The Prestige TV Podcast - ‘Atlanta’ Season 3, Episode 6 Recap

Episode Date: April 22, 2022

Van Lathan and Charles Holmes return to dissect the sixth episode of ‘Atlanta’ Season 3, “White Fashion.” They discuss the history of gentrification in the fashion industry and beyond, debate whether it’s better to be successful and a sellout or real and niche, and tackle Van’s uncertain story line this season. Hosts: Van Lathan and Charles Holmes Producer: Devon Manze Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This is Dave Chang and Chris Ying. We are the hosts of Recipe Club. You may have listened to it before, but we are now back on the air, new and improved, with the same host that lose every week. I still don't know what the rules are because they've changed as well. Chris, can you give a quick rundown? Every week we debate the best way to cook the things you want to eat. We take a user, listener submitted recipe, and we all cook it with our friends,

Priya Krishna, Rachel Kong, Brian Ford, and John DeBerry. and then we talk about what went right and what went wrong. No, I actually really don't want to do this podcast. And they are hardly our friends. They are enemies. They are enemies. It's Dave's civil disobedience. If you want to see Dave Chang in an act of civil disobedience,

tune in to Recipe Club where he will not follow the recipe. I'm contractually obligated to make this podcast. But I'm here to have a good time. So listen to Recipe Club every week on the Ringer Podcast Network. Okay, welcome to the Ringer's prestige podcast feed. That is Charles Holmes, host of the Ringer music show, and The Midnight Boys on the Ringerverse. I am Van Lathen, host of the Midnight Boys, Peebue,

and Higher Learning with Van Lenton and Rachel Lindsay. But together, we are here to talk about Atlanta. We've been doing this, Charles. Have you been enjoying our Atlanta coverage? I think we've been in our band. You know, I think everybody had the Midnight Boys pegged. They like, they can only talk about superhero shit. And then we came and we're giving them, we're giving them that real shit.

You know what I'm saying? Some people are upset. Some people are happy. But I think we're in our bag. What about you, man? How are you feeling after we're halfway through? We're halfway through. I'm enjoying this.

I'm enjoying Atlanta. I'm enjoying, we're like the midnight men here. You know, we're like, like, this is like, this is like mature stuff that we're doing. Um, all right, are you drinking a cut water? No, I'm drinking a nice spin drift trying to stay fucking hydrated out here. You know what I'm saying? That rich people, Brooklyn shit. You got that.

All right. So we are on episode six, white fashion. Uh, the, the episode was all written and directed by Ibra IK, and it is a pretty shrewd commentary on social justice, on selling out. and on what it means to be successful and try to affect your community. It starts off with the hilarious, the hilarious,

a hilarious, shall say, look into a fashion house that steps their foot in it. We've seen this before. We've seen this with H&M, putting the coolest monkey in the jungle on a little black boy. We saw this with Gucci. and the whole lipgate thing. And in this particular one,

we see a fashion house that puts... Esco Esco is I believe the fashion house. Esco Esco that puts Central Park on the back of a jersey and five as the number, complete with a promotional poster that features a white girl

laying around a group of black people. If you do not know what that's in reference to, it is of course in reference to. It is, of course, in reference to. and is distasteful because of the Central Park Five Jogger case that resulted in five black and brown boys being convicted of a crime they did not commit in the late 80s in New York City. Those gentlemen have since been known as,

come to be known as the exonerated five. And they were brilliantly, brilliantly portrayed in the Aver-Douvernei, a limited series on Netflix when they see us. So that is something that is in the site guys, has been for a little while. Wait, I think you miss one thing, though, about the jersey. Give it to me.

Which, like, I saw on second viewing, the mascot that they put on the front of the jersey is a raccoon, which is like, it, I didn't really, like, it took me on second viewing. Well, I was just like, oh, man, this, it takes the joke from, like, really biting to, oh, my gosh, like, this is a nightmare. You're absolutely right. You couldn't be more right. Yeah, so in response. to the controversy that surrounds this piece of fashion.

