What I’m Watching: Atlanta

Atlanta: Season 1, Episode 6 “Value” (B+)

It’s impressive to see a show like this, just a few episodes into its run, start off an episode with no sign of its protagonist or even its top supporting character until halfway through the installment. Van going to meet her friend showed us what her life is like as her own person, separate from Earn and his endeavors and goals. It was interesting to hear her defend Earn and his self-serving tendencies, though that may have been because Jayde was trashing everything about her life. Casually talking about all the money she spends and how she prefers Paris to London showed just how out of touch with the real world she was, and Jayde taking a picture of her food as Van frowned disapprovingly and sharpened her chopsticks was a great moment representing how differently the two of them live. Inviting a date who brought someone for Van was the last straw, and their smoke session in her car after was a good way to make up. Unfortunately, it was representative of the real world that Jayde doesn’t live in, where Van realized she had a drug test in the morning, went to extreme lengths to cook up some fake urine, had it explode all over her, and then got fired only because she admitted to it since the school couldn’t actually afford to send them in to be tested. That’s some truly bad luck, but it also shows the level of responsibility that Van has and how it’s still possible to slip up and make mistakes. I assume that she’ll find something that will help her be the breadwinner again, but it’s definitely a melancholy development that she doesn’t deserve for making one small mistake.