south pretty quick, but ultimately Lobos is killed.

The MF who eats people

Ghost tries to fire Dean and Dean reveals himself to be Milan, the Serbian kingpin boogeyman who eats people. Milan is my favorite antagonist in the show. He’s the only person who had Ghost shook for a while. Because Milan worked as Ghost’s security, he has intel and access to every single detail of Ghost’s life.

Milan comes in the picture because in the previous season, Tommy and Ruiz sabotage a shipment of his and leave it for the police. Milan makes Ghost and Tommy work for him to repay what they owe. There’s no telling how long that will take, but one thing is for certain, Angie has to go. She’s too much of a liability and the amount of danger she’s in is unparalleled. In an effort to take care of it, Ghost dumps Angie and it leaves the two of them boo-hoo crying. Ghost used his kids as an excuse, if only she knew the real reason…

Despite making it clear that Milan will have Ghost and Tommy and their families killed if they try anything slick, Ghost STILL tries to get one over on him. This plan involves Ruiz who is also working as a rat for Greg. Tommy kills Ruiz to foil Ghost’s plan and he confronts Ghost over jeopardizing their lives and lying to Tommy about it.

As Tommy’s trust in Ghost wanes, he starts to get in good with Milan. Like so many who have already tried and failed, Milan tries to get Tommy to turn on Ghost. Unbeknownst to him, Ghost and Tommy are “tight like a pair of balls,” as Kanan puts it, and the duo outsmart Milan and kill him with relative ease. It was pretty disappointing that Milan couldn’t make it past season 3. The fact that it took way longer to get rid of Lobos than him was pretty unsettling given how much smarter and more calculated he was.   

The Return of Kanan

As the season 2 finale suggested, Kanan survived his skirmish with Ghost and subsequent roast. For the first part of the season he is laying low and rehabbing with Jukebox, a dirty cop who overzealously shares Kanan's desire to get back at Ghost. They hatch a plan to kill Tariq. This leads to Kanan getting close to Tariq and being somewhat of an uncle to him.

Tariq's association with Kanan (whom he calls Slim because he doesn't know his true identity) and Jukebox's crew starts his descent into a punk ass, petty thug. He starts sippin lean, acting up at home and not trusting his parents. When Kanan discovers Tariq's disdain for Ghost, he decides against killing him and instead brings him under his wing. Tariq becomes the son that Kanan never had in Shawn and the new plan is to kidnap Tariq for ransom.

Lakeisha’s weave shop

Tasha uses her best friend Lakeisha’s shop as a place to launder drug money and Lakeisha is not happy. I think she should have just told her “girl” from jump what it was. I’m pretty sure she already knew her lifestyle, or maybe she didn’t (idk), but even if she didn’t, I KNOW she could have easily told her and she would’ve been happy with a nice cut of the profit. But still, Lakeisha’s involvement in the business makes her a liability. One that Milan makes Tommy take care of.

Hard Knox Life

After a near death experience during the Lobos transfer, Greg shakes it off and is back on his quest to bring Ghost and Angela down. With the way things went down with Lobos, it’s clear that Lobos had a mole in Greg’s department. In this moment Greg is at his most focused. Even Angie sleeping with him again to show her loyalty won’t deter him.

Greg tries to get Ghost to fess up, but he ultimately embarrasses himself. However, he does manage to identify Mike as Lobos’ mole. This discovery is short lived as Mike kills him almost immediately after he finds out. Angie is devastated to hear about Greg’s death and she suspects Ghost is responsible. Moments before Greg’s murder, Ghost breaks into his apartment to snoop around for a recording of Ruiz that could incriminate him and Tommy. When Angie looks around Greg’s place, she finds evidence that Ghost was there and uses it to bring him down.

Finale

Season 3 ends with Angie coming to Truth to embarrass the hell out of Ghost and arrest him for allegedly murdering Greg. This was the pettiest thing she did. I have to agree with my honey, Angela was very Petty Betty. She knew Ghost hasn't/wouldn't be that sloppy with leaving evidence around. He's a drug dealer. He's done some things to get where he is and has YET to be caught soooo he would not pretty much leave out things/hand over evidence.

I mean, why come to the man’s business and shame him for something that he didn’t do? If she weren’t so spiteful and heartbroken she would’ve had the decency to arrest him in a less public setting. She knows where he lives, she knows where his office is, she knows when Truth closes, there were so many ways to make it less public, but nope. She chose to ruin his image. So once again, just as things are looking up for Ghost, something happens in the club that undoes all the progress he’s made.

