Beauty in Black, the 2024 drama series on Netflix written, directed, and produced by Tyler Perry, very strongly bears the characteristic mark of his work. While that would be great if you are a dedicated fan of his work, it is not good news for the general audience since Beauty in Black has you spend almost eight hours with outlandish and shallow characters, and a plot that is equally superficial and uninteresting. The series follows a young woman named Kimmie who is stuck in the adult entertainment industry despite wanting to quit for a long time and her sudden involvement with the billionaire family controlling almost every aspect of the neighborhood in Atlanta that she lives in. Overall, Beauty in Black often resembles bad TV drama, both in terms of plot and production, and is too soapy and campy for the average viewer.
Spoiler Alert
What is the Netflix series about?
Beauty in Black opens with the protagonist, Kimmie, nervously walking down a fancy hotel corridor, approaching a room that she has been asked to visit. As soon as she enters the room, it is clear that Kimmie has been hired for sex work and is seeing a client for the first time. Despite having worked as a stripper for quite some time now, she is not comfortable in her particular position, especially because of the demanding nature of the client, Roy. Kimmie is soon forced to leave the hotel as Roy is not happy with her, and this leads to further difficulties for her as her boss, Jules, reprimands her for this failure. Jules is a powerful and well-connected man running the adult club where Kimmie works, and he also runs a prostitution ring on the side, with Roy being one of his most important clients. Frustrated with her profession, which she had been forced to enter to keep herself afloat, Kimmie desperately wants to change courses, so she applies for a scholarship at the Bellarie Beauty in Black hair care company.
The biggest hair care company in the state of Georgia, named Bellarie Beauty in Black, has been running this scholarship program for quite some time now, in which five selected candidates will be able to attend their hair school for free. Along with this, a grand prize of 1 million dollars is also going to be given to a local salon business in an effort to make the hair care industry more accessible for the underprivileged. One of the popular shareholders, and even the face of the company, Mallory Bellarie, presents the prize to a lucky winner on the stage, although her real opinion about such philanthropic work is revealed a little later when she is by herself. Mallory does not really believe in helping the underprivileged with such charities and handout programs. Having married into the billionaire Bellarie family and now being an enormously wealthy woman, all Mallory cares about is her public image and reputation.
Therefore, when Mallory suddenly receives a call from her husband, Roy’s phone, and the voices from the other side make it clear that he is getting intimate with some other woman, she cannot control her rage. Although Roy and Mallory’s marriage is still alive because of the family business, both of them are very possessive about each other and do not want their partner having any extramarital affairs. As Mallory drives home in anger and frustration, she accidentally hits a pedestrian and flees the scene, only for Roy to hit the same body and put it in the trunk of his car out of fear. On the other side, Kimmie heads home after her second, more successful, session with Roy and finds her best friend and roommate, Rain, is extremely ill after a dangerous surgery.
How did Kimmie end up in the adult entertainment industry?
Beauty in Black gives viewers an idea about Kimmie’s background quite early on, in an effort to make us more sympathetic towards the protagonist. Kimmie had a very rough childhood after her biological father abandoned the family when she was a baby, or her mother had chosen to separate from him. Either way, Kimmie and her younger sister Sylvie had to go through tremendous discomfort and difficulties because of their mother’s romantic affairs, especially when she settled with a boyfriend of hers and the girl had to move in at his house. Eventually, the toxic boyfriend started getting jealous of Kimmie’s presence in her mother’s life and felt that the teenager was taking his girlfriend’s attention from him. The man genuinely believed that Kimmie was becoming a distraction in his romantic relationship and asked his girlfriend to abandon her daughter. It is also suggested that the boyfriend might have made sexual advances towards Kimmie as well, and it might be that he wanted her to be punished only because she turned him down.
