Woke Wants to Finally Show Black Nerd Culture in Its 'True Light'

New Girl fans will be happy to see Lamorne Morris in the new Hulu comedy Woke where he portrays cartoonist Keef Knight. Our protagnoist is living well in San Francisco: his comic strip is on the verge of blowing up, and he's making plans to move in with his girlfriend when he has an unexpected encounter that makes him rethink everything about his life as a Black man living in America.

At a virtual panel to promote the show, co-creators and executive producers Marshall Todd (the writer of Barbershop), Keith Knight, Maurice "Mo" Marable (he also directed episodes), and showrunner Jay Dyer talked about how Woke is timely, even though all eight episodes wrapped before the recent Black Lives Matter protests in the wake of the deaths of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor. 

"At the end of the day, the story is evergreen, right? What's going on in society, what happened to George Floyd, right? Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, like those have been going on longer than I've been alive, longer than my parents have been alive," Marable said. "And so this story, when you look at it on the surface, it's like 'Oh this groundbreaking story to a degree,' but it's not. This story's been told over and over and over. And hopefully we'll put a modern spin on it that people will like, and hopefully learn something from -- but this has been an ongoing discussion and an ongoing conversation."

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Knight was adamant about bringing a personal flavor to the show as a transplant from the Bay Area to Los Angeles, but he didn't want to play to stereotypes -- which is what sold him on his producing partners. "People responded to my personal stories. Marshall [Todd] came in with a script that was unique, with no racial tropes in it. I thought, 'This is the guy I should pair up with,'" Knight also recalled meeting Marable about directing the show and how the director's unexpected visual cues are what sold him, "His lookbook had images from Amelie, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind – movies I loved."

However, it was important not to lose the show's focus on Black nerd culture, which is rarely seen in mainstream TV shows. "Black nerds have been around for years. I'm glad that there's a show that finally shows us in our true light," Todd said during the panel. Knight added, "Cartoons and animation are kind of like modern-day court jesters – they can speak truth to power in a way that people can't. I mean, look at The Simpsons, they can rip on anything." The team also teased several guest stars who will voice some of the show's animated characters: listen for Keith David, Nicole Byer, Sam Richardson, Tony Hale, Cedric the Entertainer, and JB Smoove as you watch the episodes.

Ultimately, a big goal of the show is to prove being Black is not a monolith. "American culture is Black culture. I want to see myself represented in the media," Knight said. "We want to make you think, we want to make you laugh, we want to make you do something."

Woke premieres September 9 on Hulu with an eight episode season.