Season 4

Free Ghost!

Ghost is arrested for the murder of agent Gregory Knox. If he is convicted he gets the death penalty. The first 3/4s of the season is a courtroom drama. It’s a circus in and out of the courtroom. Angie tries to win the case to get back in high esteem with her coworkers who know about her romance with Ghost. Mike tries to frame Ghost and make it out without getting caught. Tasha and Tommy try to keep the family and business together while working with Ghost’s legal team to prove his innocence. Behind bars, Ghost is dealing with a warden who wants him dead (played by the late, great Charlie Murphy) and an ex-mobster who turns out to be Tommy’s father.

Eventually after looking at the security footage from Truth, Angie discovers that Ghost wasn’t in Greg’s apartment during the murder, which makes him innocent. She then switches her energy to proving he’s not the culprit and tries to find the real killer. She and Mike have a standoff that results in Mike’s arrest and Ghost’s release. Despite Angie sticking her neck out for him and putting her job on the line, she’s not happy with Ghost in the slightest. Things will probably turn around though because they can’t seem to stay away from each other.   

This whole thing was a bit dragged out because we knew that Ghost would eventually be free. The show didn’t do anything to lead us to believe otherwise. Even when they tried to drop the ball with the death penalty, it was like the writers said “okay, let’s turn it up a notch.”

Lakeisha and Tommy

After the whole fiasco with Lakeisha’s weave shop, it is revealed that Tommy didn’t kill her, but hid her. The two begin a relationship, which, I don’t even know what to say about this….Lakeisha just wanted to be with somebody, clearly, and Tommy was trying to get over Holly. It doesn’t help that she was pregnant when Tommy killed her, and when he finds that out it sends him over the edge.

Kanan and… Ghost?

After Ghost is freed, the plan to kidnap Tariq is back in full swing. Kanan ends up helping Ghost rescue him from Jukebox. It’s an unexpected twist that puts Kanan in a redeeming light. In the process of saving Tariq, Kanan reveals his true identity and the fact that he killed Shawn. Tariq’s innocence and trust is completely shattered at this point and he continues to act a fool.  

How Tasha got her groove back

Tasha develops a relationship with Silver, one of the lawyers from Ghost’s new legal team when he was fighting the Knox case. Many male fans were outraged by this and called Tasha a whole bunch of names. I find it funny how the same people who are mad at Tasha had nothing to say when Ghost was living his best life with Angela in Miami and was tip toeing to and from her place while still living under the same roof as Tasha.  

The big debate/problem is that Tasha slept with more people outside of her marriage than Ghost. Okay cool… my problem is the DIFFERENCE in how they went about it. Ghost said “efff my wife and kids” the SECOND he slept with Angela….why do I say that? Well because that’s his old lover. He saw a future with this woman. It wasn’t a casual relationship ever and he NEVER got over her. That’s heartbreaking and just wrong. Imagine how you would feel. You’ve been married to this man for yearsssss, and this women from his past swoops in and he will throw away everything he built with you in a second. Tasha didn’t start messing with Shawn until after she found out about Angie.

It honestly doesn’t matter who’s wrong because this marriage has been unofficially over for a while now. The only reason there isn’t a divorce is because, like Tasha’s mom said in season 1, “you can’t take his illegal money.” So Tasha is going to continue to sleep with the next black man who walks through her door and works for Ghost while stashing away some money for herself and “accidentally” sabotaging every attempt Ghost makes to fully go legit with his nightclub. I knew there was no hope for them when Ghost bought Tasha a new ring and then revealed that it was only to maintain appearances.

Meet the St. Patricks

Speaking of appearances, after Ghost is freed he realizes that he must work to clean his image and re-establish himself as an upstanding figure in the community. In doing so he becomes involved with a shifty politician by the name of Rashad Tate. Tate knows Ghost’s double life and the two have a very “you scratch my back, I scratch yours” relationship, but Tate has something on Ghost and chances are he won’t hesitate to use it if need be.

Tariq the avenger

Fresh off of a kidnapping, Tariq is still sipping lean and cutting up. He hasn’t cut off his ties with Jukebox’s crew, Ray and Ray and Brains, and he becomes an accomplice in their home invasions. During one of them, Tariq walks in on a rape and reveals Brains’ identity which causes them to murder the victim. Things go south for Tariq at that point as he is now on the run from Ray Ray.

