The Carmichael Show – Intervention

By: Jessica Wolff

Jerrod Carmichael (Jerrod Carmichael) presents his evidence to the rest of his family that the United States faked the moon landing.  He gets blank stares in return and Cynthia Carmichael (Loretta Devine) questions why America would manipulate the public and doesn’t like Jerrod painting the country in a negative light.  Joe Carmichael (David Alan Grier) chimes in that even if the moon landing was faked, it makes him love America even more.  Bobby Carmichael (LilRel Howery) comes in wearing sunglasses and Jerrod remarks that he needs to accomplish something in order to wear sunglasses indoors.  Cynthia tells him to leave Bobby alone, as he is still working out his identity.  Joe questions if he thinks he’s Jack Nicholson and laughs that Bobby doesn’t have the talent or class of Nicholson.

Bobby explains that there’s a reason he’s wearing the sunglasses and reveals a black eye as he tells them that Nekeisha (Tiffany Haddish) hit him.  Cynthia is concerned about Bobby, but Joe laughs that a girl hit Bobby.  Maxine (Amber Stevens West) angrily tells him that it’s not funny and that Nekeisha hitting Bobby was domestic abuse.  However, Joe still thinks it’s hilarious.  Cynthia tells Joe that domestic violence is real, but hard to prove.  She suggests adding more bruises to Bobby to make the charges stick and tells Jerrod to put some oranges in a sock.  Jerrod tells her that they’re not going to jump Bobby, but Cynthia says that sometimes you have to lie in order for the truth to come out.

Jerrod asks Bobby why Nekeisha hit him and he explained that he was trying to tell her to cut back on her recently increased drinking.  Cynthia declares that Nekeisha is out of control and that Bobby isn’t leaving the house without a rape whistle.  Maxine suggests talking to Nekeisha about her drinking, but Cynthia believes that the only way to get through to an addict is yelling at them.  Joe suggests having an intervention prevention intervention and explains that it’s a pre-intervention before having to throw a real intervention.  Jerrod tells Joe to stop creating new terms, but Joe decides on IPI as an acronym for his new term.

Cynthia announces that Nekeisha has pulled up in their driveway and Bobby asks them not to say anything.  However, Cynthia insists that she needs to yell at Nekeisha.  Maxine tells them that they’re not going to attack her, but tell her that they’re concerned about her.  Nekeisha enters and Cynthia yells at her for attacking Bobby and calls her an alcoholic monster.  Nekeisha is angry with Bobby for telling his family.  Joe sits Nekeisha down and promises that their criticisms will stop her alcoholism.  Cynthia begins by telling Nekeisha that she drinks too much and her nails perpetuate a stereotype of low-income black women.  Maxine calmly tells her that they’re concerned about her hitting Bobby while drunk.  Nekeisha quickly corrects her and tells them that she wasn’t drunk when she hit Bobby, and that she would have been more relaxed if she had been.

Jerrod questions her statement, and Bobby confirms that she wasn’t drunk when she hit him.  He tells them that she had been drinking more lately and that he had just poured out all of her liquor.  Joe, Cynthia, and Jerrod turn on Bobby, and Joe tells Bobby that he’s lucky that she didn’t bite his ear off for getting rid of her liquor.  Nekeisha thanks Joe for his support, and Cynthia yells at Bobby for being wasteful.  Cynthia apologizes for insulting Nekeisha out loud, and Jerrod asks Bobby what he thought was going to happen.  Maxine defends Bobby for attempting to help Nekeisha, but Bobby apologizes for his mistake.  He promises to replace her alcohol, and Nekeisha apologizes for punching him.  They hug, and Cynthia is glad that they were able to fix their problems as a family.  Bobby remarks that he feels better, and thanks everyone for helping.

However, Maxine is not finished with the conversation and asks what is happening.  She reminds that that Nekeisha’s drinking problem led to all of this in the first place.  She asks Nekeisha how much she’s been drinking and responds that she’s been drinking pretty much every night.  Maxine tells her that the average should be two drinks a night for women and three for men and Nekeisha responds that it sexist.  Joe supports Nekeisha, but Maxine asks her whether alcohol has caused any problems in her life.  She tells them that she just got a promotion at her job with the TSA and Cynthia congratulates her with a hug.  The rest of the family congratulates her and Joe goes to get some champagne to celebrate.  Maxine stops Joe and reminds him that he can’t serve alcohol at an intervention.  He responds that they are in the middle of an Intervention Prevention Intervention Celebration.

Jerrod remarks that it doesn’t sound like Nekeisha has a drinking problem, as she hasn’t killed anyone in a drunk driving accident.  Maxine stops Joe from going into the kitchen and tells them that Nekeisha’s alcohol use still isn’t healthy.  She sits Nekeisha down and asks if there’s been anything stressful in her life lately.  Nekeisha downplays her sister going back to jail, being tasked with raising her nephew and her mother relapsing in her drug addiction.  Cynthia asks if her mom is the one that she met at the wedding and she responds that that was her now dead foster mom.  After Cynthia assumes that she’s referring to her second foster mom, but Nekeisha corrects her that she’s talking about her real mom that Cynthia has never met.

