Bel-Air's season 1 finale rehashes the dramatic storyline between Will and his dad Lou, which demonstrates its biggest Fresh Prince problem.
WARNING: This article contains spoilers for Bel-Air season 1!
The Bel-Air season 1 finale features a less powerful reimagining of Fresh Prince’s most heartbreaking scene, which demonstrates the reboot’s biggest problem. While the Will Smith-starring Fresh Prince of Bel-Air was more notable for its humorous take on family life and important social issues, the series wasn’t afraid to drop the laugh track and lean into the emotional trials and tribulations of everyday life and systemic racism against Black people in America. Since many of these conversations couldn’t be had in a fulfilling manner on the 1990s sitcom format, Peacock’s Bel-Air reboot brings back such storylines for a more intense portrayal.
Right off the bat, Bel-Air sets aside the lightheartedness of Will’s story to craft a more gritty drama, beginning when Will is arrested for pulling a gun in a fight – a much more complex start to his story than in Fresh Prince. Bel-Air season 1 also leans into the political corruption connected to Uncle Phil's election as he runs for District Attorney, as he pulled several questionable strings to get Will out of jail. While many broad storylines from Fresh Prince are repurposed for Bel-Air’s modern context, the reboot typically adds new twists that make sure it’s not directly competing with the notable moments from the original series. However, this wasn’t the case for Bel-Air’s season 1 finale, which very closely repeated the story of Will’s dad, Lou, returning after a 13-year absence.
While the reboot initially hinted at a different ending for Will and his father, the series’ twists ended up the same as Fresh Prince: Lou bond with Will before he disappoints his son again and exits his life. Bel-Air added new angles to Lou’s story by revealing that he was in jail for assault, with Vy, Aunt Viv, and Uncle Phil deciding to lie to Will about why he was really gone. In the end, Lou’s absence still came down to him choosing not to be around for Will, even though more complications with prison and pride influenced his decision. Since this was Will’s most dramatic storyline in Fresh Prince, Bel-Air’s version is inevitably compared to the sitcom, with the reboot unsurprisingly struggling to top the original.
While Bel-Air’s version of Will and Lou’s story doesn’t achieve the same compelling emotional takeaway as Fresh Prince, this isn’t to say that the reboot’s version was poorly crafted. Rather, it simply doesn’t provide the same long-term love and care for the characters or emotional contrasts that were already established in Fresh Prince by the time this storyline occurred. Fresh Prince’s storyline with Lou and Will didn’t take place until the end of season 4, when viewers had already spent years understanding Will’s backstory, emotionality, and strained relationship with his father. Bel-Air’s version of the events arguably takes place too quickly in the story, with viewers still having a fairly surface understanding of the characters.
The reboot also fails to exhibit one of the scenes in which Will was the most emotionally vulnerable, sobbing into Uncle Phil’s arms as he asks why his father doesn’t want him. In Bel-Air, this moment of love between Uncle Phil and Will never happens, as Will is just as angry with his uncle for lying to him about Lou’s absence. Bel-Air’s Will is also far more emotionally vulnerable than Fresh Prince’s character, with nearly every episode in the reboot featuring a scene in which he is subject to upsetting circumstances. Fresh Prince hardly dove into this side of Will, which is why it was so much more surprising and powerful to see him sob over his father.
Just as Bel-Air couldn’t top Fresh Prince’s Lou and Will storyline, the reboot repeating the most dramatic moments from the original will continue to be a struggle. Audiences have already experienced the emotional complexities and high stakes of these situations, and with characters that they knew so much more intimately over six seasons. While Bel-Air season 1 doesn’t repeat Fresh Prince’s scenes verbatim, the reboot’s versions are typically much angrier in terms of the dramatic responses, which can be slightly more off-putting when considering Fresh Prince’s emotional moments were still comforting in terms of the family’s support system and supportive communication.
Rather than continuing to repeat Fresh Prince’s best dramatic storylines that will inevitably be considered superior, Bel-Air needs to dive deeper into new emotional complexities and situations for the characters. There are plenty of stories that couldn’t be told during Fresh Prince’s era, but Bel-Air isn’t restricted by these circumstances. Since outdoing the original’s memorable drama will continue to be difficult, Bel-Air’s focus should be on the angles that Fresh Prince couldn’t (or didn't) make too emotional, such as Geoffrey’s relationship with his son.
The biggest problem for Bel-Air repeating Fresh Prince’s dramatic stories is that they didn’t need to be redone. Fresh Prince’s dramatic storylines were already incredibly compelling, which is exactly why the reboot aimed to turn more of the plot in this direction. Clearly, Fresh Prince had a level of drama and emotional complexities that the studio realized the entire series could work by focusing on this tone. From Will and Lou’s story to Will and Carlton being racially profiled by the police, Fresh Prince’s more serious moments were the best examples of how a reboot like Bel-Air could become a reality. As such, these scenes were already perfect in getting their messages across in a poignant manner back in the 1990s, so they didn’t require new versions in the 2020s that accomplish the same goal.
While Bel-Air’s tone doesn’t allow for Fresh Prince's comedy, the original show’s humor was one of the reasons why its dramatic moments were so poignant and memorable. Fresh Prince viewers weren’t used to the emotional vulnerability of Will, as he typically always laughed matters off or chose to respond sarcastically and humorously to dramatic situations. As such, the moments when Will was seen sobbing or particularly angry and emotive were jarring, and truly let viewers understand the gravity of the situation. Will and Carlton often wouldn’t let themselves come to such an emotional place, but when they did, it was extremely powerful.
The emotional moments in Fresh Prince stick out above many of the humorous gags, but this isn’t necessarily the case for Bel-Air's reboot, which is part of why their repetitions of the same original scenes don’t work as well. Bel-Air's dramatic moments blend together with varying levels of gravity, but any moment that took the characters past the need for humor was memorable in Fresh Prince. Unfortunately, this means that the dramatic storylines that Bel-Air repeats typically won’t accomplish the same emotional grasp on the audiences as Fresh Prince’s did.
