Editor’s Note: The following contains spoilers for Black Cake.
The big picture
- Episode 5 of Black cake reveals a shocking twist as Eleanor confesses to having another child before B and B, taking the story to London and introducing Mabel.
- Mabel, who lives as a white woman, faces backlash on social media for claiming expertise in indigenous foods, ignoring her true ethnicity.
- The episode shifts the show’s focus to Mabel’s racism and identity crisis, making Byron and Benny’s problems seem unimportant in comparison.
The Hulu exclusive produced by Oprah Black cake is a mystery thriller series based on Charmaine WilkersonThe New York Times bestselling novel of the same name. First released on November 1, the eight-episode adaptation tells the story of an elderly woman, Eleanor Bennett (Chipo Chung), who lost her battle with cancer and left behind a series of voicemails for her two children, B and B. In these messages, Eleanor reveals the untold secrets of her past as a young Caribbean girl who took her to from England to Scotland and finally to America. The life-changing stories force B and B to come to terms with their new identities as they learn to reshape their current lives with unanswered questions..
Episode 5, “Mother,” features one of the biggest twists of the series. Through his recorded messages, Eleanor admits she had another child before B and B, the result of a sexual assault she suffered in Scotland. This revelation takes the story across the world to London, where the audience meets Mabel Mathilde Martin (Sonita Henri), who lives as a white woman and is unaware of the fact that she is adopted. With this new character, Black cake dives into its most emotional arc yetforcing Mabel to confront her long-lost siblings in a world radically opposed to her own and make a vulnerable choice to decide where she truly belongs.
Black cake
Eleanor Bennett loses her battle with cancer, leaving her children a USB drive containing untold stories about her journey from the Caribbean to America; the stories shock her children and call into question everything they know about their family’s origins.
- Release date
- November 1, 2023
- Cast
- Jade Eshete, Mia Isaac, Samuel Lorenzo Bulgin, Adrienne Warren
- Gender
- Drama, History, Mystery
- Rating
- TV-MA
- Seasons
- 1
- Creator
- Marissa Jo Cerar
What is “Black Cake” episode 5 about?
Until the death of their mother, Byron (Ashley Thomas) and Benny (Adrienne Warren) had always believed that they were the sole product of their mother and father’s marriage. Eleanor never mentioned to her children or her husband, Gibbs, that she carried such a heavy secret her entire life. In fact, at the start of episode 5, it is revealed that Eleanor’s surfing accident, which puts her in the hospital, was not an accident after all, since Eleanor had planned to kill herself. After Gibbs passed away, the emptiness was too much to bear and Eleanor couldn’t handle the loss of another loved one. When she is diagnosed with cancer, Eleanor changes her outlook on life: “As soon as I found out they had found something and realized I was going to die, all of a sudden I I desperately wanted to live.”
Eleanor did what she could to stop the cancer from spreading and began searching the Internet for healthy recipes. This led her to miraculously discover her lost firstborn, Mabel Mathilde Martin. Eleanor tells B and B, in voicemails, that she immediately recognized Mabel by the sound of her voice, and knew deep within herself that she was his daughter. Ethno-food guru Mabel is interviewed about her new book something true, which talks about traditional foods from around the world. She radiates passion as she explains that foods should be seen as shared traditions between other cultures and that a country cannot claim full ownership of a food culture if its ingredients come from elsewhere.
After the interview aired, Mabel’s conflicting ideologies sparked a strong reaction on social media.. Demanding that she be “canceled,” the Internet Mafia cannot understand the idea of Mabel calling herself an expert on native foods when she is a white woman. This is a very ironic situation, given that Mabel and the audience have no idea of her true ethnicity. Mabel tries to find comfort in her family’s opinion of the negative reaction, but his parents – equally privileged and ignorant in these views – misses the point, encouraging Mabel to never apologize for who she is.
A few days later, Mabel receives a call from Eleanor’s lawyer, Charles Mitch (Glynn Turman), who informs him that she is adopted and her biological mother, who died, left her an estate in California. Mabel hangs up fairly quickly, dismayed by the news, and returns home to confront her parents, who eventually admit the truth: they wanted to keep Mabel’s true identity hidden to protect her from being confused or treated differently. Only now is Mabel able to understand where her bone structure, dark hair and love of ethnic foods come from: her Caribbean Chinese mother who gave birth to her at 19..
Does Episode 5 Change “Black Cake” for Better or Worse?
Black cake was initially set as a mystery thriller melodrama, but as the episodes progress, the series has become more of a soap opera. After B and B discover they have a half-sister, the story takes a very different direction from the experiment’s creator. Marissa Jo Cerar perhaps wanted. In an interview with Oprah Daily, Cerar said, “I wanted to see black, brown, and Asian people at the forefront of a story that wasn’t about the civil rights movement, slavery, or oppression.” Oddly enough, episode 5 makes the drama exactly that: a series involving stereotypical oppression against black people.
About halfway through the episode, Byron denies having to deal with racism at work.. He was snubbed for promotion to his position – which went to his white colleague – and his company continues to ask him to be a spokesperson on every diversity panel, given that he is the only black person in the laboratory. Bryon’s girlfriend, Lynette (Rebecca Naomi Jones) pushes him to speak out on the subject, but Byron fears losing his job and ruining his reputation, which pushes Lynette to break up with him. Later, Byron receives a call from Benny, telling him that she is at her white ex-boyfriend’s house, Steve (Elliot Cowan) house, in case something happens. Byron rushes to the address and intervenes to help his sister. When Steve provokes Bryon with derogatory comments, Byron beats him. Soon, the police arrest him on the spot, and the scene instead seems intended to portray the black man as the aggressor.
Changes in episode 5 Black cake in a series around racism. While the series was initially presented as a multi-generational journey stemming from the turbulent story of a woman’s search for happiness, the series has diverted towards a more sensitive path.. When the series focuses on its biggest twist, Mabel’s struggles become the main theme of the story. How does a “passing” white woman cope with the idea that she is not who she really is, both physically and mentally? This is the most crucial revelation of Black cake, transforming the series, but it also makes Byron and Benny’s problems even less relevant. Mabel’s character is a breath of fresh air to behold, and her identity crisis is the series’ attempt to distance itself from being labeled an overly dramatized soap opera. It’s a delicate subject, but despite this, Mabel’s reactions are beautifully executed, of a similar nature to Eleanor’s.
Eventually, Black cake must stay with Eleanor’s story, as the final episode will end the series soon. Although the first few episodes are significantly more compelling and gripping, fans can only find one answer to the biggest question we’ve been asking: Did Eleanor kill Little Man?
Black cake is available for streaming on Hulu in the United States
