There's A Little Bit Of Issa In All Of Us: Insecure Part 1

If you've never seen this show, do us both a favor and binge watch it right now.

A little bit about Insecure.

Via getcolour.com

We'll get to the rest of the Insecure girl group in later blogs but for this post we will be focusing on the main character: Issa Dee. Issa is a character played by Issa Rae, who some of you may know from her popular youtube series Awkward Black Girl. There's so many things to love about this show including the realistically imperfect (yet amazing) female characters and how the cast consists of almost all people of color. Representation of women in media is already lacking but even worse is the representation of women of color on the big screen. Seeing Issa and the rest of the cast on HBO every Sunday night is a breath of fresh air. The show addresses problems women face each day, as well as diversity and race issues in a hilarious and eye-opening manner.

Let's talk about Issa.

Via vulture.com

We're first introduced to Issa on Episode 1: "Insecure as f**k". Issa is a 28 year old woman working for the nonprofit organization "We got ya'll" and is in a stifled but stable relationship with her boyfriend Lawrence. Issa's character changes rapidly through the first season upon meeting her high school "if" guy, Daniel. The first glimpse we get into Issa's real personality is her sporadic yet insightful raps. Whenever Issa wants to escape the moment or show a different side of herself, she resorts to rapping. Rapping is something she used to do back in high school but never pursued as a career because she thought it would lead to a dead end. In the show, whenever she doesn't want to risk being labeled as an "angry black woman" by her white coworkers she resorts to rapping or sarcasm as her defense mechanisms. Her raps help her escape her polite and stable personality, even if it's just for a minute. Within the first few episodes Issa turns 28 and reveals to her best friend Molly that she doesn't exactly love her life (honestly who hasn't felt this way at some point or the other?) For all of her 28 years, she's never felt like she's taken a single risk. She stays at her job because it's stable, she stays in her relationship because it's stable, every action she takes is merely for the sake of stability. She couldn't bring herself to dump her longtime boyfriend, Lawrence, so she did the next best thing; she went after an old flame. When Issa decides to pursue Daniel, her true character really begins to come out. While she normally dresses very casually with minimal makeup, the episode where Issa meets Daniel, we see her in a green sparkly skirt and crop top (for the first time). She tries on about a million different lipstick shades in the mirror and then begins rapping according to how each of the different shades makes her feel. Her rap gives insight into how she's feeling in the moment: sexy, confident and ready to take a risk. When she finally meets Daniel at an open mic night in a club, he convinces her to go on stage and start rapping. The "normal" Issa would never do it...but the "new" Issa that's with Daniel? She would definitely do it. Issa gets on stage and begins rapping while Daniel cheers her on from the crowd. This shows us that Issa felt comfortable with herself in front of Daniel in ways she couldn't be with Lawrence. Daniel managed to bring out a different side of her that for 28 years she had kept to herself; until that moment. In the next blog post, I'll discuss how Issa's character changes even more between seasons 2 and 3 and how her decisions from season 1 affect her and her relationship with those around her.

Via giphy.com

Do you see yourself in Issa or the rest of the cast? #issadee #insecure