Abbott Elementary – Story Samurai

By starrymag | October 12, 2022

By: Atiya Irvin-Mitchell

 

 

It’s the start of the day at Abbott Elementary and Janine’s (Quinta Brunson) missing her warmest shawl. It’s getting chilly, so it being missing from her classroom has left her cold. Gregory (Tyler James Williams) tries to think of what could’ve happened. Ava (Janelle James) uses the strange case of the missing shawl as an opportunity to make fun of Janine’s style and says she would never want anything Janine wore. Then, the case is solved as Mr. Johnson (William Stanford Davis) shows up with it. He isn’t trying to wear it but use it to clean. She’s annoyed, but it goes without saying that Janine’s probably not gonna want it back all covered in Windex.

 

Moving on, some of the teachers are finding it hard not to fall behind on the teaching front. Gregory hopes some of the kids are absent. Janine is behind on her lesson plans and thinks it’s too early in the school year for movie days. Barbara (Sheryl Lee Ralph) says she’s doing Lego day to catch up. For Melissa (Lisa Ann Walter) it’s not easy to have a combined class of second and third graders, but she’s not willing to accept a teacher’s aid. She and Barbara say teacher’s aids are for the newbies. Ava comes in to laugh at the idea of working before work (prepping) and tells the staff that they’ve got an improv group coming to entertain the kids called The Story Samurai.

 

What are The Story Samurai? Jacob (Chris Perfetti)  knows as he used to be one of them. They’re a storytelling group that travel and do improv skits based on kids’ ideas. Jacob is excited about the group because they help the kids see that “everyone is a story,” everyone else just wants to have a free hour to catch up on work stuff while the kids are in the auditorium.

 

The sixth graders go to see the skit and are treated to an improv answer to the question of what would happen if Meek Mill was a meerkat. Janine says this is too corny even for her, but she can see it makes Jacob very happy. And she gets it if her Degrassi reenactment group came she’d be hyped about it, too. Thank goodness it’s Jacob’s past and not his present, right?

 

Just kidding. Gregory and Janine laugh about how the performance exceeded their expectations about how corny it’d be. Then, on a post assembly high, Jacob tells everyone the group asked them to perform with them. This worries Janine. Ava’s planning on live streaming it and he doesn’t want Jacob to be embarrassed. But she doesn’t want to hurt his feelings either, so she tries a less aggressive approach. She tells him that he shouldn’t perform because he’d just steal the Samurai’s thunder with how good he is. He doesn’t want to upstage them, right? He agrees.

 

Melissa is struggling. It’s tough to teach a class where one half of the room has already learned what you’re trying to teach them. Also, it’s just a lot of kids to try and manage at once. Plus, there’s a third grade side of the room and a second grade side and a lot of kids are on the wrong side. Barbara comes over and catches a glimpse of the chaos.

 

Gregory swings by Janine’s room to say hi and they talk about their days. Janine tells Gregory that he talked Jacob out of performing. He wonders if she told him it’s because Story Samurai is corny and people will laugh at him. No, she said she told a fib because Jacob seemed happy and she doesn’t want to wreck that for him. Ava overhears and says Janine is always wrecking stuff for her, like that time she refused to pretend to be her daughter so that she could have a free Happy Meal from McDonald’s.

 

Jacob has lunch with Megan (Maisie Klompus), Tyrone (Zack Evans) and Harold (James III) – the Samurais. They’re enjoying some Philly cheesesteaks and talking about what a legend Jacob was during his tenure and they’re bummed out that he won’t be performing after all. Ava says otherwise and she takes it upon herself to make a special announcement that she’s calling an all school assembly so that everyone can see Jacob perform with the Story Samurais at the end of the day.

 

Janine is horrified and decides she needs to be honest with Jacob. She tells him that unfortunately the Story Samurais are corny, but that’s okay because she’s corny too. Still, if Jacob gets up on that stage with them the audience will be laughing with them and not at them. Jacob is very sad to hear it, but Janine tells him he’s the real life version of pretty much every white savior trope in movies, think The Blind Side and The Freedom Writers. He backs out again, and we learn he once had a one man show called The Color Urkel.

 

Melissa’s classroom situation gets so frustrating that she punches the head off of a cutout, so Barbara comes to check on her. At first she tries to insist that she’s fine, but Barbara says it’s okay to admit that she’s drowning. Barbara admits that if she had to teach a combined class, she’d probably run away to Jamaica. Then she encourages Melissa to accept the teacher’s aid, anyone with this many kids at once would be struggling. Usually the district offers nothing to help the teachers, Barbara says, but they are offering something in this situation so Melissa shouldn’t be too proud to take it.

 

Later Gregory and Janine talk while their classes are headed to the all-school assembly and Janine’s relieved that she talked Jacob out of the performance. Gregory says they need to quit playing with Jacob’s life. They like Jacob corniness and all and if the Story Samurai’s made him happy, they shouldn’t have interfered.  During the assembly one of Jacob’s students, Clarence, asks him why he’s not up there. Jacob sadly says he changed his mind. Then the Clarence (Zakai Biagas Bey) gives an on camera interview, the kids call Jacob Mr. C because he’s corny. At the same time his class is fun and he’s cool in his own way, they like him.

 

Speaking of people who like Jacob, Janine has a change of heart so when the Samurai’s are looking for audience suggestions she says she bets everyone would love to see Jacob perform. He gets a lot of applause. And the kids get a skit where being Tony the Tiger is an allegory for racial discrimination. If nothing else after the past few weeks Melissa needed to laugh.

 

Later, Jacob’s pretty happy. He’s accepted that he’s corny but with Janine’s help he sees that it’s good that he’s stayed in one place long enough to find people who love him enough to tell him the truth. Elsewhere Melissa sits down with Ava and learns that her teacher’s aid request has been filled. She now has a teacher’s aid named Ashley (Keyla Monterroso Mejia), she introduces herself with a song.

 

It’s the end of the day and Tyrone, Megan, and Harold are still improving away in the hallway. Janine is waiting until they’re done because she doesn’t want to get pulled in. Ava walks by and tells them to beat it, but they take it the wrong way and start singing and doing the Michael Jackson routine. Janine and Gregory think they’re probably all virgins.