UnPrisoned returns to HULU this week for Season 2 and we couldn’t be more excited.
Source: Kelsey McNeal / Disney
When Season 2 begins, we find that things with the Alexander family are still very much messy!
Paige’s therapy practice is in trouble, Finn’s anxiety is through the roof, Edwin is still figuring out how to get his life together outside of prison, and their relationships are more complicated than ever.
‘UnPrisoned’ creator Tracy McMillan spoke to BOSSIP about how the show is all about healing Black family dysfunction and says the second season is about “getting free.”
We’ve been fans of McMillan since her OWN unscripted series Family or Fiancé and she told us that the series is not that much unlike UnPrisoned.
“It’s so interesting because both of the shows really are about Black families and how do we put the Black family back together and how do we take care of ourselves?” McMillan told BOSSIP. “How do we deal with generational trauma? How do we carry it in a way that gives us more freedom? How do we set ourselves free? That’s always part of the Black narrative — freedom. I wanted to do a season about how to get free.”
This season, the Alexanders turn to a “family radical healing coach,” played by John Stamos, who throws out all the rules to free them of their issues, old wounds, and family secrets holding them back.
Source: Kelsey McNeal / Disney
While Kerry Washington’s character Paige finds her subconscious is still occasionally visited by her younger self Little Paige (Jordyn McIntosh), we noticed that role has decreased substantially from the first season but McMillan, who based the series on her own life experience, says the relationship between Paige and her inner child is still significant.
“I think she’s developing a relationship with that inner self,” McMillan told BOSSIP. “Over the course of season one she was this part of her, so I imagine Little Paige as the part of myself that has never been touched by anything that’s happened to me — the wisest, most whole, most light, that knows every single part of my consciousness and tells me what I need to know and I need to sort of partner with her in moving forward in my own life, but she’s got wisdom for me that I need to know and she will give it to me if I listen so developing that relationship with that part of myself has been a huge key to my own journey of healing all the stuff that I went through in childhood as a result of my dad going to prison. So you’re just seeing that relationship deepen between these two characters who, really she’s a part of Paige.”
While Paige is continuing to grow her practice as a relationship expert on this season of UnPrisoned, McMillan says the show reflects how the healing journey never truly ends for people looking to thrive and not just survive.
“Life is constantly unfolding, whatever your life circumstances are, change is the only sure thing,” McMillan said. “So whether you have kids, like they’re growing or if you don’t, whatever choices they make and this is a lot about the age group, when your your kids start to get a little older or you come into your 40s and you’re like, ‘OK now I know who I am, what is it that I need to work on?’ A lot of it is just survival up to a certain point. When you get to the point where you’re like, ‘I don’t wanna just survive, I wanna make choices, I wanna flourish, how do I do that?’ or ‘I wanna grow how do I do that? That’s what I’m here to explore. What is that process? I know that to be a hopeful sacred journey, it’s the most important work a person can do because it it impacts everything else — your family relationships, your health, so this is important stuff, but I wanted to make it fun.”
Season 2 of UnPrisoned returns to Hulu Wednesday, July 17.