'FOREVER' IS A MASTER CLASS IN REIMAGINING A CLASSIC WITHOUT LOSING ITS ESSENCE

In 1975, Judy Blume released her taboo-busting Forever, a YA novel about a teenage girl who has sex for the first time and, shock, it doesn't ruin her life. Almost immediately, it was deemed controversial by those who believed it was too sexually explicit for young readers, with some states going so far as to ban the book from schools. And for decades after its release, it even appeared on the American Library Association's list of the 100 Most Frequently Challenged Books.

Fifty years later, the bestselling novel is Netflix’s latest adaptation, getting a shake up from its original version in more ways than one. Blume’s Forever is set in white, affluent Westfield, New Jersey and focuses on the coming of age of a young girl; Creator and showrunner Mara Brock Akil, however, saw the a young adult classic—and by proxy, the relationship—through different eyes: her own, as a mother to Black sons. While the seminal coming-of-age story helped generations of young girls understand their bodies and themselves, the TV version is told from the perspective of the boyfriend, and the series focuses on Black families.

Lowkey, I've Always Had a Crush on You.

The eight-part series stars Lovie Simone (of Greenleaf, a drama following a Black megachurch) and newcomer Michael Cooper Jr., flipping the original story’s gender roles: Simone, as Keisha Clark, is more experienced and self-assured; Cooper Jr., as Justin Edwards, is the awkward one who falls hard and needs guidance. Yet, the series manages to expertly preserve the source’s emotional innocence—breathe easy; this ain't Euphoria.

Justin is from a wealthy family, and one of the few black students in a largely white school; Keisha is being raised by a single mother and has recently lost her scholarship place at her own school, leaving the family under serious financial strain. Though they knew each other as kids, Justin and Keisha are reunited at a New Year’s Eve party and sparks fly.

Keisha and Justin bumble into and out of a bad first date, but before too long, he’s texting her, “think I woke up with a girlfriend can u confirm” and she's replying “how can I be ur girlfriend if u haven’t asked me.” (He will.) Things get better and worse and better, happier and sadder and so on, as the couple travels through eight episodes of mostly ordinary drama—jealousy and insecurity, mopiness and mooniness, desolation and elation, miscommunication and reconciliation—on the way to maturity.

Their attraction is instant, the way first loves can feel, but they're mining all the feels and angst both together and as individuals, and they don’t yet know themselves, never mind each other.

And this being a drama, they both bring a lot of baggage to their nascent romance. They get into minor trouble with school and parents when an infamous sex tape—something shot by Keisha’s former boyfriend, Christian (played by Xavier Mills), but distributed by an offscreen character—leads to a conversation...or two. But it's more or less old news by the time the story begins. And, anyway, Justin isn’t bothered.

Set in Los Angeles in 2018—post-Trayvon Martin, pre-George Floyd—Netflix’s Forever grounds itself in a world where being Black often feels like screaming into a vacuum. Made evident by the fact that the show doesn’t shy away from exploring race as a device to build tension, but doing so with nuance and restraint.

But this adaptation is more than just “Forever, but Black.” It doesn’t attempt a direct retelling of Blume’s iconic novel, but instead draws from its spirit—respectfully reshuffling and updating its details. The story centers on two Black teenagers navigating the thrilling, awkward terrain of first love and sexual awakening in a digital age. It shifts between the two leads’ perspectives, asking mature questions about class, gender, mental health, privilege, and, yes, Blackness without aiming a sledgehammer at any of it.

Feels Good to be Seen.

Blume originally wrote Forever in response to her daughter’s desire for a love story where a teenage girl could have sex and not be punished for it. A book in which two seniors in high school fall in love, decide together to have sex, and act responsibly (apparently, a bold notion in the 1970s).

Sex, and how to do it, is a primary focus of the novel, but here, sex both is and isn’t the point. It’s part of Justin and Keisha’s story. They try things out, make mistakes, and get there eventually. It all feels true to their age and environments. But there’s a sort of openness that comes with the characters’ use of smartphones and access to the internet, which makes it a much less furtive endeavor.

Their parents are largely supportive and open with them. Justin’s father throws a condom and a cucumber at him, then closes the curtains. Keisha’s relationship with her mother is more complex. “Keep your books open and your legs closed,” she cautions her daughter, unaware of that video that has wreaked havoc on her daughter’s life.

As a teen drama, it just works, primarily because its teenagers actually look and behave like teenagers. The performances are excellent—especially Karen Pittman and Xosha Roquemore as the moms, the icons—but it all rides on whether you can buy into what Cooper Jr. and Simone are selling. And they are, no doubt, Forever's greatest assets. Forever could be the best written, most thoughtful, best produced adaptation anyone’s ever conceived of, but without two actors who can look excruciatingly horny yet terrified at the same time, it would never work. For as much as Keisha and Justin are teens of their time, they are also the closest and most vital connection between this series and Blume’s original work.

Forever? Forever.

Forever's greatest success is that it perfectly captures the dramatic rush of first love and the fumbling urgency of adolescent exploration in a way that feels, to put it simply, real. Which I personally appreciated. Coming of age myself in the 2000's, I always felt that there was so much capital E emphasis, capital P pressure put on losing (or not losing) your virginity—for girls. It was seen as this life altering, mind bending, body morphing thing with, thinking back on it, an absurd amount of magnitude given to it. And rarely were those conversations (in my personal experience) centered around being in or falling in love. You lost your virginity the way you lost teeth—just something you gotta do to grow up.

But Forever, focuses on the feels rather than the act—the high stakes and d-rama of that first real, true, honest, in your gut, in your soul thing.

Mara Brock Akil, who was also a showrunner on Girlfriends, The Game, and Being Mary Jane, has created something sensitive and winningly sweet, while still managing to maintain defiance and bite. It doesn’t so much update its source material as treat the novel as loose inspiration: details are shuffled around, extrapolated, nudged to the front and pushed to the back, and neatly avoiding the enormously disruptive effects of the pandemic on teen life, while maintaining the dominance of smartphones, which it writes into the story with ease and authenticity.

Netflix’s Forever is still as poignant and honest as the novel. Early on, Justin has a novel idea for getting himself unblocked by Keisha. “This is, like, low-key adorable,” says Keisha’s friend, approvingly. And that's exactly what Forever is: low-key adorable.

4.75/5 ★: To All the Boys walked so Forever could run.