‘Atlanta’ Recap and Review: Looks Like Al is Finally Out of the ‘Woods’

As inconsistent as “Robbin’ Season” has been so far, it has a few gems that make its pitfalls worth trudging through. “Woods” is one such gem, though Alfred (Brian Tyree Henry), who the episode centers on, would likely disagree. The episode opens on the anniversary of Al’s mother’s death, which is never explicitly stated but which can be inferred from Earn’s inadequate concern for his cousin, Al’s particularly poignant laziness, and the hallucination he has of his mother cleaning up his home. “You know good and well I did not raise a son this lazy,” she chastises in the way only a parent could. “Get on up now. It’s close to noon,” she hums, blurred in the background, before disappearing as the room’s sunlight dims.

The hallucination makes sense both in and out of the context of the show. Brian Tyree Henry’s mother, Willow Kearse-Rice, passed away in 2016 and is the woman the episode is dedicated. Henry certainly uses his grief to emote Al’s reticence throughout the day. His mother’s absence sets Alfred off on a journey of self-discovery, a cliché but necessary plot device the stagnating show desperately needs to keep it moving forward. To anyone else, sans hallucination, Al’s day starts off well enough: He goes shopping, gets his feet massaged, and spends the first part of his day with his not-girlfriend Sierra. Unfortunately for Al, who just wants to keep things real, Sierra’s social-climbing antics make it nearly impossible. In the store, she pushes Al to change his image—”People gonna get tired of seeing a sweaty nigga in a polo and cargo shorts. Nobody wants somebody famous to look just like them.” At the nail salon, she takes a photo of herself and Al without his permission to post it on Instagram in the hopes of boosting both their profiles. But Al, whose tough act belies his desperation for normalcy, has finally had enough. “Look, I ain’t got to stop being me, all right? That’s something boring-ass people like your ass got to do,” he fumes, before walking out barefoot, off to God knows where to stay grounded in himself.

But during “Robbin’ Season,” staying grounded isn’t always the best move. Al encounters three teenagers who seem innocent enough, until they realize he’s alone. The boys initially act like the starstruck fans Al has grown used to—”When I tell my brother about this, he gonna trip,” one says—before turning against him. “You alone? You ain’t got no car?” one asks. “Aw, you keeping it real,” a teen croons, before they attack. Looks like in “Atlanta,” keeping it real doesn’t just mean not having money or ceding to the pressures of fame; it means making yourself completely vulnerable to the danger inherent in “Robbin’ Season.” As the boys beat and pull a gun on Al, successfully stealing his watch and gold chain, Al escapes into the woods where he either further hallucinates or loses himself within the depths of the forest.

Not for the first time, director Hiro Murai plays with the camera to evoke his character’s psyche: In this episode, the unconventional camerawork echoes Al’s off-kilter subconscious. Al is miniscule, fully immersed in the grandeur of the woods. The camera lens flares as the sounds of nature become the episode’s soundtrack. And hours later, when it’s dark and he has only just realized he has been walking around in circles, yet another stranger stalks him and threatens to hurt him. Somewhere, somehow in the darkness and while potentially facing death, everything clicks for Alfred. When he finally emerges from the woods, he takes a picture with a (white) boy in a gas station. “Got to give, like, a mob face, man,” he encourages, embracing what he has been running from all season. At last, Al understands what it means to be Paper Boi, and steps up to the challenge. Will Earn?

Deer Guts:

- I’d like to think the man in the woods was not a hallucination of Al’s, but then I’d never go into any forest every again, so maybe not.

- Sierra might be the show’s most annoying character, but for what it’s worth, I don’t think her hunger for money is the result of anything less than justified frustration at the systematic exclusion she experiences trying to make it big. Plus, her purple hair looks great.

- I love Darius, but he crossed a line this episode. Who cooks pasta with their feet?

—Staff writer Mila Gauvin II can be reached at mila.gauvin@thecrimson.com.