Prime Video drops the eleven-episode first season of Beyond Black Beauty today. Although the season debuted in March on Amazon Freevee, airing on a weekly basis, the October 15 relaunch on Prime Video is sure to reach a wider audience, perhaps fueling a renewal. For the relaunch, the first two Freevee episodes have been combined into a double-decker premiere. (Just in case anyone’s wondering why Season 1 has twelve episodes listed.)
Prime Video describes the series as “following young equestrian Jolie Dumont (Kaya Coleman) whose Olympic dreams are dashed when her mother (Sagine Sémajuste) moves them from Europe to an urban ranch in Baltimore. An angry Jolie wants to escape until she bonds with a spirited horse named Black Beauty. Jolie will learn to embrace her heritage while continuing toward her Olympic-hopeful future and discover the value of family and home.”
Prime Video’s Beyond Black Beauty
There’s nothing quite as versatile as a girl-and-horse story, is there? Although Anna Sewell’s novel Black Beauty, published in 1877, doesn’t even have a central girl character, it is considered the first of the “pony book” genre. The hallmark of the genre is a deep connection between the protagonist rider and steed that anchors the protagonist through the conflicts they encounter in life.
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Beyond Black Beauty uses Sewell’s novel as a touchstone for the main character, Jolie Dumont. Early in the premiere, we see her as a young child listening to her Belgium father, Cedric Dumont (Gilles Marini), read her the book at bedtime. Her voiceover — possibly a throwback to the novel’s first-person horse perspective — informs us that this was the beginning of a lifelong obsession with horses.
Fast-forward to fifteen-year-old Jolie and the voiceover conveys more anxiety than passion as she prepares for an equestrian jumping competition. As her mother, Janelle, watches from the stands with Jolie’s paternal grandparents, her father is noticeably absent. This foreshadows the many obstacles ahead.
Leaps of Faith
After the initial victory in the competition, Jolie’s life rapidly descends into chaos. First, her mother sells her horse and separates from her beloved papa. Then, they’re landing in Baltimore of all places. Finally, they arrive at the Chambers Family Ranch, Janelle’s childhood home, where Jolie immediately starts off on the wrong foot with her mother’s family.
Credit goes to Kaya Coleman in her first major television role for stepping into Jolie’s designer shoes and saddle. To begin, she exudes all the entitlement and privilege the teen’s been raised to expect. She’s incredibly unlikeable and unrelatable on the surface, unwilling to show her mother any sympathy or her Baltimore family any warmth. However, Coleman manages to give the audience glimpses of the vulnerability Jolie’s feeling as she tries to reconcile what she thinks she knows about her family and herself with her new normal.
Family Ties
It may be come as a shock to Jolie but the series is about so much more than her. Her mother Janelle left Baltimore twenty years ago, leaving behind family and friends, and doesn’t seem to have looked back until now. It’s a reckoning for her as she’s forced to reconnect with her sister Yvonne (Lisa Berry) and an old flame Rashad (Mark Taylor). People have changed while she’s been away and so has she.
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Sémajuste and Berry do a fantastic job conveying the complexity of their sisterly relationship. There are old wounds and grudges, misunderstandings, and poorly explained choices. It’s messy and confusing. But underscoring it all is a deep and abiding affection built on humor and forgiveness.
Not to be outdone, the younger cast members build a strong rapport with Coleman’s Jolie. Cousin Ronnie (Gina James) starts out as a hard nut to crack but she softens to “Belgium,” her nickname for Jolie. There’s also romantic interest Alvin (Akiel Julien) and lovable rascal Lil Man (Justice James). Both tap into different sides to Jolie’s personality, drawing her out of her defensive shell.
Urban Ranching. It’s a Real Thing.
A fascinating key element of the series is the ranch itself. Baltimore’s history of urban farms and stables is a phenomenon I personally knew nothing of before watching the series. As Lil Man tells Jolie while touring her around, the Chambers Ranch is a six-generation family establishment dating back to 1910. And that’s not stretching the truth much for dramatic purposes. Baltimore’s equestrian culture is intertwined with their Black American heritage. (For an IRL example, the Jacksons of Prince George’s County, Maryland, are a family of cowboys and cowgirls stretching back five generations.) From famous rodeo competitors to the street-vendor arabbers, seeing horseback riders on the city streets isn’t unheard of. How cool is that?
In contrast, the world of competitive equestrian jumping is one for the elite and haute ton. It is personified in Jolie’s wealthy paternal grandparents and symbolizes her life before Baltimore. The competition is fierce with other Olympic hopefuls posing cold and calculating adversaries. When Jolie saddles up, she feels isolated and defenseless. The pressure to perform is overwhelming.
There and Back Again
However, like any good bildungsroman, Jolie’s journey of self-discovery and growth brings her full circle to the European equestrian jumping competition circuit where her old anxieties return. This time, though, she has the newly trained Black Beauty and her Baltimore family by her side.
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There are a lot of heart-warming moments along the way as well as a predictable number of teenage face-palm instances. As Jolie gets to know her family and Janelle reacquaints herself with life in Baltimore, things get increasingly complicated. Whether it’s high school bullies, family drama, or hormonal shenanigans, encounters are framed as opportunities to challenge preconceived notions of what it means to be valued and safe.
Although it’s sold as a horse-and-girl story, Beyond Black Beauty is truly a story of family and healing. Jolie’s feeling of abandonment and hard-done-by-ness is juxtaposed with Beauty’s trauma. Meanwhile, Janelle’s choice to return to her roots turns out to be a crucible for mother and daughter, a trial to test their mettle. And as they both learn to trust and hope, they grow closer and stronger.
Season 1 of Beyond Black Beauty is streaming now on Prime Video.
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