If you’re looking for a new show to watch with your partner, check out the “Snowfall” spinoff “The Drop: A Snowfall Saga.” “Snowfall” has been lauded for its storytelling, which offered an authentic look into life in Los Angeles during the ’80s and the effect drugs had on the Black community. Now, we get to explore one of the show’s most beloved couples on the spinoff.
The show picks up where “Snowfall” left off with characters Leon and Wanda, played by Isaiah John and Gail Bean, starting anew after the drug game nearly destroyed their lives.
“Snowfall” viewers witnessed Wanda’s journey to overcoming drug addiction. Now, she is clean and focused on something bigger: rap music. However, not everyone is happy with Wanda’s ambitions, mainly her husband Leon. Black Bride chatted with both Bean and John about the new series and their characters’ rollercoaster relationship.
“They’re not together, but they’re still married, right? So they’re just going through a tough time, and Leon is having a hard time accepting the fact that she wants to be a part of the rap industry because he sees the rap industry; he sees the streets. He doesn’t see a separation,” John says.
“So that’s why he’s been warning her about Lamar and the dangers of that because he’s like, we been down this road and we already survived, and you’re trying to go back. So he’s more so looking at it from that perspective, which is a hard thing for her, and it’s a hard thing for him.”
“They’re not together, but they’re still married, right? So they’re just going through a tough time, and Leon is having a hard time accepting the fact that she wants to be a part of the rap industry because he sees the rap industry; he sees the streets. He doesn’t see a separation.”
Isaiah John
Lamar, played by “When They See Us” star Asante Blackk, is Wanda’s cousin and a music prodigy. They work together to make a name for themselves in the up-and-coming West Coast rap game. But it’s been anything but easy. The show is set in the early ‘90s, a period known for peak gang violence in Los Angeles. However, Wanda is determined to break through and build something that she truly believes in.
“She presents at an all-time high, and then we’ll have moments where you see where it’s really at. She definitely believes in herself, but then it’s like she goes out into the world. If she steps out her house at a 10, and she goes out into the world, she keeps encountering different things that will knock her down. Then it’s like even the small wins that she may get, it may boost her back up to a 10,” explains Bean.
When it comes to Wanda’s and Leon’s marriage, Bean describes it as “complicated,” as they are in a space where they can’t be together, but they also can’t be apart. “[The show] picks up in a complicated place with Leon and Wanda having to try to both get through past trauma while still reinventing themselves. They’re trying to decide: Are we reinventing ourselves as individuals, or reinventing ourselves as collectives?” Bean says.
“So with trauma, sometimes you can either sit in it and mourn it and have survivor’s remorse, or you can use it to motivate you, and you want to stay busy and not really think about it and keep going. I think they are both dealing with trauma two different ways. So we’re seeing the complications of that and how that miscommunication and that misplaced trauma is affecting them personally and collectively.”
“I think they are both dealing with trauma two different ways. So we’re seeing the complications of that and how that miscommunication and that misplaced trauma is affecting them personally and collectively.”
Gail Bean
She adds, “It’s so much love there. You know what I told somebody? I said we are seeing two people who cannot be apart, but cannot be together. That is what we’re seeing, and it’s pulling at the heart. As you see that, and we learn throughout the season, we start to find out that there is other traumas that they have faced that get revealed, that make you want to fight for them harder and make you feel so bad for them. It lets you know that they belong together. Then we’re in the story of like, will they or won’t they?”
Only time will tell if Wanda and Leon’s marriage can survive this new phase in their lives.
Watch “The Drop: A Snowfall Saga” every Tuesday on FX and Hulu.
Photo courtesy of NABJ