'Mixed-ish' Episode 12: The staredown between Aunt Denise and Tamika has fans gushing over the duo
In this week's episode of 'Mixed-ish', titled 'It's Tricky', the Johnson family dealt with stereotyping and racial profiling as Rainbow signs up for the track team at school and Alicia tries to reign in her temper as her father-in-law, Harrison, tells her that she portrays the angry black woman stereotype.
While Rainbow tries out for the swimming team to resist the stereotype of black people running, it does not go so well and she decides to stick to what she is good at and what she likes. This works out well since Rainbow, Tamika and the others end up winning.
Meanwhile, Alicia decides to be herself as well and when she schools the opposing lawyer and Harrison rejoices, she tells him this is not his victory — and rightly so.
In an educational and informative episode, what stood out was, however, the pair of Rainbow's aunt Denise and her track teammate, Tamika. Both characters have played their parts in Rainbow's journey to become more comfortable in her own skin.
However, this episode was the first time that the two characters met. In an extended staredown, both Denise and Tamika sized each other up, leading Rainbow to ask them if they were both okay. To this, Tamika replies, "she's cool," and Denise says, "I like her."
Fans love the duo and many pointed out that Tamika and Denise were reflections of each other. One fan wrote, "Denise & Tamika sizing each other up, was TV GOLD #mixedish." Another fan wrote, "(the) last scene of #mixedish was like looking at a younger and older version of ya self at the same time lol."
A viewer tweeted, "#mixedish OMG!!! That’s Denise when she was little." Another fan wrote, "Denise done met her Mini-Me!"
As viewers, we could hope to see more scenes featuring the two sassy characters together — not only do they give Rainbow lessons in much-needed self-confidence, they also could be an iconic television duo.
'Mixed-ish' airs on ABC on Tuesday nights.