Kimmie’s mother was in quite a helpless state, besides her selfish nature, and so she did not hesitate to side with her boyfriend, who was providing her with a stable life, instead of her daughter. Thus, the teenager was abandoned by her mother, quite literally, after Kimmie was dropped off on the street with some meager amount of money by her mother, and she was told to figure out the rest of her life on her own. Kimmie had no idea about what to do next or how to survive all alone on the streets of the city, and she kept crying throughout the evening, both out of sadness for having been abandoned by her own mother as well as fear for herself. That night, she hid herself inside a stall of a public toilet while having an emotional breakdown when another teenager entered the toilet and heard her sobs. This teenager turned out to be a girl named Rain, and she not only consoled Kimmie but also told her of a bright professional prospect she had recently learned about.
Rain introduced Kimmie to a young man named Angel, who had promised the former that he could arrange some job for her that could earn her a lot of money. Rain had already learned the harsh truth that she had to sell her body in order to survive, and she convinced Kimmie to do the same, with the latter not having much choice either. Angel said that the girls had to go to Atlanta and meet a contact of his before getting flown to Seattle, promising that each would be paid 500 dollars for their efforts. Essentially, Angel was also in a similar helpless situation, and he had been given the task of recruiting young girls for the adult club business in Atlanta. When the three teenagers finally met each other in the city, they realized that they had walked into a trap laid by the businessman, Jules, who took away their passports and all personal documents to force them into working as entertainers at his club. False criminal cases were also prepared against them with the help of a corrupt lawyer, and the entertainers were threatened that these cases would be filed if they tried to leave without paying them back.
This was how Kimmie had ended up in the adult club business, even having to get intimate with clients for more money shortly afterwards. Like all such rackets, the performers were also charged money for clothes and livelihood, which they obviously did not have when they started, and the ever-increasing amount was held as money owed by them to the club. Even at present, Kimmie and her best friend Rain owe a lot of money to the club, because of which they cannot simply leave the profession, and it also makes Rain get dangerous surgery from an informal source, which leaves her terribly sick. Although Kimmie had been abandoned by her mother, she does keep in touch with her still and even spends money on her family. But she does so mostly for the sake of her younger sister Sylvie, although their mother’s evil boyfriend still steals most of the money and depends on the very girl he had once abandoned in order to provide for his family.
Why does Kimmie change her mind about robbing Horace?
As the plot progresses in Beauty in Black, Kimmie gets introduced to an elderly man who starts to frequent the adult club, although he is very different from other clients. The man, named Horace, only spends time talking to Kimmie and even pays her for the sessions, while he really just wants to get acquainted with Angel. Horace admits that he has only discovered a sexual interest in men and wants to get intimate with Angel, and Kimmie helps him get in touch with the entertainer. In return, she wants only assurance—that Horace would visit the hospital where Rain is admitted and check up on her, since Kimmie herself cannot visit after being ordered by Jules not to do so. Horace assures her that he will definitely do so and even help Rain in whatever way that he can, but Kimmie is absolutely shocked when she does visit the hospital the next time.
As she sees Rain’s bed empty, Kimmie asks around and is told that the last person on that bed had recently passed away. This news absolutely breaks her heart, since Rain was the only person other than her sister who loved and cared for her, and it also makes Kimmie gradually turn vengeful against the members of the Bellarie family. This is because she had already found out that Horace was one of the two Bellarie brothers who had founded the hair treatment company, and that Roy is his son, and Jules is an important employee of the family business. Therefore, Kimmie feels betrayed by Horace, for he had clearly not helped Rain out, and she also believes him to be their actual boss, since the elderly man must be the one in control of the club business, being Jules’ boss. Therefore, when Angel presents her with the idea of holding Horace hostage and looting his house, she agrees to be a part of it.