They have to do what they always do, which is a symbol, a diversity council and an advisory council and make a big show out of the fact that they are going to rededicate themselves to issues of diversity inclusion and attempt to understand by talking to the community how they fucked this up. And for our purposes, as Atlanta viewers, they are going to use Paperboy, who is now, once again, yet again, another clue as to how big of a deal Paperboy has become is big enough to where a fashion house like this would enlist the services of Paperboy to help them put out this fire. Yeah, I think this episode, for everybody saying that, like, season three is a little wonky. I would argue that white fashion is not only the best episode of the season so far,

but it ranks among one of the best episodes of Atlanta period. I think what they are doing in this episode, especially around as a black person, can you affect change within a corrupt institution? And once you're in that institution, how much will greed? how much will your closeness to wealth and influence change the foundation of everything that you're fighting for?

Because it's not just Khalil, it is all of these activists who no longer are fighting for their people. They're fighting over scraps for themselves. And I'm like, that is such a difficult thing to pull off and make funny. And this episode does it superbly. love this episode. What about you? I loved it as well. There's also a subplot with Darius who goes to a

Nigerian restaurant and thinks that he is doing this restaurant a favor by bringing someone he met at Esco, Esco over to the restaurant. Well, he doesn't think he was doing them a favor. It just kind of happened. He thought that something good had come out of it when the woman whose husband is involved in food service. He runs commissaries all over the city where they're at. she decides that she wants to invest into the place, which would seem like it's a good idea, but it turns out to absolutely not be a good idea. And I feel like there is a theme in this episode

of how you stay pure when you get in proximity to commerce or to whiteness. That seems to be the underlying thing, because what we see from the Nigerian restaurant that ends up becoming a Nigerian bowl is that when it was untouched, when it was what it was, it was pure, it was real,

it was a place to where you could even bring your own meat, and then they would put whatever meat you liked into some of the dishes. But when, just to be honest with you, white money got a hold of it, it became fast, it became express,

it became fusion. It became everything. They gentrified. They jolof rice. It became everything except for what it was, which was an authentic expression of culture. And this episode seems to be these characters existing in a tug of war between those two things.

When Ernest talking to Paperboy about why they might not want to do this or why he has reservations for doing it, what he feels is that black people never get enough for lending their cultural voice to causes like this, that they always get corrupted by them. And we see Paperboy, we see Al go through the whole machinations of that throughout this episode. Yeah, so the person that I wanted to bring up really quick

is this Derey send up Khalil. So let's be honest with this because I spoke to Doree about this. You spoke to Doree about that? I did. I spoke to Doree about this. He hasn't seen the episode yet.

These are clearly send-ups between Doree and the other gentleman. These are clearly send-ups. I mean, for the viewers, Khalil wears a red life preserver that is supposed to spoof the blue vest

that Doree, the Black Lives Matter activist is best known for. And let me just say the commentary not only on this modern activism, but especially Dore in this episode,

is very, very harsh. Can you kind of enlighten me like how Dore might be feeling before he, watches this episode. Well, so I feel like, and we should say, on the advisory council, you have one

guy who's the send up of Doree, and there seems to be another guy who is the send up of Sean King. Yes. A very light-skinned man who at one point, paper boy is like, are we sure he's black and everybody looks around, and they're like, uh, and he says the N-word,

and then they were like, yeah, that doesn't sound right. So yeah, they go in. Right. Right. And we should say that the Doree send up and the Sean King send up do not seem to get along, which of course reflects the issues that these two men have had in actual real life. So when I spoke to Doree about this episode, if I'm being honest, he couldn't care less. I mean, just to be real with you, I've known for a while to par for the courts for him. He understands some of the criticisms that people have of him.

I'm sure he'll get the opportunity to speak on this on his very own, and I don't mean to speak for him. But as far as he's concerned, from what I gathered in the conversation I had with him, it just comes with the territory. It's just something that it comes with it. It's just a part of it. Can I pitch you on something that might be a controversial? You might be like, how can you say this?

as much as this episode like pokes at Dore and as much as it skewers him by the end of the episode I agree he's not wrong like out of everybody like I don't like that the truth of what he tells Paperboy

and I think we should get into it later and maybe go chronologically but I actually think this episode does a very good thing instead of demonizing Dore it shows you the ways that he actually understands very, in a very, very kind of fraught way, how you have to act in these situations to get anything.

