Vanessa (“Van”), played by Zazie Beetz (Joker, Deadpool 2), and her daughter Lottie, played by Austin Elle Fisher, have a bizarre and intriguing adventure in “Work Ethic!”. The fifth episode of Atlanta’s latest and final season begins with Van driving Lottie to Chocolate Studios. After over-invasive security, they enter the grounds owned and run by the elusive Kirkwood Chocolate. He resides in an office building in the heart of the studios, and nobody is allowed inside.
Vanessa signs in and proceeds to do her hair and makeup. She reveals that she’s there just for the day to make money, feel independent, support black art, and have Lottie watch her do something she wants. A maintenance worker enters and shows a clear interest in her. Van rehearses in a modern soap opera, and the style of this show being shot is strikingly authentic. During a scene involving a possessive and harsh husband, a male voice over the intercom begins giving instructions. This is the voice of Mr. Chocolate. The scene proceeds, and Lottie, who’s watching, tells the mean man to shut up. Mr. Chocolate loves it and adds her into the scene to repeat the line, despite Van’s reluctance. Lottie is wanted for more scenes.
In costumes, Van allows Lottie to pick her outfit. She receives advice from a kind older lady who suggests letting herself be happy in the same way that Lottie is allowing herself to be happy. Van instructs Lottie to give her a thumbs down if she ever wants to leave. Lottie thrives on set and ignores Van’s suggestion to put her thumbs down. Van denies Lottie’s enthusiasm for acting and insists this is just for the day. Having looked away for a few moments, Lottie disappears to the next scene, one of the fourteen others she has been assigned. Van wants to speak to Mr. Chocolate but is denied.
The maintenance man flirts with Van as he helps direct her to the next scene. He gives her his card with his phone number. Van can’t keep up with Lottie, who is moving around too quickly for her to keep up with. She forces a production assistant to take her to Lottie. On their way over, they discuss the quality of the content, and Van criticizes it. They argue against her, drawing attention to black awards and his work for the community. She finds Lottie in the middle of filming, but as soon as the scene ends, Lottie disappears again. Van loses it.
She speaks to the intercom and demands Mr. Chocolate give Lottie back. He refuses. She responds by heading to his offices to enter. After being denied entry, the kind older woman from earlier pulls out a gun and shoots a guard in the foot, who himself had a prop gun. Van goes in and meets Kirkwood Chocolate, who is played by the show’s creator Donald Glover (Solo: A Star Wars Story, Community). His makeup is brilliant.
Mr. Chocolate is playing a “key-ano” awfully that somehow produces scripts. He reveals that the operation runs on its own. He snaps when she argues that he can’t kidnap her child and likens Chocolate Land to his own child. She throws burning grits at his face, which he claims doesn’t hurt him. Van accuses Mr. Chocolate of producing unrelatable content to exploit the people he claims to be helping just before Lottie arrives back at her arms, much to her relief. Mr. Chocolate then points out how Van’s day was filled with tropes of soap operas. Her life is imitating his art. He offers Lottie six seasons of a television show. Van doesn’t let Lottie, who wants to do it. She drags her daughter out, kicking and screaming, and Mr. Chocolate asks his assistant to call an ambulance.
At home, Van apologizes to Lottie repeatedly and sincerely for how their experience ended and vows to protect her in a fitting, melodramatic fashion. She finds the maintenance man’s card in her pocket, which has an inscribed message suggesting they hook up in the boiler room.
There was a very layered narrative surrounding art and its reflection of life in this special episode of Atlanta. Van and Lottie were heavily isolated in a typically atypical setting with jarring abnormalities. Mr. Chocolate’s omnipresence was harrowing and disturbing. The conversations surrounding the quality of his content made the peculiar characters’ observations about Van much more impactful. His lack of engagement with the operation, and the connection between life and art, suggests that his shows reflect life for black people in America. This becomes fascinating when Vanessa’s day is proven to demonstrate how Van was actively enacting all that she had criticized. Additionally, the commentary is all coming from Atlanta: a television show focused so heavily on commenting on black culture in the United States. Is it commenting on its own surreal nature by including crack sandwiches and filming focused on putting black people in positions of power? The compelling commentary was subtlety injected amidst tense and engaging scenes that culminated in a brilliant revelation – incredibly clever.
Rating: 9.0/10