Roots (1977) / YMMV

Angst Aversion: The horrors of slavery are shown so blatantly that the series can be a hard watch, especially when it takes until Chicken George is an old man for anyone in the Kinte family to get free from slavery. Mind, this isn't the show's fault; it's only being honest. It's just that the series works mostly as an educational tool than any kind of entertainment.
First Installment Wins: The nearly unanimous opinion of critics and viewers regarding the two miniseries. While the second one is excellent in its own right, it's generally regarded as lesser than the first. The Interquel Roots: The Gift and the parallel Mini Series Queen (1993) don't fare as well with critics.
Hilarious in Hindsight:
- The sequel series being titled "The Next Generations" after the original introduced us to LeVar Burton of Star Trek: The Next Generation.
- Four actors who appeared in Roots: The Gift starred in Star Trek series: LeVar Burton in Star Trek: The Next Generation, Avery Brooks in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and Kate Mulgrew and Tim Russ in Star Trek: Voyager.
Mandela Effect: The famous scene where Kunta Kinte gets whipped until he accepts his name as Toby, though often referenced and/or parodied for Black Comedy, is often misremembered. For one, the Overseer doesn't whip Kunta himself, he has a Black slave doing the dirty work. In addition, the Overseer is often remembered as being quite bloodthirsty, screaming at Kunta to accept the name Toby. But in actuality, the Overseer (though definitely cold-hearted and cruel), was more composed when punishing Kunta.
Moral Event Horizon: Tom Moore crosses this in his second scene when he rapes Kizzy. Strangely, he has a few Pet the Dog moments afterwards.
Narm:
- The telegraph employee enthusiastically yelling "IT'S WAR!" in an excruciatingly high-pitched voice.
- 33-year-old Leslie Uggams is embarrassingly hard to watch as the teenage Kizzy. Luckily, she improves significantly while playing her real age.
One-Scene Wonder: Marlon Brando as George Lincoln Rockwell in The Next Generations.
Retroactive Recognition:
- Tracey Gold played the young Missy Anne Reynolds in Part IV of the original miniseries.
- Todd Bridges played Bud Harvey in Part VIII of the original miniseries.
- Debbi Morgan played Elizabeth "Liz" Harvey in all but the last episode of The Next Generations.
- Brian Stokes Mitchell played John Dolan in Part I of The Next Generations.
- Gerald McRaney played Harry Owens in Part II of The Next Generations.
- Irene Cara played Bertha Palmer Haley in Parts III, IV and V of The Next Generations.
- Philip Michael Thomas played Eddie Franklin in Part III of The Next Generations.
- Kristoff St. John played the young Alex Haley in Part V of The Next Generations.
- Kim Fields played Lydia Haley in Part VI of The Next Generations.
- Ernie Hudson played a Muslim in Part VII of The Next Generations.
Signature Scene: The whipping scene where Kunta accepts the name Toby (by sheer force). Out of all the scenes, this one is most referenced and parodied. Even those who have never seen this series know about this scene.
Tear Jerker: Among the most memorable sad sequences are when Kunta is whipped in front if the other slaves until he accepts his name is now Toby, and when after finding out that Kizzy is literate, and helped forge freedom papers for another slave, Dr. Reynolds sells her to Tom Moore, while Kunta and Bell watch helplessly as their daughter is taken from them.
- Fiddler's death. While Fiddler "finally knows how it feels to be free," to paraphrase the way that Kunta puts it, Kunta still loses the closest thing to a father figure that he has had since arriving in North America, and unlike in the novel, he dies very shortly after Kizzy's birth, meaning he cannot become a grandfatherly mentor to her as well.
Unintentionally Unsympathetic: In more recent years the series has been knocked a bit for expecting us to sympathize with Captain Davies just for feeling kind of bad about propagating the slave trade, but not enough to actually do anything about it.

YMMV / Roots (1977)

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