With its engaging cast and steady stream of titillating twists, CBS’ Beyond the Gates is more than just a historic moment in daytime. It’s also a drink-tossing, face-slapping, golf club-swinging good time.

The Duprees will not be erased — and their story is far too fun to ignore.

It's just the kind of comforting, heightened, sometimes-silly drama that can get you through a long day.

Beyond the Gates’ first episode was inevitably a little heavy on exposition, as characters provided potted portraits of themselves and their histories. It’s going to take viewers a minute to get to know them, and for stories to grow around them; there are 20 full-time cast members, and 20 on contract and recurring.

While Beyond The Gates isn’t reinventing the daytime soap formula, just the idea that we’re being introduced to a new set of characters, and we’re getting a soap that features and affluent and powerful Black family, is more than enough to get us to keep watching.