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Perhaps the end result of Atlanta's unnerving second season, and the theme that will drive the story from here, will be something more universal: empathy.
Where the episode excels is in how authentic it feels. So often school-set stories come off like the product of a hazy reflection from an adult mind. But most of this felt distressingly real.
This is about middle school, but it's also about what we pass down to our kids and how that gets distorted-so distorted that we don't see our own hands in it.
That twist isn't unexpected, especially if you've been watching this season dive headfirst into the dour deep end, but it's handled well with a detached sadness that is very meaningfully shot through the hazy grime of a school bus window.
It really does feel like the season has been building to something important between [Earn and Al], and this origin story was part of that, in addition to being a bittersweet nostalgia trip in its own right.
Donald Glover, Hiro Murai, and company create illusions so all-encompassing that they've created a world with its own mechanisms, functioning independently, in tandem with, and in spite of its viewers.