Tariq’s twin sister Raina has noticed his change in behavior and is concerned about the trouble he’s gotten himself in. She confronts Ray Ray outside of their school dance and he kills her. Tariq takes Tasha’s gun and kills Ray Ray to avenge Raina’s death. This is a family affair that sees Ghost, Tommy, and Tasha arrive just in time to clean up all the evidence. They moved so quick it was almost like watching a NASCAR pit crew at work.

It would’ve been nice to see Ray Ray actually getting dropped rather than just hearing a gunshot and “wondering” who got hit. Because it wasn’t like the show was REALLY going to kill of Raina AND Tariq. Given all that Tariq has been through, him getting his first body is another rite of passage into him becoming a hardened criminal. This is the last thing Ghost and Tasha want for him as Tasha takes the blame for the murder to protect him. This unofficially ends any chance of her and Silver’s relationship going further as she appoints him to be her lawyer.  

Finale/Dre must die

After working under Ghost in the beginning of season 3, Dre believes he is primed to become the new huncho in the drug business. He is mistaken, however, when Ghost and Tommy, promote Julio, their longtime associate. To make matters worse, Dre finds out that Kanan is alive and their relationship has taken a turn for the worse. With the looming threat of Kanan’s existence and Julio’s promotion, Dre grows impatient and decides to boss up on his own terms. He does so by teaming up with Cristobal, a lizard looking member of the syndicate, and forming an alliance with the Jimenez brothers, the brother and sister duo behind the notorious Jimenez Cartel. Their notoriety was well known in previous seasons due to their rivalry with Lobos.  

Dre slowly but surely sets off a powder keg that will put Ghost and Tommy at war with Dre and the Jimenez Cartel. Kanan joins Ghost and Tommy as an ally in the war, setting things up for an explosive season 5.

Power seasons 1 and 2 recap with Sunshine

When Game of Thrones was popping last summer, Power was also the talk of the town during its fourth season run. Since its premiere in 2014, the 50 Cent produced drama series has increased in ratings as more people become drawn to the crime underworld of the big, rich town. Power returns this Sunday with its 5th season. Because it’s been a while since we’ve seen Ghost, Tommy, Angie and the rest, my wonderful girlfriend and I here to bring you up to speed on all that’s happened. 

Season 1  

Power follows James “Ghost” St. Patrick, a drug dealer who aspires to leave the drug game and fully invest in his career as a New York nightclub owner. Unfortunately, this is a desire that nobody in his life shares with him. The closest to him being his wife Tasha, who is the mother of his three kids and has been down since Day 1, and his best friend and drug dealing partner, Tommy. 

Throughout the series nobody appears more determined to keep Ghost as a drug dealer than his own wife Tasha. She sees Ghost as the biggest drug dealer in N.Y. and nothing else, and she intends to keep it that way. Honestly, if she wasn’t this way, maybe I’d be more supportive of their marriage. From their very first interaction we can see that Ghost is not that into Tasha.

Tasha: “Tell me I’m beautiful”

Ghost: “You know you are”

And that was that. For the rest of the night, Ghost proceeded to ignore Tasha as she did everything she could to get his attention. Even in their intimate moments he has his mind on other things. With all that said there is little reason to be invested in their relationship or believe it’s rooted in anything beyond the grit and glamor of the drug game.

One night Ghost sees his high school sweetheart, Angela Valdes, and he falls in love with her all over again. To Ghost, Angie represents the life he wants to live. Because unlike Tasha, she sees a lot of potential in him *rolls eyes* *throw up emoji*. It’s sad seeing Ghost trick himself into believing he can live a life he can’t have. And this is made even more impossible in the fact that Angie is a U.S. attorney. So throughout the whole show they play a Cat and Mouse game while carrying on a liaison that gets them both out of focus. They both have their heads so far up each other’s asses that they can’t see anything in front of them.   

Meanwhile while all of this is blossoming, Tommy begins a relationship Tommy with Holly, a bottle service girl at Ghost’s nightclub Truth. She stops working there once they’re together and personally, I don’t like this because at any moment things could go wrong and she’s not going to have any money. Luckily, Tommy is head over heels for Holly, so she’s secured.

On the business side of things, somebody robs Ghost’s people during a supply shipment and Ghost tries to figure out who it is. To further add to his worries, a pink sneaker donning assassin is making hits on some of the turf leaders, and everyone is suspicious as to who she is and who she works for. 

Ghost seeks guidance from Kanan, his former mentor who is days away from finishing his jail sentence. It turns out that the assassin is working for Kanan, who plans to have Ghost killed by the time he’s out of jail so that he can take back his spot as the top drug dealer.   

