Apple TV+’s Smoke, a gripping new procedural drama, currently ranks third on the platform for good reason. Stellar acting, sharp directing, and shocking twists hook viewers, making it a compelling watch. But, as with most Hollywood shows, it comes with a price. In this case, it’s tired anti-white male tropes.
Set in the fictional Pacific Northwest town of Umberland, Smoke draws from the 2021 true-crime podcast Firebug by Kary Antholis. The series stars Jurnee Smollett as Michelle Calderone, a newly appointed arson investigator partnered with Dave Gudsen (Taron Egerton).
Jurnee is sister to Jussie Smollett, the actor who was convicted of staging a hate crime (the Illinois State Supreme Court has since overturned the conviction on procedural grounds). Her performance in Smoke is phenomenal and blends perfectly with the talent displayed by the entire cast.
Calderone and Gudsen are hunting two arsonists: the “D&C” (Divide & Conquer) arsonist uses cigarette-triggered devices to ignite stores and divert resources, and the “Milk Jug” arsonist sets homes ablaze with oil-filled milk jugs.
In episode 5, “Size Matters,” Calderone questions Gudsen’s former partner Ezra (John Leguizamo), suspecting Gudsen of the D&C fires. (Gudsen was revealed to viewers as the culprit in episode 2, “Your Happy Makes Me Sad.”) Their bar conversation turns woke when Calderone criticizes “mediocre nothings” who feel entitled “because they’re born male and pale”:
Ezra: Dave still charming?
Calderone: Not sure I’d go that far but he’s likeable somehow.
Ezra: Likeable. That phony prick gave me hives. Careful. Don’t let him in your head.
Calderone: Oh, please. World’s full of Daves. These mediocre nothings who feel they’re owed the spoils because they’re born male and pale. And once things don’t work for baby, baby tries to burn the whole G*ddamn world down. That’s not the kind of guy that gets in my head.
Episode 1, “Pilot,” hints at similar sentiments. Firefighter Arch Stanton (David James Lewis), another white male and a D&C suspect, is portrayed as racist, mocking Calderone as an “affirmative action hire” during questioning about his absences during fires:
Calderone: March 28 last year, April 10 last year, May 9, July 12, August 4, September 27…
Arch: July 4, Christmas Eve, my birthday, your birthday…
Calderone: No, no, no. These are dates…
Arch: Yeah, they are dates…
Calderone: Dates of fires that Ward 3 responded to that you were not at.
Arch: So you say.
Calderone: So we proved.
Arch: Oh, you proved?
Calderone: Yeah.
Arch: Oh, wow. Proof is relative.
Calderone: Oh, no, proof is just proof.
Arch: No, it’s your proof.
Calderone: It’s our proof, okay. So, then tell us where you were on those days.
Arch: What’s it to you?
Calderone: It’s my job, Mr. Stanton.
Arch: Job or agenda?
Calderone: What kept you from responding to those fires?
Arch: Are you filling out some kind of quota, sweetie?
Calderone: Just looking for some truth, Archie.
Arch: Well, since we’re talking about truth, is it true you don’t know what an engineer is? And they gave you an office. What’s next, your own holiday?
Gudsen: Arch, that’s enough.
Arch: No, your face is on the $20 bill. F*ck Andrew Jackson. You’ve got my union rep’s info. Well, the next time you want to give busy work to your affirmative action hire, have her people call my people.
Calderone: Oh, it just keeps getting better. Okay, good for you. Bravo. That was incredible. Did you hear him? Affirmative action is how I got hired.
Arch: See you next Tuesday.
Calderone: Yeah, see you on C block. You’ll be walking a whole lot different.
Arch: Chow is up.
Gudsen: Come on.
Calderone: I’m gonna remember that face.
In Episode 2, Calderone illegally enters Stanton’s property, determined to prove he’s the arsonist. She discovers illegal weapons and a BDSM bedroom in his prepper-like underground bunker. When he surprises her with a gun, she shoots him in both legs.
As she attempts to torture a confession out of him, it feels as if the show wants us to root for her as a fierce heroine who’s putting the evil white man in his place, reducing him to an emasculated pile of sobs and pathetic pleas. (Warning: Language and violence):
Arch: Oh, God! Oh!
Calderone: Don’t you move. Don’t you f*cking move!
Arch: Ow!
Calderone: This ain’t my first bunker, Arch.
Arch: Get me a doctor.
Calderone: Who else is here? Who else is here? Who else is f*cking here?
Arch: Who else would be here? Get me a doctor!
Calderone: Who else is here? Don’t you f*cking… I’ll blow your brains…
Arch: You’re breaking my wrists. F*cking hurt.
Calderone: Who else is here?
Arch: There’s no one here. A doctor! I have f*cking rights!
Calderone: A civil rights advocate? Doesn’t seem on brand, Arch. Turn the f*ck over!
Arch: Oh f*ck! Oh, oh!
Calderone: Why do you set fires?
Arch: I don’t set fires.
Calderone: Why do you set fires, Arch?
Arch: I don’t set fires.
Calderone: You don’t set f*cking fires? Why do you set fires?!
Arch: I don’t set fires. Look around. There’s no incendiary devices. No f*cking accelerants. Oh f*ck!
Calderone: Okay, if you don’t set fires, why are you never at work? D*mn it, you’d better stop lying to me!
Arch: You know how hard it is to build a place like this and hold down a job? Huh? You think I’m gonna add f*cking arson on the list? You f*cking genius! Oh f*ck! You better have a f*cking warrant, you stupid tw*t! Ow! F*ck! Oh, God!
Interestingly, after realizing he isn’t the arsonist, there’s a moment of art imitating (alleged) life as she quickly stages a hoax to cover up her crimes and frame him, casting her as a hero while vilifying him:
Agent: You observed him walking to the truck?
Calderone: Yeah, I see he’s carrying the pig, something else, he had…
Agent 2: Pig?
Calderone: M60. You know, the big machine gun. We called it “the pig,” you know, in the service. So, he loads it in the truck, goes back inside…
Agent 2: At which point you breached the gate?
Calderone: I went to the truck, yeah. Not only do I see the pig, I see a 240. I’m thinking Newtown. I’m thinking f*cking Vegas, you know…
Arch: Every word she says is a f*cking lie! You f*king liar! I will f*cking end your career! You’re f*cking done!
Agent: Why didn’t you call it in right then?
Calderone: That mother f*cker would’ve been able to come back out with more, put on body armor. How many of us might not have made it home trying to take him like that?
Captain Steven Burke (Rafe Spall), Calderone’s former lover and superior, also fits the trope. After Calderone rejects him when he leaves his wife and children for her, he demotes her to the arson unit as punishment and continues to exert his power over her there, as well. With main character Gudsen as the D&C arsonist and Stanton a racist bigot, these three white male characters reinforce the “white man bad” propaganda.
And while Freddy (played by the extraordinarily talented and Emmy-worthy actor Ntare Guma Mbaho Mwine), who is black, is revealed to be the Milk Jug arsonist, his arc of being driven by pain and isolation adds tremendous depth, but doesn’t erase the show’s focus on white male villains.
Despite these tropes, Mwine’s performance alone makes Smoke worth watching if you can get past the heavy-handed liberal clichés.
