The novelist Marlon James signs an original and queer-friendly detective series, which immerses us in a Jamaica where the stigma of colonialism and slavery remains.
Few series are written, and even more so created and shown, by novelists. Renowned writers, such as AM Homes or Michael Chabon, have certainly contributed notably to the effort of the peak TV, Taffy Brodesser-Akner and Tom Perrotta had the opportunity to participate in the adaptations of their books, Anatomy of a Divorce et The Leftovers, but the case Get Millie Black is exceptional. Because the Jamaican Marlon James, from whom we are also eagerly awaiting the cinema adaptation of the African fantasy cycle Dark Star (Black leopard, red wolf ; the witch of the moon), in fact transcribes his literature, his instantly recognizable tone and his gentle madness without further ado. All those who have been marked by its pavement Brief History of Seven Murdersa crazy imbroglio woven around the assassination attempt against Bob Marley, will thus engage in this British-Jamaican series with an unexpected feeling of familiarity.
The story, and its heroine, are original however: inspector Millie Black (Tamara Lawrance) investigates, accompanied by her gay partner Curtis, the kidnapping of a young teenager who will take her from strip clubs to to the mysteries of Jamaican society, and beyond, since this child from the ghettos of Kingston was raised in the United Kingdom to escape an abusive mother and studied at Scotland Yard. Soon equipped with a London sidekick, Millie will mainly verify the survivals of colonialism (in the face of detective Holborn, she quips ironically: “Have you come to colonize our investigation?”) and slavery (ultimately a case of human trafficking).
A little stiff in its form – like a hallucinated variation of existence of a good old cop show on Tuesday evening -, Marlon James' first series never ceases to amaze in its deployment, each episode embarked by a preamble seen and narrated by a different character which deviates the plot. Among them is Hibiscus (Chyna McQueen), Millie's little trans sister abandoned against her will by the latter, who constantly brings the story back to the tarmac and to the reason of the weakest. Beyond the bruised body of Curtis, which his companion would like to take away from homophobic and ultra-violent Jamaica, Hibiscus is the soul of the series and the vibrant stigma of its author – it would have been unthinkable that Marlon James, this writer so precious, don't bring out a queer-friendly series.
