An episode of ABC’s black-ish was yanked from this season’s line-up after the show’s creator, Kenya Barris, and the network were unable to come to an agreement over how the episode handled certain social issues.
“Given our creative differences, neither ABC nor I were happy with the direction of the episode and mutually agreed not to air it,” Barris said in a statement.
An ABC representative echoed that sentiment: “One of the things that has always made black-ish so special is how it deftly examines delicate social issues in a way that simultaneously entertains and educates. However, on this episode, there were creative differences we were unable to resolve.”
The episode, titled Please, Baby, Please, was originally set to air February 27. The show’s storyline featured Dre (Anthony Anderson) attempting to calm his infant son with a bedtime story in the midst of a calamitous thunderstorm.
When the bedtime reading proves futile, he begins to invent a story that, over the course of the show, begins to touch on the character’s concerns over various social and political issues — such as whether athletes have the right to kneel during the national anthem.
The show, now in its fourth season, has touched on social and political topics in the past — including assimilation, LGBTQ issues, the activism of Black Lives Matter and police brutality.
“black-ish is a show that has spoken to all different types of people and brought them closer as a community and I’m so proud of the series,” Barris said in his statement.
The withdrawal of the episode, though first reported by Variety, was revealed in a scheduling announcement issued by ABC late last month. At the time, the network noted that the Please, Baby, Please episode would be replaced with a rerun.
