‘Black Lightning’ S1E9 Recap: “The Book of Little Black Lies”

Last week on Black Lightning, fan-favorite La La returned, despite having been murdered in his jail cell earlier on by Tobias.  While his return is still shrouded in mystery, he’s now taking tips from spirit-Lawanda, including having sex with the spirit.  Meanwhile, Jefferson is trying to lay lone after Lady Eve was killed by Tobias’s electrical weapons, turning the police and community against him.  Trying to solve who framed him, he found the weapons, but some corrupt cops managed to destroy the evidence.  To make matters worse, Gambi finally fessed up to his mysterious past as it pertains to Green Light and the creation of metahumans in Freeland, causing him to distrust and part ways with his former mentor.  Jefferson’s youngest daughter Jennifer has started to gain powers like her sister did, that seems to have the same “spark” that her father does.

This week starts with a still confused Jennifer finally confiding with her sister as she feels she’s going crazy.  Anissa basically tells her sister that she also has powers, which of course, is met with some skepticism.  Only when Anissa uses her powers to lift Jennifer’s bed (with Jennifer on it) does she start to see just what’s going on.  Anissa tries to tell the frightened Jennifer that not only does she have powers and is going as the vigilante “Thunder,” but their dad is also Black Lightning.  It seems kinds of rushed with both the powers reveal and sharing the big family secret of their father.  Jennifer confronts her father, who doesn’t deny it.  Instead of being wowed by the fact that her father is a superhero (and a little hypocritical) and being excited, she’s angry and hurt that such a big secret was kept from her.  Of course, it was kept from Anissa, but she has a much different reaction from her big sister, showing not only her maturity, but also that the sisters are two distinctly different people.  This will play a big role later on in the episode.  Jefferson and Lynn are angry with Anissa for letting the cat out of the bag before they could, but eventually, peace is made with everyone, except Jennifer who’s still upset.

Meanwhile, there is still a mystery surrounding Green Light and the death of Jefferson’s father that needs to get solved.  While most superheroes just go around punching and kicking bad guys, this is a different type of hero.  Like Batman, who’s the “World’s Greatest Detective,” Jefferson and Anissa have to do their own investigating that doesn’t require any powers, just their intellect.  Looking at grandfather Alvin’s old records, they “follow the money” to determine who was behind the financing of Green Light for the past 30 years.  Leading them to a shady lawyer (and wearing some political masks for great social commentary and comedic effect), they move closer and closer to not only the corruption within the police department, but ultimately the head guy in charge, Gambi’s former boss.

Lynn tries to console Jennifer about her new reality.  Jennifer doesn’t want to have powers and be a hero.  She just wants to be a normal kid.  While Anissa wants to save the world, she wants to go to prom, college, get married, and have kids.  You know, just normal people stuff.  We also get our first clue that Black Lightning is in the Arrowverse.  For a long time, the producers of the show stated that Black Lightning will be independent of Supergirl, The Flash, Legends of Tomorrow, and Arrow, it looks like all the DC CW shows are connected as Vixen and Supergirl are name-dropped.  While Supergirl is from Earth-38 and Vixen is from Earth-1, both are mentioned.  This probably means that Black Lightning is taking place in Earth-1.  Expect the characters from Black Lightning to be in next year’s crossover event.