And I'm not talking about sweeping changes, but to get at least something out of it, which I'm just like, that is actually a smart way to go about that. Right. So let's talk about it. Earn says to Paperboy that if he was going to do what they're going to do, which is essentially going to be a part of, helping this company that made this egregious cultural era

save face. That is what you're doing. You're going to help this country save face. And Ernst says to Paperboy, point blank period, I feel like this is like an Uncle Tom thing. Like I feel like this is an Uncle Tom moment. It's Uncle Tom, right. And he says, I might, he tells Paperboy, he goes, you know, I might still do this.

Paperboy says, hey, I need to close because he asked the Esco Esco for three years of free clothes. He asked them for three suits for the press conference. And he asked for free tailoring. And, you know, he asked for some ribs and a dry rub, whatever. So he says to them, he says, paper boy says, you know, I care about the clothes. I care about this. And he's, I don't care about coming off in street in any way because I actually shot niggas before.

You know what I mean? I laughed at that moment. He's like, I don't care about whether or not people think I'm street. I'm really street. So I don't care about whether or not people think I'm street. or not people think I'm straight, which is pointing on its own. Earn says that, yeah,

he might still do this entire deal, but in order to do it, he will need five years on the board. He would want to learn their infrastructure so that he could then use what he learned from working with Esco Esco, to help start programs where people would invest back into their own hoods

and grow black fashion houses. Because at some point, you know, you look at, guys like Bernard Arnaud, who is the head of LVMH, which is Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy, he's worth over $100 billion. As far as I'm concerned, Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy are all things that I learned culturally from other black people. I never walked into a Louis Vuitton store in Baton, because they didn't have any Louis Vuitton

stores in Baton. I didn't hear about Moet while vacationing on the French Riviera. I heard about it from Puffington. And as far as Hennessy is concerned, they used to put that shit in my bottle. So that's a true fact. They used to put Hennessy in my bottle to calm me down when I was too unruly as a baby.

So all of these things are almost black cultural traditions that are being handed down from generation to generation, but are enriching people that do not look like black people. So I think Ern's point was that at some point in order to do this, we have to be able to,

in some way use what we learn to come back and grow our businesses and our hoods. So, I watched this episode twice, and at first I was like, Earn has a point. Like, Earn is very, very astute in his observations, and what he's saying is true. And on the second viewing, I was just like, ah, this kind of goes against everything that I believe.

And what I mean is, is that I don't know, I don't know if the black liberation can happen under capitalism. And what I mean by that is like, there's this idea of like, hey, if we can reinvest, if we can build up black businesses, if we can get into these white companies, learn everything, and take it back to our neighborhoods,

that we can start that road of building generational wealth. my thing is, especially the United States, but all across the world, is the world built for that? Will they actually allow that to happen? Because what you're actually seeing happening in Esco Esco is that they will never do what Earn is proposing.

Because to do that would be to sign the papers of their own demise, for them to say the loud part, the loud part out loud, that we owe all of this, to black people, black culture across the globe. We're going to give you a seat on the board is to let a fox into their henhouse.

And like, they are never going to do that. And I think that's something that Khalil knows. Khalil has been around this and not being like, I have to take everything that I can, but what would actually give us black liberation, this white company will never do. Like, is that a wild thing to say? Maybe it's very, very negative.

So here's the thing about, Liberation. No one gives you liberation. You take it. Yeah. So no one in the history of the world has ever been given liberation. The first, the, the first story of liberation that we're all told is the Ten Commandments, right? It's Moses, right?

Like, God had to compel Pharaoh in Exodus. to give liberation to to to give liberation to the to the to the to the to the to the to the to the to the to the to the to the to the Israelites right it had to be taken it had to be you have to be compelled to do it right so to your point um no one's going to give you anything right the question is not so much about whether or not it'll be given to you because that's never going to happen right the question will is how you take it so like so it it it it it it it's Because it's going to be taken. The question is just how, right?

There are ways that you take it that are incredibly disruptive. There are ways that you take it that are incredibly violent. And there are ways that you take it that are incredibly strategic. So the reality is it could happen, but it wouldn't even be so much about what America didn't want to do. It really have to be more about whatever group that we're talking about, in this case, black people, about what they didn't want to do. Because that would have to be intentional.