Bobby asks Nekeisha why she didn’t talk to him about her mom and she tells him that she didn’t want to burden anybody with her problems.  She admits that she drinks to deal with the stress and Joe calls her a hero for dealing with all of that.  Cynthia tells her that she’s proud that she’s found a system to deal with the weight on her shoulders.  Joe remarks that Nekeisha has earned the bottle of champagne and Maxine asks Jerrod to help her.  Jerrod remarks that Nekeisha’s life sounds like an episode of “The Wire” and that some people have earned the right to drink.  He comments that drug PSAs only show the negatives and not the people who use substances to cope.  Joe returns with the bottle of champagne and tells Nekeisha that the bottle was intended for the celebration of Hillary Clinton’s election, but that her promotion will have to do.

Maxine tells Nekeisha that there are other ways of dealing with stress and suggests meditation.  She tells Nekeisha that she has been meditating since she was ten, and Nekeisha responds that when she was ten, her grandmother claimed to be meditating when she was really doing heroin.  Undeterred, Maxine tells her that she started meditating when her parents got divorced.  Joe tells Maxine that she can’t solve Nekeisha’s the problems the same way, as a drug addicted parent and two dead foster moms are worse than divorced parents.  Nekeisha asks Maxine if meditation will cost her anything and Maxine says no.  She then asks if it will affect her sexual orientation and Maxine is confused by the question.  Nekeisha declares that she’ll try the meditation and Bobby decides to try it as well to deal with the negative voices in his head.

Trying to lead the meditation, Maxine tells Nekeisha and Bobby to picture a stream, put their problems on leaves, and float them away.  Bobby tells Maxine that he did that, but that the leaves are floating back to him.  Maxine tells him to not let the leaves float towards them, and Nekeisha tells her that you can’t change the flow of a stream.  Bobby remarks that his stream is disgusting, and Maxine tells them to picture a mountain instead.  Nekeisha asks how high the mountain is since she is afraid of heights and decides to go back to the stream.  Her nephew, Terry (Judah Howery), comes in and asks for candy.  As Terry looks for candy, Nekeisha tells Maxine that meditation isn’t working for her and that alcohol is better to help her relieve stress.

Terry comes over with a bottle of pills and Maxine sees has been taken from her purse.  Nekeisha takes the bottle and Terry runs off.  Upon examination, Nekeisha sees that Maxine takes Xanax.  She criticizes Maxine for pushing the meditation when she’s been taking antidepressants.  Bobby asks how the pills are different than Nekeisha’s alcohol and Maxine points out that a doctor prescribed them to her.  Bobby says that nobody can meditate without mind-enhancing steroids and Nekeisha implies that Maxine is a hypocrite.  Maxine argues that she only takes them on an as-needed basis and tries to prove that she doesn’t need them by telling Nekeisha to keep the pills.  Terry comes back in and declares that this place is boring and that he’d rather live with drug-addicted grandma.

In the middle of the night, Maxine is unable to sleep and is horrified by what she is seeing on her computer.  Jerrod asks what she’s watching and Maxine tells him that she watched an episode of Vice about child soldiers in Africa.  Jerrod tells her that she shouldn’t be watching Vice so late and Maxine tells him that she was trying to distract herself from over thinking a situation with a coworker.  She shows Jerrod a picture of nine year olds wielding machetes and he asks her to take a Xanax.  She tells him about her deal with Nekeisha, but is still affected by what she’s looking at.  Jerrod remarks that he would probably be excited if he was given a machete at nine and asks Maxine to go to sleep.  She asks him if he knew that there eight active genocides in the world, but Jerrod tells her that they’ll still be active in the morning.  Maxine tries to show Jerrod a video of a sinkhole swallowing a family minivan and Jerrod grabs a joint out of a drawer in frustration.  He remarks that she’s insufferable without Xanax and that he’s going to get high and go to sleep.

Joe gives Nekeisha a Quran to celebrate her promotion and Cynthia comments it’s so she can understand the Muslims that she’s going to be pulling out of line.  Bobby tells her that they want to be sure that she racially profiles people properly.  Jerrod and Maxine arrive and Jerrod begs Nekeisha to give back her Xanax.  Maxine asks for the pills back and Cynthia accuses her of being a pill popper.  She responds that it’s a prescribed medication, but the family comments that it reminds them of Michael Jackson.  Maxine argues that the Xanax didn’t kill Michael Jackson, and Cynthia implies that Maxine is a hypocrite.

Joe declares that they’ve been doing the IPI on the wrong person and begins the intervention.  Cynthia starts by calling Maxine arrogant and unlikable, but compliments her nails.  Jerrod tells them to call down and that a lot of people take antidepressants.  Joe argues that that same logic was used for crack and Maxine argues that the world is stressful.  She asks them if they know how many active genocides there are in the world.  Cynthia guesses eleven and Maxine answers with eight.  Both Joe and Cynthia are relieved that the number is less than they thought and Jerrod asks them if they know what genocide is.  Frustrated, Maxine declares that she doesn’t care if they judge her and that she’ll judge them for not taking antidepressants and turning a blind eye to what’s happening in the world.  She cries about the child soldiers as she and Jerrod leave.  The episode ends with Jerrod doing a PSA declaring that people can use substances as long as they don’t overdo it.  He lights his joint as the “The More You Know” rainbow appears.