Not much has been written specifically about "Brazzaville Teen-ager." In her 2001 entry on Friedman for Dictionary of Literary Biography, Brandy Brown Walker notes Gunther's wild attempts to save his father's life, but says that the illogic of Gunther's "reasoning is typical of Friedman's non-sequitur stories" and that the story's ending is "rather anticlimactic and as pointless as the stunts themselves." On the other hand, in his 1973 article for Studies in Short Fiction, Stuart Lewis takes the story seriously and analyzes Friedman's ritualistic use of the "doo-wahs' and 'yeh, yeh, yehs" as a "magic chant," like those found in traditional rituals.

Despite the lack of specific criticism on the story, it does share characteristics with other Friedman works, so many general critiques apply. For example, in her 1978 entry on Friedman for Dictionary of Literary Biography, Karen Rood says the following about Friedman's protagonists: "As losers who try...