I would have to intentionally say, you are black, and I am going to support you because I want that for black people. Capitalism makes that almost impossible because in order to do that, you might have to end up dealing with a service or dealing with a product that is not the product or the service that you're used to dealing with. So you might have to buy something that is not in vogue That hasn't been around for 200 some years And you might have to make that You'd have to make that like forget about Louis Vuitton Or Esco Esco or anything like that The black kid who's making the dope clothes on your block

You're going to have to say fuck Louis Vuitton You're going to have to say fuck Doche de Cibana Fuck Jivanchi Fuck all of that And now you're going to have to rock his shit to the point to where he is the man. But you're not going to do it on accident. It's going to have to be intentional because it's going to have to be intentional that you

use some black designer's new cellular device other than an iPhone. It's going to have to be intentional. And sometimes there might be access to materials that these other companies have that you don't have. And you might have to do stuff on the strength of the culture. When I go to a new black restaurant, I realize they are. not Mastroes, right? A new black steakhouse.

They are still figuring it out. The grace that I give them is a cultural grace. It's a grace that I do not give to white corporate American structures because those structures aren't investing into our communities. So what I'm saying is we're going to get back to Atlanta. And the second is it's possible, but no one gives you anything. Anything that anyone gives you is to benefit themselves. So no one gives you anything to benefit you.

Like if a company is in trouble and they give you a seat on the board or they give you a seat on an advisory commission, they're giving you that because it helps them, not because they want to understand anything. They just want to sell close. So that's something that in this episode, Al has to learn. Al comes up with when he's talking to the advisory board, the advisory board that's made up of professional social justice. Warriors. And because they're professionals, they're sitting in a room and they don't even have the best interests of their communities on their mind at all. They're thinking about what they can get from their situations, right? So because of that, he actually has to come up with the fact that Earn talked to him about the reinvest in your community plan and he wants to get money

from ESCO, ESCO, and then give it to black designers and help them reinvest into their hood. that's the idea that he comes up with. That's the idea that he thinks can actually lead to some meaningful change. I mean, even before we get there, I think the thing that I wanted to touch on that you just said is that it's not just the fashion house. It's the reporters who are there

who are a part of this system where they don't actually want black change. They want someone, they want this advisory board to tell them that they're not racist. Because when Paperboy gets up on that, gets up on that table, there's a reporter who's like, all right, is racism done?

And like, paper points like, fuck no. And then Khalil is like, racism will be done by 2024. And I don't know about you. I've been in situations where I've been the black dude having to call, white, like, yo, that's racist. And what I realized in that moment is I'm just like, they're like, what do you mean? Oh my gosh.

And I realize it's like, oh, you don't want to understand why what you did is racist. You want me as a black person to tell you what you have to do. so I don't think you're racist anymore. Right. And I'm just like, that is the level that paper boy isn't understanding where I'm just like, yo, the only reason that you are here is so that this company, to your point, can keep selling clothes. And the fastest way for them to do that is for you to get up there and be like, yeah, racism is over now because I'm here now,

which is, it's just so grim, but the show makes it so fucking funny. Right. Because the show makes it funny because what Atlanta as a show, and there's also a subthread going on with Van and Earn, where they seem to be getting it popping again. What Atlanta does a lot of times, and what it's done so brilliantly in this season is it gets, it's getting right to the point.

It's taking that press conference, and it's making that press conference into direct fuckery. See, what happens to the fuckery is the fuckery gets hidden under vocabulary. It gets hidden under, you know, buzzwords. It gets talked around. But that reporter stands up and asks, do you think racism is still real based upon this? That's the fuckery of this. Because every single time a company gets in this type of trouble, they come back and they act like we fixed it all by talking to these five people.

And that's dumb. Like, I'm not saying, I'm saying that talking to those five people, whoever they might be, can help. I've been on advisory boards before, not of companies after they fucked up, but like, for example, I was on the advisory board of the Judas and the Black Messiah film that came out from Warner Brothers, right? Because they wanted to make sure that they handled Chairman Hampton's memory correctly. So they put together an advisory board of people, and it was our job to make sure to go through this different strategy and stuff that was happening,

and that nothing untoward ended up happening. And there was some stuff that we had to be like, nah, don't do that. You know what I mean? You know what I mean? There was some stuff that we had to be like, I don't think we should do that. Like that's a, like, don't, don't, like,

there was one particular thing that we would have to be like, nah, do not do that. Like, seriously, don't do that whatsoever. And so these companies sometimes they act in ways that are counter at cross purposes to what the people like Fred Hampton and other people like that are trying to get at. So back to our story.

