The fourth season of Atlanta continued with its third episode, “Born 2 Die”. Alfred (“Al”), played by Brian Tyree Henry (Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, If Beale Street Could Talk), faces difficulties as he attempts to remain relevant to the music industry.
Al is offered a million daughters to have an incredibly wealthy man’s son shadow him for a week. He needs to teach the kid a few things about rap and take selfies, and the money is his. Al cannot turn this offer down. He heads to the studio and meets the son, Benny, played by Daniel Rashid (Beast Beat, Paper Girls), who surprisingly wants nothing to do with him. Yodel Kid, played by Tucker Brown (Wildness, Pieces), is also present and unknowingly insults Al by saying he used to listen to him as a kid, even though he is still a young teenager. Bunk, played by Charles Malik Whitfield (Behind Enemy Lines, Notorious), a fellow musician, enters the studio and offers Al an escape. They speak, and he invites Al to a meeting the following night, where they will discuss how to make more money from being in their position.
Earn, played by the show’s creator Donald Glover (Solo: A Star Wars Story, Community), attends a meeting where he must endure listening to corporate strategies to hide racist behavior. The little suggestions about how to protect a white client of theirs from facing backlash for a racist action provided clever parallels to comment upon the media’s role in perpetuating racism. He offers to go and find a new client for them instead, the elusive D’Angelo.
Al attends the meeting, where he is instructed to find himself a Young White Avatar (YWA) to help him achieve Grammy-level success and extreme wealth. He opposes this idea, alluding to his current relevancy as well as his representation of the streets. The speaker warns him that his relevance will be gone very soon and that the streets won’t pay him nearly enough. He is convinced and finds Benny, who is performing at local high schools, throwing cash away. Yodel Kid is there as well, drugged out. Al offers to be Benny’s manager only to find out that Bunk approached him at the studio when they were there together and has taken on that role. Al gives Yodel Kid a ride.
Earn finds himself at the back of a Rally’s where there is an upside-down bathroom sign inscribed with “D’Angelo.” Inside he finds a guard and a waiting area. He spends days there waiting with nothing but patience, a tennis ball, a bucket, and foreboding chalk on the wall that suggests people waiting a week there. He eventually snaps before coming to conclusions about him and the guard being D’Angelo and asks to experience D’Angelo. The guard then opens a shaft in the wall with a key. Earn climbs through and finds a man singing, playing video games, and making himself a sandwich. He is not D’Angelo. The whole operation is a façade intended to make people realize that they are all D’Angelo and are protectors of it. The man also speaks of Earn’s dreams about hands pulling him under, which is reminiscent of images in season three. Earn seems genuinely impacted by the advice not to presume that the hands are trying to harm him.
At the Grammys, Al sees Benny and Bunk again and shocks him when he says he is present to support Yodel Kid. Benny informs Al that Yodel Kid died that day, likely from an overdose. Al watches the Grammys from a diner as Yodel Kid wins. He is left alone to reflect.
This episode had some amusing commentary on the shifting music industry but seemed to make its point effectively enough by the meeting Al attended. Yodel Kid achieving the legendary status he so desired and pushing the trope of the premature death rockstar status was fitting, but there seemed to be less depth to this episode than usual. It also felt uncharacteristic for Al to be persuaded to act so disingenuously. He argued against the YWA strategy but gave in far too easily.
Rating: 7.5/10