Brooklyn Nine-Nine

EDIT: B99 WAS UNCANCELLED YA'LL :DDDDD (but keeping this post anyway cuz my love letter to this show still stands)

Alright. So. If you follow this show or American TV in general, you might have heard that Brooklyn Nine-Nine is cancelled.

I. Am. Devastated.


Quick background - I don't watch English TV much. If I do, I rarely ever love a show as much as I do Brooklyn Nine-Nine. Mostly because after the third of fourth season, a lot of American TV ends up sucking. Bad. But not with this show.

I only got into B99 this February and the only reason I bothered was because I needed something playing in the background while I did school work, I wanted it to be light and funny, I recently got a netflix, and I had seen a couple episodes of B99 on a plane and it seemed like an "OK" show. Just OK, nothing spectacular, but I remember it being pretty amusing. So. I put on the pilot and I was literally hooked within the first 5 minutes. I had no idea what I was getting into, and I was screwed.

The thing about Brooklyn Nine-Nine's humor that really gets me is that the type of humor in the show is the type of humor I express in my life. It's dry, self-deprecating, dramatic and deadpan, sarcastic, and just so, so, so, good. And for the most part a lot of the humor is very inoffensive, or it's used to poke fun of things in the world that are genuinely ridiculous and should be frowned upon. It also happens to have an ensemble where everyone is an awesome and unique character in their own right, and there is no pairing that sucks or is boring. Yeah, I have my preferred favourites (honestly, if Amy and Rosa became the A-team of B99, I would not complain, give me more Amy/Rosa buddy cop plots any day ya'll), but at the end of the day everyone with everyone else is satisfyingly enjoyable and entertaining.

Getting into specifics though, Holt, Amy, Rosa are really what make the show for me. Don't get me wrong, I love the rest of the cast too, but Holt, Amy and Rosa are really the shining stars. It wasn't even like that in the beginning. My love for them honestly crept up slowly and earnestly as the seasons progressed. Like, yeah, Holt was somewhat amusing with Andre Braugher's stoic delivery of everything, but the more Holt loosened up around the nine-nine and the more you got to see how petty and vindictive he was, the more hilarious he became. And Amy and Rosa. What can I say, I'm always a suck-up for badass ladies and they are both incredibly badass. Rosa at first I liked purely because she is literally the epitome of "bad ass", but then her story arc appeared and oh my god what an arc. The fact that she, and her actress, are both openly bisexual, and they devoted an entire episode to her coming out was amazing. I legitimately was floored at how well they did that episode. Speaking of this - I am continually amazed at how well Brooklyn Nine-Nine manages to take serious topics and treat them with the respect they deserve while still delivering hilarious comedy to boot. And nothing feels forced or out of place or wrong. Just in the latest episode for Season 5, Show Me Going - how do you have an episode like that and also have the line "They're in a dick punch 69" in the SAME EPISODE. That is insane, but that is also exactly the type of show Brooklyn Nine-Nine is and I appreciate that so much.

Okay, that was a tangent, moving back on to Amy. Oh Amy. Amy Santiago. Again, another character I didn't necessarily think I'd like as much as I would, but like Holt, she grew on me bit, by bit. I just love how unashamed and proud she is of her quirkiness, and how despite being seen as quirky, it's never really played off as something bad. Like yes, Amy does get made fun of for her need to be perfect, the sex tape jokes, all of that, but at the end of the day there is also an underlying appreciation of her type-A personality. Again, in Season 5, that episode where it's Amy's first day as a sergeant and the 99 are teasing Amy about Gary, her own "Amy", but then you get that conversation with Holt at the end where you realize - Amy gets shit done and she gets it done well. Essentially what I love about Amy is a lot of what I see in myself. I'm not as extreme as Amy, but I like to do things well and I always strive to do things well, and sometimes I honestly feel awkward about it. Sometimes I feel like maybe I'm going over the top, maybe I'm doing too much, over-dressing, over-reaching, and yet here is Amy Santiago, taking it all in stride. Also, what I love is that even with her type-A strictness, Amy can still have fun. She can still be kinda wild, and break some rules (I still find it amusing that she was the one who encouraged Jake to make out in the evidence room with her, like Amy! Bad!)