Earl, Al, Paperboy is uninitiated into this world. He doesn't know it. Everything that he does is very, very genuine. Like, when he tells you he's going to fuck you up, he means it. When he says he wants 300 chicken legs and a bottle of champagne at 1.30 the morning, he means it. So he gets around a bunch of people who

are saying what they don't mean to, they're saying things they don't mean to get an outcome that they desire. And he's not used to that. And so his energy clashes with this. I mean, the thing that I loved about that scene when the advisory board is all together is that this is an unnamed company, but some racist shit happened or was about to happen and all the black people and a bunch of women found out at this company that I worked at. So I'm one of the first people that gets up in front of.

like all of the, all my bosses and leaders be. And I tell them like, yo, this is racist. The fact that you tried to hide it is fucked up. And like, I went in. I told them just like, yo, this is everything that you do every single time something happens. And what I realized is everybody starts going in, going in. I leave. And then I was so angry and so passionate.

and I had led everybody else to be super passionate, whatever, leave. They present me with the biggest opportunity of my career thereafter. And I go, I turn to one of my black mentors and I go, I feel like this is a payoff. And he's like, that's absolutely what it is. Like they want you to be happy now because they know that if you keep being angry, there's a bunch of people behind you that you're inspired. to be angry. And if you get this thing that will help you and your career, it's fine.

That's what they do. And like, there was this thing where I was like, I can take this because, like, if I don't, they're going to, they're going to do it anyway and they're going to fuck it up. And it's going to be even more racist. But I'm going to feel like a sellout. And the biggest moment of my career is tainted now. And I realize in that moment, I'm like, oh, this is what happens when those, all this advisory boards, that has happened to them. countless, countless, countless times to the point where they don't even turn to someone be like, is this blood money?

What a fantastic point. Like the first time it happened to them, it might have been something that they were uncomfortable with, but now they understand that this is the way that it goes. And here's the thing about this. Somebody that's been doing this for a very long time told me, he said, you can either be a sellout or you can be ineffective. And I was like, what?

And I was like, yeah. I was like, yeah, it's like, we need the money and we don't have it. So somebody's got to sell something. And I was like, fuck. That's so grim. It's like, somebody's got to sell something. We need the money and we don't have it. So somebody got to do it.

And it was like, if you, if you're going to be down there, you're going to like try to, you're going to try to take donations from a hood that doesn't have any donate, does not have any money to do things that they, that people, don't want them to do, he's like, well, good luck with that. He's like, either you're going to go some places, you didn't think you're going to have to go or you're going to be ineffective, so choose one. I was like, God damn, it can't be like that. But a lot of the people that we talk to, they say that it is.

So the reason why the fact that Khalil's character ends up expressing this to Paperboy at the end is so important is because they de-demonized him. They made him look like a fraud at first. At the end, they made him look like somebody who is playing a game the only way that it can possibly be played for him.

I mean, can I read you what he says? Absolutely. Go for it. So it's so good. Khalil says to Paperboy, quote, why would a company make a project that would teach black people to stop buying their products and reinvest in their own?

Why would they fund their own demise? And what you realize is, I looked at his vest. Atlanta's very smart. His vest is a symbol. You could think of it as just descend up of the blue vest that Doreight wears. What he's actually wearing is a life preserver that you wear when you're drowning. And what it says in the corner in white is Survivor. And what I realize is I'm like, they could have chosen anything,

but they chose a life preserver and Survivor because, Cleal is right. He knows how to survive in this world. And I'm not saying that he's pure. He's corrupt. But I do think that like I've even learned this in my career. I'm just like there's a level of the more success that you get and the closer that you get to wealth and whiteness. There's a level of corruption that you are going to, even if you don't think is happening, it is. And you like you always have to realize that. And I think that. And I think that. And I I think Khalil knows that. That's how he's gotten this far.

But it's such a thing where it's just like, you never want to be like, I'm corrupted, I'm part of the problem. But it's like it's almost impossible not to be. Yeah, yeah, it's tough. Are you looking for support in your weight management journey? Zepbound terseptide may be able to help. Zepbound is a prescription medicine used with a reduced calorie diet

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to do at mintmobile.com slash switch. Up front payment of $45 for three-month plan, equivalent to $15 per month required. Intro rate first three months only, then full price plan options available. Taxes and fees extra. See full terms at mintmobile.com. So Aaron comes up with an idea. He makes a very heartfelt video, invest in your hood. Oh, you mean paperboard?

