PRODUCTION/CULTURAL REFERENCES (written 2/20/19)

-After "Dumb's the Word" back in season five, one thing on my bucket list was to write a proper Black History Month episode. While "Dumb's the Word" did cover Black History Month, the main plot was meant to explore Buster and Wade's friendship. The episode I wanted to write would have the holiday as the main focus. If the element of Black History Month is gone, the episode can't exist.

-My first opportunity was last season. I came up with an episode called "These Are Your Heroes" (a reference to the Nas song "These Are Our Heroes") where Wade finds out that Cornelius Marsalis had unfavorable opinions of the African-American community, and sought the acceptance of white people. He was also a sociopath and abusive to his wife, things Wade would find out while reading Marsalis' journal. The rest of the episode would focus on whether or not Wade would continue looking up to Marsalis in spite of everything he did. The subplot was exactly the same, and would end up being triggered by RK writing his own make-believe sociopath stories.

-The episode was scheduled for February 18, 2018. However, I ended up running into writer's block, and I eventually lost interest in the idea. I only wrote up to a little over 1,500 words. The episode that was meant to come out on February 11 ("'J', My Name is Jaylynn") ended up coming out a week late and released in its place. "100 Things to Do When You Skip School" made references to Marsalis to make up for it, but it ended up being delayed also and released on the last possible day where it made sense: February 28.

-When I was putting together season seven, I came up with an idea similar to "These Are Your Heroes," which dealt with Sparky, Buster, and Wade overhearing racist statements from a teacher. This is also when I changed the title to "These Are Our Heroes" (I got the title wrong the first time) and decided to release it in December. However, I still had the original script left over. I was interested in revisiting the episode, but since "These Are Our Heroes" was already tackling a similar issue, I knew the original idea couldn't work anymore. That's when I decided to approach the episode from a different angle, where Wade finds out that the statements made against Marsalis were born from racial prejudice and jealousy of his success. I originally considered calling it "These Are Our Heroes II" to differentiate from the December episode or "These Are Our Heroes (OG Version)," but I instead went with "Tricknology." I came up with the revised idea in September.

-The episode's writing ended up being influenced by the Michael Jackson documentary Leaving Neverland, which brought up Jackson's prior allegations of pedophilia. People were already turning against Jackson on social media, even though they were old enough to know about Jackson's previous trials and the fact that he was not only extorted, but acquitted in both cases. The reaction upset me and I decided to incorporate that into the episode, which presented the Marsalis allegations in the form of a documentary.

-Elements of the season six version remain in this episode. I did some slight rewriting to those first couple scenes to keep them from being outdated (like Wade deciding to write about Marsalis again in an attempt to top his previous work), and certain scenes were kept, added, or moved around. For example, KG talking about the inventor of television shows was just a random joke in the second scene of the season six version, but it was moved near the end to reflect his nervousness over talking to RK about his sociopathy.

-The original version of the episode was also inspired by the Simpsons episode "Paths of Glory," which gave me the idea for the sociopath subplot. I was considering making it a cover episode, but I decided against it.

-The title of this episode comes from a line in the Gang Starr song "JFK 2 LAX," where Guru says, "I've been there, I've seen how they make us fall victim to their tricknology..." I looked up the word to see if it was real and I found out it was meant to describe a dominant (especially white) group that uses manipulation and deception to strip power away from a weaker (especially black) group. I thought it described where I wanted to go with the episode perfectly, so I knew I had to keep it.

-RK and Wade reference "100 Things to Do When You Skip School," which Wade uses as a reason to write about Marsalis again. In that episode, Wade begins to become a slacker after cutting school with the rest of the guys to see Black Panther. His original plan was to write about Marsalis for Black History Month, but after the negative effect slacking has on his schoolwork, the finished piece isn't up to his usual standard.

-When I was writing this episode last year, I wanted to have some continuity from "Dumb's the Word" with Buster talking about the Negro Leagues. It was a case of him remembering what he had learned from trying to impress Wade. I was considering taking it out due to a year having passed, but I decided to keep it. This is also reflected in the callback to "Dumb's the Word" where Buster shows up in the same outfit from the original episode, but he doesn't have the cane because in "Dumb's the Word," he felt like he wasted the cane on the event. In the original episode, he also believed that he was underdressed, but here, because of what happened at the festival the first time, he believes bringing the cane would make him overdressed (while still being more dressed than everyone else, which Jaylynn points out).

-This is the second consecutive reference to Reading Rainbow. I guess I just had the show on my mind because I wrote this only two days after I was done with "The Art of Yellow Journalism."

-RK references the New England Patriots winning their sixth Super Bowl after defeating the Los Angeles Rams, 13-3 in Super Bowl LIII earlier this month. The Patriots are now tied with the Pittsburgh Steelers for the most Super Bowl championships in history.

-The title Deconstructing Cory was a parody of the documentary titles Surviving R. Kelly (a recent Lifetime documentary about R&B singer R. Kelly) and Leaving Neverland. I felt like there was a theme going on, so I wanted to reference it.

-James Robeson's name is a combination of the names of Wade Robson and James Safechuck, two men who alleged in Leaving Neverland that Jackson sexually abused them. Robson originally testified on Jackson's behalf during his 2005 trial.

-The Thomas Gardner allegation was inspired by something I had read a while back that stated that Charlie Sheen sexually abused Corey Haim on the set of their 1986 film Lucas.

-The allegation that Marsalis wanted to be white was inspired by a video I watched where Suge Knight referenced a conversation he had with Dr. Dre, and Dre told him that he wanted to be white.

-KG references the season four episode "Fake It" where RK is mistakenly diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome, and after finding out that he didn't really have it, decided to pretend as if he did in an attempt to cope with the loss of his uncle Carmine.

-Sparky references the season one episode "Native American Day," where he finds out that Christopher Columbus never really discovered America, along with his other atrocities.

-Buster references Demi Lovato's drug overdose last summer, but he is incorrect in stating that she smoked crack (none of the drugs she reportedly used were crack).

-I was considering a few songs to play during the episode when I first started working on it last year, and that number only increased this year. At one point, I was considering having two montages along with the end credits song, but I ended up only using "Can't Truss It." Other songs I considered using were: "Edutainment" by Boogie Down Productions, "HiiiPower" by Kendrick Lamar, "As I Read My S-A" and "Who's Gonna Take the Weight?" by Gang Starr, "N***** (The Slave and the Master)" by Nas, and "High for Hours" by J. Cole.