In the season finale the assassin fails to kill Ghost in his nightclub, but instead shoots Holly who reveals that she knows about Ghost’s double life. 

Season 2

Kanan is back on the street and he’s bent on revenge. Because Ghost wasn’t killed, he decides his best course of action is to sabotage Ghost’s operation from the inside. Kanan quickly becomes my favorite character, not only because he’s badass, he’s the most consistent character. There’s no love interest that causes him to lose focus (although he unsuccessfully tries to get with Tasha). He sticks to the plan and will eliminate anybody who threatens or gets in the way. 

One of my favorite Kanan moments is when he cuts off a guy’s tongue, literally duct tapes it to his hand, stuffs him in the trunk of a car, and has Dre—Kanan’s newest mentee—kill him as part of a lesson in keeping his men in line. Let me paint the picture again: this guy was running his mouth, so Kanan cut his tongue off and made him hold it to teach him a lesson in holding his tongue. He turned an expression into a literal demise. What a boss. 

Anyways, Kanan’s son, Shawn, is Ghost’s driver and secretly a mole for Kanan, however Shawn doesn’t know this. It could be because he’s too busy creeping with Tasha to realize anything. That’s right, Tasha is having an affair as well. Towards the end of season 1 Shawn tells her about Ghost and Angie and she sees them for herself. She confronts Ghost and tells him to shut it down, and he said he did, but in actuality he did not.

In fact, he and Angela go on a vacation to Miami. It’s really a business trip for Ghost, but he invites Angie and they live it up as if they are a couple. They even go as far as referring to Angie as Mrs. St. Patrick, which pretty much does it for me. He has a whole wife and children, told that same wife that this affair was over and now is on vacay with his side piece? Yepp, he’s trash. Throw him away.

During that vacay Ghost confronts the assassin but is unable to really talk to her because Dre kills her before Ghost can reach her. In her dying words she leads Ghost to suspect that Kanan was behind the hits and he’s out to get him. 

Angela finds out Ghost and Jamie are the same person...does she do anything with this? Not really! She just tries her best to not believe it. At the same time, her department gets wind of Ghost and try to bring him and Lobos, Ghost’s supplier, down. The most zealous one in Angie’s department is Greg Knox, Angie’s jealous  ex-boyfriend who discovers that she’s with Ghost and vies to bring them both to justice. 

Meanwhile Tommy is conflicted because as Holly tries to get involved in the business, she makes Tommy choose between her and Ghost. Ghost sees that Holly is a threat and tries to pay her to leave without a trace. Tommy finds out about this when Holly returns and he unfriends Ghost for a while. 

Things are lowly unraveling for the worst in Ghost’s personal life but he is convinced that he has things under control. Tasha wants answers (why Angie?) This is a GREAT question. Not really great, but very interesting. You want to know why your husband/boyfriend/ lover/ spouse/partner chose this person. What about this person is SOOO great that you would throw away everything we’ve built with no regrets and no turning back? For me this would be an emotional scene. Like how could you? Why would you?

She initially wants a divorce, but her mom slaps some sense in her. She has no money, no job and no place to go. Shawn tells her that they can leave with the kids and start a new life together, but those plans are soon foiled. Shawn, in his infinite naivety confronts Ghosts with the intent to kill him as part of Kanan’s plan. 

Instead he nearly gets himself killed and Ghost spares his life. Shawn then confronts Kanan after learning that he was being used this whole time. Kanan, not being as compassionate as Ghost, kills his own son and he and Ghost duke it out. Ghost emerges as the victor and leaves Kanan to die in a burning building, however, it is revealed that he managed to escape.  

Movie Review: 'Superfly' makes its fortune by and by

As the upcoming rappers get younger and younger, Scarface and New Jack City references are bound to become archaic. Oddly enough, you’re more likely to hear a Rick and Morty reference, or some homage to a Nickelodeon show than a mafioso shoutout. 

With a new generation of rappers who were yet to be thought of during the time when so many of these gangster legends were popular, who will the kids have as their Nino Brown? 

Have no fear, the new Youngblood Priest is here!   

Superfly is a remake of the classic 1972 blaxploitation film Super Fly directed by Gordon Parks, Jr. and written by Phillip Fenty (no relation to Robyn.) Both films follow Youngblood Priest, a drug dealer looking to make his last big score which will make him rich enough to quit the drug game. 

Should you watch the original to understand the remake? Not really. A skim through of the original’s Wikipedia page should do. All you really need to know about Super Fly is that Curtis Mayfield produced the soundtrack which includes the title track and “Pusherman,” both of which appear in this movie.