Paperboard. Excuse me. Makes a very heartfelt video. Reinvest in your hood. Comes up with a little bop. They change it. It changed the video. Let's go, that's go, people.

It changed the video. It changed the video into All Lives Matter. It has nothing to do with black people. What they do sometimes is they make black people a part of the conversation and not the exact conversation. It's kind of like dealing with American politicians

sometimes where you're saying, hey, what specifically are we going to do for black people? They go, no, we're not going to do anything specifically for black people. We're going to do something for Cleveland, and we know that there are black people there. And then you'll be like, what? Like, don't we need something specific for us?

No, no, no, no, no, no, no. This is what we'll do. We'll go into a specific place and everybody with the last name, Johnson, will do something for them and we just know that there are a lot of black Johnson, so hopefully you guys get something to. And he'll be like, God damn!

You know what I mean? So that's kind of what they did to his message. Al doesn't understand that, and Khal has to explain to him. At the same time, we have Darius who is learning that same lesson in a different way. When Darius comes back to his favorite Nigerian restaurant because he wanted Jolov rice and he couldn't get the Jolov rice, they didn't know where to go. He takes them to go. The people from Esco, the woman, takes him to go get it.

She eats the food. She loves the vibe. She loves the ambiance. She loves the Nigerian lady who is waiting on. them and to show her love for it, she commodifies it. She takes it and she gentrifies it. She says there's a lot of growth potential and I was like, damn, there's a lot of growth potential. I knew that. I knew right there. And Darius then is left wondering something that we're all wondering. Is it better to be rich or pure, like you said before? Is it better to be successful and watered down or real and niche?

And every single artist that we've ever known has dealt with this. Every single person, Spike Lee, I love Spike Lee. He ended up winning his first Oscar for a movie that the NYPD gave him hundreds of thousands of dollars to make. A movie that was literally about a double agent and a guy that went inside of not just the clan, but inside of various black power organizations and tried to infiltrate them from the middle. So of all the times that Spike Lee ended up saying fuck you to the establishment, the movie that ended up winning him

his Academy Award, do the right thing was by far the best movie of the year that it came out. The movie that ended up winning was about an agent. An agent that wasn't just an agent inside the clan. He was an agent. Love Spike.

He wasn't just an agent inside the clan. He was an agent inside of black organizations as well. He tried to destabilize them as well. It's just the facts. So, but you, if you spike, you want that Academy Award. You want to do all the things that you've ever, that you've ever said you were going to do before. Like, you want those things, but is it possible? And would you, and if, and another thing is this.

If the people that were running that Nigerian restaurant, I'll ask you this, Charles, if they sold to the Nigerian people and made, all kinds of money for themselves and their family. Is it worth the sale? Is it worth losing something pure, getting some bullshit if the black people that sold it, our brothers and sisters in the diaspora, if they got their money.

Is it worth it? So the reason it's difficult to answer that question is because I got the feeling that Sharon went behind their back. because she says that she didn't even talk to the Ah, it's true. She went to the landlord. She did some snake shit and she's like, the landlord

had been saying that they've been trying to sell for a while. You know what? You're right. Like, she bought the, like, their entire business, maybe not business, but their entire, the place that they were renting. So she could pop up her food truck. But I think the thing that I thought was so brilliant

about that B plot, is how much whiteness is like a virus where Darius doesn't even know he's a carrier. He thinks he's just going to a restaurant to enjoy it, and he's so pure and so innocent. He's just trying to share this experience with someone else. What he doesn't realize is that's how gentrification happens. The minute he says, oh, there's growth potential here, Darius should have been smart enough to realize, oh, no. she's going to take something that is for the community and is small for a reason and is going to commodify it.

Not even for the community, of the community. Of the, yes, perfect, yes. And I think that the sadness of everything that happened is I'm like, yeah, I could deal with that woman getting paid because I always say this for all black people. Like, even when sometimes they get paid for shan, like, damn, I'm just like, but also, I know how it is.

I can't be mad or a brother and a sister for coming up because I know sometimes the life-changing effect of money. Like, let's just keep it real. Like, sometimes it is blood money, but yo, sometimes money can change an entire family's life.

