Two words probably sum up a great deal of strife, bitterness, and hatred in the world: cultural change. Those are the two words that led to the Trump presidency, where 63 million people essentially voted for the past (‘Make America Great Again’) rather than a future that would look extremely different from what most people over the age of 40 recognized. Rap Sh!t, the new HBO Max half-hour dramedy, masterfully depicts the changing culture (which is, again, why most people over 40 will hate it).
Rap Sh!t is the televisual equivalent of a recent fact disclosed by Prabhakar Raghavan, a senior vice president at Google — 40% of people under the age of 24 use TikTok and Instagram instead of Google for news and searches, and that stat is growing (the fact that TikTok is owned by a Chinese conglomerate which works with the government for censorship and surveillance is another story). Rap Sh!t, created by Insecure’s Issa Rae, captures the zeitgeist of this cultural change by embracing it, and as a result, has a lock on younger and more diverse demographics.
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Technology and Culture in Rap Sh!t
Warner Bros. Discovery Interactive Entertainment
Rap Sh!t uses the same technology that many people view their lives through, including its characters. The majority of the show is filmed through the prism (or prison) of cell phones, with FaceTime calls, recordings, TikTok videos, text messages, Instagram posts, and video memos woven together to create a tapestry of technology. More than just a gimmick or found footage device, this serves a narrative and thematic function; Rap Sh!t almost feels less like a television show and more like a scroll through TikTok and social media itself.
As such, everyone seems to be performative, acting as if they’re being filmed (because with cell phones, everyone is). Everyone is pushing themselves, their own ‘brand,’ trying to go viral or hustle. When Rap Sh!t occasionally turns off the cell phones, with no found-footage, the artifice comes down and genuine moments are revealed behind the previously filmed facade. It’s an interesting contrast that helps develop the characters.
Aida Osman and KaMillion Star in Rap Sh!t
Shawna (played wonderfully by Aida Osman, a writer for the show) is passionate about her music and tired of being ‘slept on’ and underrated; her lyrics are sociopolitical, like Killer Mike or Mos Def, and she had a viral hit during the massive Black Lives Matter protests in 2020. However, she hasn’t been noticed much since, and works at a hotel in Miami, lamenting the commercialism and superficiality of music that feeds into capitalism and the patriarchy by rapping exclusively about money and sex. Her rant (recorded, of course) perfectly describes this:
Her friend Mia (played by rapper KaMillion, who is the breakout star here) is much more sociable and mainstream, though her three jobs (including making videos for Only Fans) and young daughter take up most of her time. When the two friends make an impromptu freestyle rap on a night out, their video quickly gets 80 thousand views, sparking something inside the ambitious Shawna and the struggling Mia.
Y’all’s favorites are out here doing the bare minimum with no originality, while I’m over here living and breathing this rap sh!t. I’m done being patient, I’m done caring. Y’all say, “I want a different type of female rapper.” No you don’t! Cause you don’t support me! You don’t support any of us! So what’s the point. You listen to the same sh!t over and over again, it’s tired! I work too fu**ing hard and y’all don’t respect good music.
Issa Rae Sets Up a Cultural Conversation in Rap Sh!t
When they decide to work together on some music, though, they find that their approaches to rap are incredibly different. “Is you rapping about student loans?” Mia asks her incredulously. “Technically, I’m rapping as the student loans. Everybody’s affected by predatory lending,” Shawna replies. When she asks Mia what she’d like to rap about, Mia says, “Something fun, something for the summertime, something for the girls to get ready and party to […] fast cars, money?”
This exchange marks one of the big conflicts of the show, with each character representing separate ideologies. Shawna is the activist, the political one who wants to make a difference, the second-wave feminist who thinks Mia’s Only Fans is an exploitive, misogynistic exercise; Mia is the one who’d like to have fun but also survive, to “seduce and scheme,” as she says. Their conversations about music, sex, women, and Blackness have a refreshing honesty to them, and their exchanges are often the highlight of this show, simultaneously provocative and funny while cleverly developing the characters.
Rap Sh!t is Authentic, So You’ll Love or Hate It
A lot of the honesty and authenticity of Rap Sh!t comes from Issa Rae’s vision and her attention to detail. The show is loosely based on the story of two Miami rappers (and is named after one of their tracks), Jatavia ‘JT’ Johnson and Caresha ‘Yung Miami’ Brownlee, who comprised the group City Girls. In many ways, the series is a love letter to Florida, featuring many musicians from the area and brimming with songs from Florida rappers (Fam0us.Twinsss, Trick Daddy, LPB Poody, Khia, and KaMillion herself). Filmed in Miami-Dade County, Rap Sh!t has an air of authenticity that’s impossible to mistake.
The series’ depiction of different cohorts (Millennials and Gen Z, Black culture, and especially Black women) also rings true, thanks to the cast and crew. The use of technology absolutely reflects a generation that documents its life while experiencing it, filming themselves and having difficulty ’turning off’ from the culture of cameras.
That authenticity will definitely connect to some people who will definitely see their lives mirrored in the events onscreen, though the show is so accurate in capturing a generation and demographic that it might alienate audiences who see a very different world and life than what they know. Rap Sh!t expresses the major cultural changes that have been shifting for the past decade, which is why many people will hate the show; the others who’ve caused or embraced the change, for better or worse, will undoubtedly love it. Rap Sh!t is available to stream on HBO Max, with new episodes each Friday until the Sep. 1st finale.
