Donald Glover's FX dramedy ATLANTA

Not confused--baffled. Did I miss the connection?

it’s a dream of Earn’s — or is it?

I don't want to deprive anyone of this: I will say that the cut to Earn made me gasp--a jump-scare that wasn't really even a jump-scare. Something they did with the sound.

it was a dream within a dream, nolan style

this show has completely primed us for an episode that doesn’t feature any of the main characters at all. that public access tv episode was basically that, with a brief appearance from paper boi

I had a dream last night that involved African-Americans. I was sitting in the audience at the Academy Awards and--never mind, it's so far-fetched it's not even worth describing.

still cracking up at "is Hugs your father?"

And the dog is named Corn Pop.

Also wtf with that suicide machine? I cannot imagine a worse possible way to go. Please tell me that isn’t a real thing. I’m not googling it.

lol

that series of events combined with the chime ringing made me laugh harder than I had in a while

I have to say, this show is amazing at setting up a series of very serious events immediately followed by something insanely absurd

then the perfect drop of "hail mary" lol

With the noise from the beginning of the song played by the guy!!

S3E1 is dark AF

Lol @ S3 ep3 where they agree about everyone hating Moby

S3Ep5 was so good -- I feel like I need to watch it again. When will we ever get to see Paper Boi perform on this tour?! It's so weird to me how we keep getting closer but we still don't get to watch a performance. The venue & characters especially in this episode.

feels like it's deliberate, I as actually surprised we heard as much of his music in this episode as we did.

Amazing episode. Amazing season. Amazing show.

it has to be deliberate -- everything about this show seems very on purpose imo
we did get a tiny bit of performance and a LOT of Darius dancing <3
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qBCPMQp2l7Q

The most we’ve heard of a paper boi song is still the horrible white woman cover from way back, right? It’s very intentional

i still need to catch up on this show - i remember their parody of a justin bieber song was v funny

The Darius dancing was such a gift, I wanted even 10-15 more seconds

It like he’s heard all this music and seen these performances countless time but this is his good friend and he’s STILL hype when the moment comes

I didn't think as highly of E5 as some of you, but I thought E4, "The Big Payback," was excellent, especially when "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face" (one of my favorite songs ever) played overtop Earnest/E holding court with Marshall. That would have been a great scene anyway, but having it play out to Roberta Flack covering a 1957 British folk song made it that much more complicated.

i think part of the reason why they don't show too much of paper boi's music is because it is so clearly donald glover rapping. the voice doesn't fit brian tyree henry at all haha

lolo yeah i had forgotten that & was very confused for a few minutes during this last episode

re: episode 4, i thought that the point it was trying to make was interesting, and i liked the epilogue a lot, but in general it was leaden and not super enjoyable to watch.

episode 5 was good, i thought that wiley was a compellingly weird character. paper boi could maybe overcome his writers' block by using wiley's little song as a hook!

the last scene of ep4 with the minnie ripperton song was really beautiful somehow

Ep6 was super on the nose (this whole season has been kinda on the nose) but I get why

As I was telling a friend -

I feel like we’re in a moment where creators are pointedly hitting the nail in the head because if they don’t many audiences will 100% not understand what’s happening - because they don’t have time to understand.. A lot of people exist on the surface of media because there’s too much media to absorb or they’re caught up in the chaos of life

this season is getting to be a little too much. enough of the one-off white ppl episodes

It's been an amazing season so far.

i was wondering if this was a one off or if we would see, maybe one of Sylvia's daughters or the Tribeca guy or maybe the dad again? the dad was the least cartoonish of the two parents. the scene where they were talking to Sebastian about death made me want to puke, their voices, blecch. but what is the value to the show of feeling yucky about those parents? i get it and yet i don't.

i'd did lol when i found out the Tribeca guy is Chet Hanks

Tonight’s episode, you guys

Died at “I’ll just let fate take care of it.”

Lol that was funny

You kinda have to watch this with the volume cranked or you miss a lot of incidental adlibbed dialogue

Or “adlibbed” dialogue

When drugged-up Al was walking along and listening to Stereolab, that felt so much like Joe Buck's arrival at the fake-Warhol party in Midnight Cowboy--may even have been an allusion.

“You didn’t have to call the boy Clarence Thomas. He ain’t THAT white.”

lol that last shot

lol'd at 'which soda is good for you?'

That last shot is amazing

one of the best parts of ATLANTA is how it shows all of these ways to be, and people moving between them, and they’re all so idiosyncratic and somewhat distorted so at no point do you think “hmm, yeah, that character… they’re a role model”

except maybe Van, and I have no idea where she’s going to end up. she probably doesn’t, either

life imitates art imitates life etc.

A white mom on Fox News is complaining that her mixed son now sees himself as “a Black man.” She’s suing the school, says CRT taught her son to not do his chores.

— Sophia Tesfaye (@SophiaTesfaye) May 16, 2022

i think i liked last week's ep more than any of the other anthology episodes

Is this gonna be a Van-centric episode? Feels like it.

https://www.complex.com/pop-culture/stephen-glover-atlanta-writer-interview?utm_campaign=complexmag&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_medium=social&fbclid=IwAR2UY69xgA-0WJL-9lDQiZhaPwPqCWV-Wo1NsF4Zjc_sdpD8eyDoNwZgTpU

regarding the weird show descriptions:

Stephen "Glover wrote the episode descriptions for Atlanta’s third season. The description for “Three Slaps” reads: “Wow it’s been a minute. I mean, I like this episode about the troubled kid but we waited 50 years for this?” “I told him to write them like somebody who hates Atlanta and he was like, ‘Bet,’” Donald Glover says."

I just caught up on the last two seasons. S2 was consistently excellent and hilarious. As for S3, most of the anthology episodes have been watchable, but I didn't like this week's Van ep at all and I usually like her character. it was a strange season overall, I didn't feel like they were always playing to their strengths

https://www.complex.com/pop-culture/stephen-glover-atlanta-writer-interview?utm_campaign=complexmag&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_medium=social&fbclid=IwAR3kiqrhQoRGgDW2iDeNqdAmA0CuEcntvIuQDbcisOeIEGQ6nhxGjrdqRbk

get this girl a cigarette she’s freezing