However, just as the robbery is about to take place, Kimmie receives a call from Rain’s number, and she picks up to get another surprise. Having spent days grieving the death of her best friend, Kimmie learns that Rain is actually alive, and she had been moved from the previous hospital to a better and more secure facility when an elderly man had used his influence and money. The protagonist quickly realizes that the man must have been Horace and tries to stop the robbery from taking place, although Horace himself kills the robbers without her help. This is when Kimmie and Angel tell the man the whole truth, and it is revealed that Horace actually has no idea about the adult club and prostitution business. It was actually Horace’s brother, Norman, who had been running these illegal and immoral businesses with the help of Jules.
Does Charles get killed?
Along with focusing on Kimmie, Beauty in Black is also about the dysfunctional dynamics and complications among the Bellarie family members. The two brothers, Norman, a scientist by profession, and Horace, a businessman, had created the Bellarie Beauty in Black Company and took it to great heights of success, but they are always at each other’s throats at the present time. This is because of a number of factors, including the fact that Horace’s divorced wife, Olivia, had once gotten sexually involved with Norman. At present, Norman mostly stays away from the business, just like Olivia, who has distanced herself after the divorce, and it is mostly Horace’s son and daughter-in-law, Roy and Mallory, respectively, who run the business. The company is also facing a number of lawsuits filed by hundreds of users after their products have been believed to be causing cancer among customers, but Roy and Mallory want to simply quash these claims. It has been getting increasingly difficult for them to defend themselves though, as their lawyer confirms that if they lose the legal battle and a hefty amount be paid to the public, it would surely lead to the family becoming bankrupt.
In this already turbulent situation, Mallory ends up hitting Norman’s wife, Ina, with her car while driving back home while the woman is out on a run. Roy later runs over the same body and then stows it inside the trunk of his car, not realizing that the victim is still alive. As the couple tries to get rid of their car and the evidence of their crime, Ina tries to escape and is found by the authorities. Norman is soon informed about his wife’s accident, and although he does not know the perpetrator, he has a strong hunch that it must be one of Horace’s sons. The family members meet a number of times after this, with Horace’s younger son, Charles, also summoned, despite him having no interest in the family business.
By the end of Beauty in Black, Ina passes away, leading to Norman’s violent side coming out as he kills all the doctors and nurses at the scene. He then sets out to take revenge, and it is most possibly him who hires gunmen to shoot at Charles’ sports car, believing that Charles must have killed his wife. However, it is also not clear whether Charles actually dies, as he had been robbed only a few hours earlier at the adult club. This means that it is highly possible that the stripper who robbed him might have been driving the car when it got shot at, resulting in a deadly fire. It is very evident from the ending of season 1, as well as information online, that the story is far from over, and a second part is about to come soon. Therefore, whether Charles actually dies from the attack and whether it was Norman who ordered the hit on him will be revealed in the future.
What happens to Kimmie in the end?
At the end of Beauty in Black season 1, Mallory comes across the scene of the attack on Charles’ car, and upon identifying the vehicle, she immediately calls Horace and tells him about it. Therefore, whenever part 2 or season 2 might arrive, Horace and Roy will surely attack Norman, even if the latter is actually not the one who ordered the hit on Charles, meaning that the family feud is far from over. The business will also have to survive the difficult lawsuits, especially with the praiseworthy efforts of the dedicated lawyer, Lena, trying to ensure that all the wronged customers can get justice.
On the other side, Kimmie will have to face the most difficult situation, as she learns of a very disturbing development at the very end of Beauty in Black season 1. Throughout the season, her handler, Body, had been mistreating Kimmie and being exceptionally rude to her in order to keep her in line. Body and her associates had even beaten up Kimmie on the orders of Jules, and she had then started to boast about some young girl she was about to bring into the business, whose presence would surely make Kimmie insignificant. Unbeknownst to the protagonist, Body had actually been tracing her background and trying to find any family members of her. Thus, at the very end, it is revealed that the young girl Body had been boasting about is Kimmie’s younger sister, Sylvie, as the latter has been kidnapped by the adult club gang. Kimmie will have to protect her sister and save her from this dark and degrading life as a sex worker, along with trying to carve her own exit from the profession, whenever the story of Beauty in Black continues.