You need money. You know what I mean? I'm just like, look, man, we've never had money. We need money. And the reality is,

anytime I just watch an interview with Tukashia, 6-9 and it's a bunch of goons in the interview with Takashi 69 he got a bunch of goons and they straight up say they go look he's a rat but this rat is like providing for me you know what I'm saying like they straight up said

and I'm not saying nothing they didn't say it's like this like why it's like why can't other people do kick it with a rat for whether it's like why can I kick it with a rat for a bag like people need money people be fucked up out here so they do shit I mean, and I think the genius of this episode is that you see it from so many angles where Paperboy himself is trying to do this out of the kindness of his heart and fails.

And Darius isn't trying to do anything and still fails. And that is what's so pervasive about this is that like you could have the best of intentions and you could have no intentions and this will continue to happen. It's a force in the world. racism is a force, it's going to bowl you over whether you want it to or not. Yeah. Let's talk about Van and Err. Van and Err. Let's talk about...

Well, Van and Earn. Yeah. Let's talk about Van and Earn. I don't know why. Van &er. I don't know why. I'll talk. I'll say that. It's my name. It's my name. Let's talk about Van &ern real quick. So, Erne is in a hotel and he is looking around and he sees Van walking to the hotel. She sits down.

They talk. They haven't seen each other in a while because she's been doing her own thing, gallivanting around Europe, gallivanting around Europe, and has been slow to respond to his text messages. A woman comes in, a Karen archetype, comes in and says that, that was very funny thing. She goes, she saw that van stole a wig out of a store

that they were in. I think the store was called Christine's. And she goes, I'm not going to let you steal this wig. And then at one point she goes, it's all up to me. Did she say she says up to the effect of like citizens. She's in arrest. She's like, I can't let you do this.

It's all up to me. And just the fact that she said it's all up to me. Atlanta has this way of, I'm telling you, man, saying the direct thing that we know that people are thinking when they do these things. And it's just, it's so hilarious.

Earn ends up flipping this. Van probably did steal the wig. by the way. No, I think Van kind of confirms that she did by the end. And then to your point, Earn, my God, he's like, if he was so ineffectual in season two, this man is a fucking wizard in this season. Like, he is so good at his job. Yeah.

So he uses this to talk to the, I guess, the concierge there. Concierge? Yeah. And he finangles one room for one night free. in the best suite they have in the hotel. And there's a romantic scene that happens to really kind of end the episode between Earn and Van and Earn and

Seemingly wakes up alone, even though they have this Dalianz. What do you think is happening between them? So, I wanted to pitch this to you, because we have talked, you know, our sisters and our brothers in the culture, a little pissed off at Donald Glover. They're, they need to land vans. story because I don't know if I like that Van steals the wig.

And I kind of need there to be a point. I know there's probably going to be a van specific episode. I believe there was one in season one. But I'm starting to be like, all right, what is going on with Van? I don't want her to have this stereotype of what society thinks of black women. I do want her to have an episode where I'm like, what's going on with her that is deep, but I'm worried that they might

not pull it off. Am I being like, am I thinking too much about that? I don't think you are. I think that Donald is, I think that that's just something, bro. It's just like, you know, all of these artists we love and we get, and look, people

love us for what we do. And the more they get to know about us, the more they have to say about who we are. And there are many people who believe that who don't trust in Donald Glover's ability to handle black ladies in his stuff. And we've talked about the reasons why. And some of them may be fair. Some of them may be unfair, but they exist.

And so because of that, it's not a question about whether or not you're reading too much into it. That's not a thing at all. The question is whether or not it's up to the show to legislate that at all. you know um the show is what the show is he's got a black lady stealing he's got a black lady being a louvre he's got a black lady doing whatever is the question becomes whether or not it's up to Atlanta to uh reconcile with a lot of people what donald glover's feelings about black ladies are there are times in the show where i felt like he's he's he's directly addressed it the question is now does he have to directly answer to some of the people who might believe some of these things

because as long as there's a black female lead in the character, those questions are going to get asked. So I just think it's kind of a thing and it kind of is what it is. I'm really interested to know what's happening to her character because there's just been no consistency with the character. There's nothing to learn. It seems as if sometimes she's just there. And even when she's there, she seems like to be floating.