...Can you tell Amy is my favourite of the show? Again, don't get me wrong, I love the rest of the characters too. I love all of Jake's jokes, and I love how much he's grown and how respectful he really is. Yeah, he was an arrogant hot-head in the beginning who was super self-centered, but at the end of the day he was never a bad guy. He respects people immensely, and cares for them, he just used to get lost in his own head sometimes, but look at the person Jake is today. Honestly. The Jake of today is an amazing Jake. And then Charles with his own brand of awkward hilarity. In a lesser comedy, I feel like Amy and Charles would have been the same character with their awkwardness and being the butt of most of the jokes, but nope. They are both distinct in their brand of awkward and it's lovely in how both of them are so completely unashamed of themselves. Hitchcock and Scully also fall into this range, as well as Gina. And the best part is that... even with character like Hitchcock or Gina, where their ability to be unashamed also leads them to say the most perverted (Hitchcock) or mean (Gina) things, somehow you still don't end up hating them. There is still enough heart, care and humanity to their character that makes you still enjoy them regardless of the somewhat questionable things they say or do.

Don't get me wrong, there are many moments where I have raised my eyebrows at how mean Gina is to Amy, but then I rewatch older episodes and Gina has so many great moments. Yeah, she can be mean. Yeah she can say terrible things, but she cares about the nine-nine just as much as anybody on the crew and when you see this part of her character come out, it's lovely.

Brooklyn Nine-Nine is a show that I feel truly exemplifies respect. Respect for others. Respect for it's characters. Respect for the subject matter it touches upon. And the thing is so many people might wonder, how does it do this? It's because Brooklyn Nine-Nine does what very few people ever think about doing - it normalizes everything and doesn't make a big deal out of anything.

Yes, they had an entire episode about active shooters, about coming out as bisexual, about racial profiling. But what allowed them to portray these issues so well is how they don't try to hammer things down on you like a cinder block. All the show does is was lay things out there and say "this is how it is". It times the jokes well so that they accurately highlight the ridiculousness of situations (think Rosa's mom during pictionary when Rosa was drawing - because a situation like that is ridiculous. How ridiculous is it that people can be so willfully ignorant? Also with Moo-Moo - how ridiculous is it that we actually have to explain to children "hey, people might hate you cause of your skin colour?"), but knows when to lay back and just the reality of a situation take it's actual weight (literally what happens right after the scene of Rosa drawing with her parents, because despite what we think is ridiculous - this is the outcome of such willful ignorance and hate, and it hurts. It hurts other people and it sucks).

I'm going to speak from my place as a therapist now, but normalizing is the heart of what allows people to connect with others. It's when you stop thinking "oh my god, I can't imagine that happening to me" and you start going "Oh, okay, I get it. That specific thing never happened to me, but I can see why it seems so bad now". Connection comes from, not setting aside differences, but in seeing the overlaps between our differences, and that is what Brooklyn Nine Nine does. It manages to hit at those overlaps so, so, so well. It touches upon subject matter by seeping into the cracks and highlighting the aspects that everyone can relate to. It highlights absurdities in our lives by making it funny, and then masterfully takes that absurdity and goes "I know you laughed, but this is also the result of what this absurdity creates", and then the watchers go "Oh. Now I see what is wrong with."

I really hope some other company decides to pick up Brooklyn Nine-Nine, even if just for a final 6th season. I feel this show really deserves a proper send off in a way that goes beyond Jake and Amy getting married. Don't get me wrong, I love Jake and Amy and I could wax poetics about how amazingly healthy their relationship is for a TV couple, but I feel like this post is already way too long. One thing I love about Jake/Amy and B99 though, is that their romance was never at the forefront, so I'd rather the show not end on their wedding--an event that is very much focused on Jake and Amy. I want a finale that encompasses the whole nine nine.

All in all. I am really going to miss this show, and it will forever be one of my most favourite shows in the world.