The Boondocks is a cartoon based off the comic strip by Aaron Mcgruder. It was on Adult Swim from 2005-2014 weekly for 4 seasons. It challenges black culture and habits as well as American society. The show is famously controversial, gaining the ire of Al Sharpton, BET and Tyler Perry. It’s unapologetic in its humor and politics. The show serves to create a discussion. The show was America’s first real look at how black people in this country think about what’s happening. The media will often go to intellectuals and academics rather than to the people when trying to get a grasp on what black people are thinking. It’s often good enough to have a token black presenter for the purpose of representation but the Boondocks challenged that. It was boundary pushing in terms of saying what needed to be said, it never shied away from putting forward controversial ideas. The Passion of Reverend Ruckus episode put forward themes of faith, self hate, exploitation and powerlessness.

The show is based in the fictional town of Woodcrest. It’s a wealthy, white suburb outside a major city. The town is based on Columbia, Maryland where Mcgruder grew up. The Boondocks is a reference to the term for a neighborhood far from the city with plenty white people. The show often parallels real life parodying the R. Kelly trail and the emergence of “cruelty free” labeling. It refuses to just hit at easier targets to the right but also parodies blacks and so called liberals, often sighting complacency and empty rhetoric as poor traits on the left. 

The character Uncle Ruckus is one half a modern interpretation of an Uncle Tom, the other half being Tom Dubois a lawyer in the neighborhood. Uncle Ruckus hates black people and is unapologetically racist. He is also black but claims it is only due to his having revitiligo, the opposite of what Micheal Jackson had. In the beginning of the episode we see him standing before the pearly gates. Instead of St. Peter at the gates he meets Ronald Wilson Regan. In the first episode of the Boondocks Regan is stated to be the devil with Ronald Wilson Regan his name having 6 letters each (666). Regan tells Ruckus in order to get to white heaven he would have to spread the word of the goodness of the white man.

After Ruckus wakes up from his dream he finds he’s dying from a tumor on his back. He goes to Robert Freeman’s door to tell him about his message. Robert turns him away but when he preaches from the back of his truck he gets a crowd. Most of the crowd is indifferent to his race based message but one member catches on. He continues to preach on the streets gaining passive interest with statements like “the blackness in our skin represents sin, which is why god wants us to hate the black in us.” One person listening is Armstrong Elders. Armstrong Elders is a parody of black conservative personality Armstrong Williams who served as legislative aide to Senator Strom Thurmond who in 1964 opposed the Civil Rights Act. Elders picks up on Ruckus’ race based message and packages his message for the masses. The mass marketing is a parody in it of itself of the televangelists who capitalize off of people’s faith only with Elders being the main profiter. Elders is also played as the typical self hating black man who’s turned his back on his race. Ruckus greets him by saying “you’re the only darkie I ever seen make sense on the TV news. And you talk white too, that’s very impressive… for a monkey… no offence”. To which Elders responds “none taken”. His book has become so popular he is able to become a nationally known race based preacher. He gets a TV interview and a televised sermon at Woodcrest Postpavilion.

The first words we hear Huey Freeman say is “Jesus was black, Ronald Regan was the devil and the government is lying about 9/11.” Huey is a 10-year old inspired by Che Guerva, Malcom X and the Black Panther movement as well as most things to the left. His name sake is Huey P. Newton, a founder of the Black Panthers and a man idolized as a martyr for his cause. He is often the voice of reason and very much moves against the tide which often vexes his grandad and brother who along with most the rest of the cast encourage him to let go of his principles and go with the flow. Huey meets with Shabazz after the execution date was set. From across the glass wall he tells Shabazz he had sent a letter to the governor threatening to expose his gay lover. Shabazz doubted the plan since they didn’t know if the governor was gay or cheated on his spouse but Huey said this is him having faith. Mumia Abu-Jamal is the basis for Shabazz. Abu-Jamal is a notorious death row inmate that many people consider innocent. Amnesty International objected the introduction of the death penalty due to the politicized nature of the trail as well as Philidelphia police recent history of abuse, corruption and the fabrication of evidence. Shabazz was arrested for the murder of a deputy sheriff even thought there was overwhelming evidence that a man named Eli Gorbinski did it. Huey comes up with operation Black Steel his plan to infiltrate and liberate Shabazz on the night of the execution then escape to Cuba assuming he’s not killed in the breakout.

At the end Ruckus is holding a sermon at the Woodcrest Postpavilion, his largest crowd. Grandad decides to go along with Tom to try and stop the sermon before it gets more out of hand. This is the same night of Shabazz’s execution when Grandad had promised to take Huey to the prison. Huey is distraught that he can’t even attempt to realise his plan so Grandad tries to comfort him telling him to pray for his friend. Huey looks at the TV with Ruckus’ interview on it and says “what makes your god anymore real than his.” At the sermon Ruckus preaches his vision of hatred of the black within you, his sermon turns violent as he commands his audience to beat the black out of each other. While this is happening Huey stands on a hill overlooking the city with a storm all around, he starts to pray this. “I never prayed before and I don’t know who I’m praying to. Maybe I’m too young to know what the world is supposed to be, but I know it shouldn’t be this. It can’t be this, so please.” While that is happening Ruckus leads a prayer over the chaos around him, “Lord I have always hated you for making me black and now I see I must hate myself and all those like me, and cause them misery just like your servant Ronald Regan did. And if any of my words don’t come directly from the almighty then let me be struck by lightning where I stand.” At that moment he was struck by lightning, miraculously the lightning struck him right on the tumor, it also cut power to the city and the prison right as the lever was pulled to execute Shabazz. When power returns the governor calls the prison to stay the execution after receiving the letter from Huey threatening to expose his gay lover. 

The stories in the episode present two extremes of religion and faith. To one side Huey tries to change the world in his own way, he is action orientated and feels as though good comes to those who make it. Uncle Ruckus is fanatical, his faith is based on self loathing and white supremacy, yet people consume it. When the media reported on his sermon they used the word ‘peculiar’ to describe his message. Soft and safe language giving him more legitimate standing than he would if they said what it was. Ruckus is propped up by the world around him for no reason other than people don’t want to think for themselves. Huey to the contrary is ignored and held down by the complacency of others. The world has largely forgotten about Shabazz, the media puts in a blurb after the Ruckus coverage saying “time being up for a condemned man many say is innocent.” The story that can get the most eyes is Ruckus so reporting on injustice takes the backseat. Huey is willing to put everything on the line in order to fight injustice but he never prays. Throughout the episode his friend tells him to pray and finally when his grandad chooses to try and save Ruckus rather than go to the prison he tells Huey to pray. In that Ruckus, a man who thinks he’s the one doing the saving, who is prepared to die proselytizing hate and Huey a child who is trying to fight injustice that world ignores, who is prepared to die in that struggle isn’t even given the chance because nobody cares to fight a losing battle. It was only when Huey truly felt powerless did he pray. As much as Aaron McGruder’s track history of writing characters who go against the flow, that are very counter cultural in a way, he is sensitive to religion. His other Adult Swim show was Black Jesus where instead of lampooning Christianity he uses it again as more of a social commentary and a political one over a religious. So Huey, McGruder’s most revolutionary character, praying as the story reaches its climax, when he sees no other option, and having his prayer answered is perhaps McGruder trying to say that as bad as the world may seem it is still fundamentally good.