I was apprehensive about seeing a movie directed by a music video director (Director X), but Superfly exceeded my expectations. Upon seeing the trailer, many would expect the movie to be one long music video or a corny BET TV film with a big budget. Superfly is neither of the two. It’s actually a pretty good crime film in tune with the hip hop culture and what’s going on in society.    

The costume designers probably deserve the biggest round of applause. Everything was on point from the cars, guns and clothing. It really made Atlanta look like a world where luxury and the underworld are entangled. Priest’s perm may not be a fashion for most men this Summer, but it definitely serves its purpose in giving his character an iconic look. The Snow Patrol had the best costume design hands down. The all white everything ensemble from their guns to their Air Forces made them look intimidating and silly at the same time. 

The cameos were great too, there were plenty of people in Superfly that made you go “wait, isn’t that…?” Some of the cameos are done so subtly that if you aren’t up on who’s who then you won’t think anything of it. In the words of Pusha T, if you know, you know.  

Superfly’s writing also deserves an applause for its authentic dialogue and consistent pacing. Nothing was forced or felt exaggerated. There were also some moments in the movie that had what I like to call “tight writing,” which is essentially when a potential plot hole is plugged before it can appear. 

For a while the movie keeps you in the blind about what’s to come of Priest and his right hand man Eddie, and I was curious to see where they would end up. It was a fun ride to experience, and like any good ride, I only wish that it was longer. 

!! WARNING !! mild spoilers ahead. To read my concluding thoughts on Superfly you can skip ahead to right about…

My biggest issue with Superfly is in the way it wraps up. With about 20 minutes left in the movie Priest has this eureka moment where he realizes that all his adversaries set themselves up to play themselves, and it’s pretty much over from there. For all that we went through for the past hour and a half, to see it all tie up so swiftly was a bit disappointing. I felt robbed of a well written ending. 

The movie could’ve been 2 and a half hours and I would’ve been fine with that, just give me a great ending. It was like Alex Tse was writing the script and somebody—could've been Director X or Future—barged in and in a Chris Tucker voice said “Alex, you’re STILL writing the script?! Dayyyum! C’mon man, hurry up! Whatchu trying to win, an Oscar?! Wrap it up, man, the soundtrack been finished!” 

For what it’s worth, with the way things ended, it was hard for me to really believe anything was at stake for Priest. Which sucks because there were so many possibilities in which this movie could’ve ended. Even with the way it ended, it still could’ve came to that conclusion in a different way. 

Oh, and since you’re still here, let me get one last thing off my chest that isn’t so much about this movie as it is about media depictions of drug dealers in general. 

There’s a popular crime trope when it comes to drug dealers and their public image. This is most popularly seen in moments when he asks his significant other what she sees of him. 

“When you look at me *breathes in and broadens chest* what do you see?”

“Well, you’re not freaking Santa Claus!”

A lion is a lion and a drug dealer is a drug dealer. It doesn’t matter how many people are employed because of him, how many soup kitchens he opens or how many fur coats he owns. Superfly teased this topic into the mix, but it didn’t go beyond its initial conversation. 

No matter the good that may come from a drug dealer’s wealth the bottom line is this: you sell drugs. Drugs can hurt people. Drugs can make people hurt people. So no matter what, as long as you’re selling drugs, somebody is getting hurt, even if you’re making somebody else smile. 

Power has made this a running theme of the show and it’s kind of ridiculous. But the biggest difference between Priest and Ghost is that Ghost actually wants to venture into something legitimate. Priest just wants to cash out and dip. Which isn’t bad considering that Priest isn’t a family man like Ghost, and therefore doesn’t have the extrinsic motivation to reinvent himself into an honest man, but at the same time, I’d rather root for a guy who wants to do more than sip martinis on a yacht for the rest of his life.  

The “Drug dealer image” trope was recently best addressed in Moonlight during a powerful scene where Juan, played by Mahershala Ali, realizes the impact his business has on people in his own life. It puts things in perspective as he’s clearly deeply affected by this revelation. 

I get it though, Moonlight isn’t trying to tell the same story as Superfly or Power. But there’s something to be learned in the way Moonlight handled that part of the story that can be used in future crime films and shows to come. 

… HERE!

Superfly is a pretty good movie that’s worth the full price and guaranteed to generate plenty of discussion. The only thing I hold against it is that it ended too quickly. 

If you want something a little grittier than The Incredibles 2, Superfly is your best option for this weekend. 

3.5/5