Review: Donald Glover Impressively Delivers New Vibes With FX's 'Atlanta'
Source: FX
The FX series created and written by Donald Glover ignited buzz that grew to a roar before it aired with mind-bending promos of Glover's character, Earnest, posting palm cards on parked cars with the world moving fully opposite his direction. With no idea what the show was about or why I should care, I immediately recognized the nerdy black genius therein and knew I had to watch.
At day's end, what resonates with me most about Atlanta is that it lets black people live. While Atlanta is most certainly a specific and mostly black world, it is one in which we just get to be, in defiance of stereotypes; wholly rebuking the warped view of African Americans as a monolith. The show's main characters also literally do not die or become gravely wounded in the series, which is just sweet all-spiced glaze on top of the already delicate, savory peach cobbler Atlanta serves up.
What makes Atlanta compelling and an absolute binge-watching must before Season Two? So many things. I've narrowed it down to five.
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The Writing
Atlanta's story and dialogue prove forevermore that a series can be universally relatable even as it is blackity-black, deeply Southern and dancing squarely inside the poverty line. Donald Glover made it a point to staff its writer's room with black writers. Who's in the room shows in the authenticity and complexity of what and how things are said.
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Humanity Over Circumstance
The characters may lose in life, but they never lose their dignity. Earn makes $96 per pay period, which is "technically homeless," as he tells his not-quite girlfriend and co-parent Vanessa (played by Zazie Beetz), but his intelligence, determination and dedication as a father to their toddler are never in question. He ain't got much going for him, but he's far from the "ain't shit n***a" that TV loves to depict. Earn's cousin Alfred, better known as the rapper Paper Boi (portrayed by Brian Tyree Henry) is a weed-dealing, hardcore rapper who shoots a guy for snapping off his car mirror. But when he's bullied on social media by a guy who delivers pizza for a living with his son in the back seat, he calls off exacting revenge because recognizes that talking trash about his mixtape is all this internet troll has going for him.
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Black Women Rock in Atlanta
It would be easy to paint the black women in Atlanta as one-dimensional strippers, baby mamas and gold-diggers in a city where all of the above are plentiful. Thankfully, Glover realizes that there is more to real life black women and that his fictional ones can echo that reality. Black women get to be dynamic, whole complex humans. They're in control of their minds and bodies, but they don't have all the answers either. Vanessa ("Van") shares a daughter with Earn, but she is a schoolteacher who glams up, and lights up after dinner with her girl Jayde (Aubin Wise), who has a thing for blunts, jet-setting and ball players. Van checks Jayde on what the "value" of a woman is, but she also makes sure Earn knows that she sees his effort and has his back, even if he can't expect exclusivity.
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Politics Are Taken Personally
Yes, black people understand how systems conspire to derail them—and this comes from being educated by and from first-hand experiences with said system. The system gives not a single damn about your life or your time, prioritizing "processing" over personhood. When Earn and Paper Boi get locked up, the holding facility reveals how the penal system discards the mentally ill. In one very shocking scene, an officer brutalizes an indigent man for spitting toilet water in his face. Earn voices what we all know: "Clearly, this man just needs help." In that evocative episode, the holding facility even thrusts together trans-people and homophobes, holding a mirror up to our own beliefs about both.
Even Earn's friend Darius (Keith Stanfield) is joined in solidarity by Middle Eastern men as he confronts white men at the shooting range over his choice in target illustrations. Darius shoots at a target with a dog at the center and is a terrible shot—but his point about practicing on a dog being no worse than practicing on a human being defended by Muslims is priceless.
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Music Is Life
The immediacy of streaming and the cheapening of music can undermine the value of music and how it fuels and sustains us. In Atlanta, music is revered and not taken for granted. Whether it's the passion with which Paper Boi is fanned over at the club by a groupie who knows his lyrics word-for-word, or the commitment Earn demonstrates to Paper Boi by using his rent as payola to help his cousin's career — music is a potent and central theme for Atlanta's characters. This extends to the music supervision, which is nothing short of superb, flexing OJ Da Juiceman and Migos or Billy Paul and Bill Withers from week to week. It hits all the right notes, from Black Bieber (played by Austin Crute, vocals by Donald Glover) and his cheesy pop press conference hit to the strains of Keith Ape's South Korean trap music playing in the sword trade-up scene to the muzak stylings of the Montague show time and the use of "Elevators" by Atlanta rap icons, OutKast, in the finale.
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All in all, Atlanta is extraordinary in its depiction of both what's normal and what's utterly absurd. It deserves all the accolades and plenty of award season recognition. May Hollywood get the messages it sends along with its creativity and its ratings loud and clear. Universal content through a black lens for the win!
Thembisa S. Mshaka is an award-winning creative campaign writer/producer (The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill) and a 3-time festival selected filmmaker. She is also a business author. Chuck D of Public Enemy calls her book, Put Your Dreams First: Handle Your Entertainment Business, “the definitive industry bible.”
