There’s no “I” in team, but “there’s no team tighter than family.” That’s the tagline of Disney’s new family drama The Crossover, premiering April 5th on Disney+. Adapted from Kwame Alexander’s award-winning verse novel of the same name, the series is narrated by Daveed Diggs from the future looking back on events occurring in the present.
(Disney/Alyssa Moran)
Josh ‘Filthy’ Bell” (Jalyn Hall) and Jordan ‘JB’ Bell (Amir O’Neil) are twin brothers and best friends. Basketball is their life, both serving as huge assets to their middle school team and hoping to go pro one day. But as they cross over into their teenage years, Filthy begins to be distracted from his focus on basketball, mainly by his new crush Alexis (Skyla I’Lece).
As much as The Crossover centers around Filthy and JB, it’s very much a family drama. Their parents are not only key figures in their upbringing at home but also at school. Their mom, Dr. Crystal Bell (Sabrina Revelle), is their school principal, and their father, former NBA player Chuck Bell (Derek Luke), is their basketball coach. The drama follows Crystal and Chuck just as much as it does Filthy and JB, with the parents not only working to solve challenges for their boys, but also for each other.
Basketball is a major part of The Crossover, as is probably obvious by the title, and among its executive producers is NBA superstar LeBron James. Author Kwame Alexander is on the project as another EP and showrunner (and also with a cameo), with the core story from the novel present for fans of the book. While the series is an entirely different format, broken into eight episodes and with expanded action, another key element connecting the series to its source material are pop-up vocabulary moments that emphasize important words. It never gets distracting, but reminds viewers that there’s a lot to learn from this experience.
With a lot of drama and strong performances across the board, The Crossover easily welcomes viewers in. There’s a generational aspect to the show, with Crystal and Chuck trying to instill in Filthy and JB the lessons from their own past to try and give them both a brighter future. The story is heavy, offering something markedly different than your typical Disney+ series, and the show would’ve benefitted from the addition of some lighter moments to add better emotional balance. But fans of dramas will eat this up, and when watched with the whole family, the arc is guaranteed to spark meaningful conversations.
I give The Crossover 4 out of 5 trophies.
The Crossover premieres with all 8 episodes on Wednesday, April 5th, on Disney+.