And I don't know what the thing is. You know, there's one interesting thing to where he plays a little bit, and this was a good line for me, he says that he called her mother to see where she was. And her mother goes, her mother didn't know where you were. And she goes, well, does your mother know where you are right now? And it seems as if even earned, who is an involved guy, there's some probably entrenched misogyny there to where a woman's mom's, you know where she is, or a grander. to a child, child should know where she is. He never probably thinks about the fact that his mama don't know where he at, but her mama should have known where she's at.

So I like the little things, the little interplay in that, but we're not really getting enough earned or van in this season to know what's what with who. Oh, I mean, and I do want to be, I do want to be very clear. I think that the thing that we also tend to do with Atlanta is that we, make it so much of Donald Glover's vision that we kind of paper over the fact that there's like a lot of talented black writers on the show, a lot of talented black women who write on this show. So I just also want to be like,

Van has had very good storylines. Like, Van actually I do think sometimes has been the character, especially when Earn was down, who was the only person being like, yo, you have a kid, like, what the fuck are you doing? You don't know what you're doing. And you're selfish. I just kind of want to see more of that van because I know it's there. We just haven't gotten it yet. But I want, before we go, I want to pitch you on this other thing. Do you think potentially that Darius and Van,

there might be something happening with them? Interesting. Why would you say that? In the first episode, second episode, but the first one we get with the gang back, they have their whole, uh, they have their, uh, their whole kind of like day together, right? And at the end of that episode, Earn walks through the hall and he sees Van up late.

And she goes into the room. And I was just like, is Van alone in that room? Did her and Dary's have a connection? And in this episode, she says to Earn, yeah, Darius says that this is all a simulation. And it seems like she's kind of enamored, at least with the way that Darius thinks of the world. And I was wondering if there potentially might be something going on.

with them. I don't know if it's sexual. I don't know if it's a budding friendship. But I've been starting to be like, hmm, what's going on with them? That would be a kick in the Niger bowl if that were. That's a great theory. I don't know. I don't know. I feel like Earn can get mad at that. Wait,

can Earn get mad at that? Yeah, what the fuck? That's his kid's mom. What kind of new age shit do you all be on? Hell yeah. Yeah. I mean, I'm not saying he has any dominion over her body, but can he be mad about it? Yeah. Like, like, hold on. Where's producer Devin?

We need a, we need a lady's opinion here. Like, producer Devin, let's say, I see that you're married, right? I am, yeah. Okay, let's say that like, you know, back in the day, you dated a guy, right? And let's say that you were in baby mama territory, right? and then you and him stop being pals or whatever and then one of your friends dates him the father of your child

how's that going to sit with you you know I just feel like there's so many human beings on this earth and like to choose that one is a little bit strange strange like Steven it's just weird it's weird Wait, this is my last question. Would you think that your friend has been plotting the whole time? And would you start, like, wondering, like, hey, are you really my friend?

Like, you know? I guess it depends what the lead-up would be or how they got together. Yeah. Ooh, this happened in Black Mirror episode. I read an episode of Black Mirror, White Christmas. What a dude was like kind of whole, well, actually, that's different because they were together with that. Black Mirror, White Christmas is trippy. It's a trip. You ever watch Black Mirror,

Charles? Hell no. I watched the first episode where the dude fucks the pig. I'm like, not for me, sir, not for me. Black Mirror is an amazing show. All right, we got to get out of here. Anything left? What are you giving this episode here?

We had the White Fashion. What are you giving this? This is by far the best episode of this of this season. If they keep this up, I think people are going to really, really happy. If I had to give this out of like, let's say, at a 10, out of 10, I'm giving this episode an 8.5. What about

you? Out of 10, what are you giving this episode? I think it's solid 8.5. I agree. 8.5. Maybe a 9, even. Really good. Really good stuff. Really good stuff. And for a lot of people who are, we're getting antsy about, you know, the narrative of the show, not really

tracking with the main characters that we've come to learn. You got two in a row. So, I'll shut up. All right. Okay. I am Van Lathen. That is Charles Holmes. You have been listening

to the ringer's prestige podcast feed. Our producer for this episode has been Devin Manzi. So this is the ringer's prestige podcast feed.

Thank you to Devin. Appreciate you, Charles. We'll be back next week. Hell yeah. Let's keep this trainer rolling.