The series focuses on Ben, an eight year old African American boy with a big heart and amazing imagination. Using a magic paintbrush, he transforms his city by bringing various street art to life, as well as classical sounds of Motown.
It has not been renewed past its second season, which released June 28, 2019.
Motown Magic provides examples of:
- Alliterative Name: Motown Man, of whom Ben has an action figure.
- Alliterative Title: Motown Magic.
- Animate Inanimate Object: Angie's skateboard is temporarily brought to life in "My Girl".
- Art Initiates Life: The power of the Master Piece allows Ben to create living beings from graffiti.
- Christmas Episode: "I Wish", which is set on Christmas Eve and deals with Ben trying to find a special ornament that Grandma Ruby lost as a kid.
- Debut Queue: While Ben and his friends are introduced in the first episode, the robot Dancing Machine is introduced in the second, while the car Jimmy Mack is introduced in the third.
- Magic Music: The Master Piece appears to run on the power of Motown music; Ben activates its painting-animating powers by singing “It’s Easy As ABC”.
- Mr. Imagination: Ben is described as this, which allows him to use his magic paintbrush to bring the sounds of Motown to life in his hometown.
- Idiosyncratic Episode Naming: All episodes are titled after or are puns on songs by famous black singers which are simultaneously incorporated into the episode.
- Powers in the First Episode: The first episode has Ben discover the magic paintbrush for the first time and discover its Motown powers.
- Quarter Hour Short: Like most animated Netflix shows at the time, every episode is a fifteen minute short segment, not paired into a full half-hour. The sole exception would be the first episode which is a full half hour.
- Second Episode Introduction: Dancing Machine, Ben's Robot Buddy, is introduced in the second episode, "Dancing Machine".
- Sentient Vehicle: Jimmy Mack, a talking convertible brought to life from graffiti of a Cool Car.