WARNING: Major spoilers for Atlanta season 4, episodes 1 and 2Atlanta has finally answered a lingering season 1 mystery — and that answer is brutal. The hit FX dramedy has never been overly focused on continuity, and as it approaches its conclusion, the series might just be remembered for taking some wonderful detours and delivering unforgettable episodes. But, in its double-premiere, the show leans on its established history to stunning effect. Atlanta season 4, episode 2, titled “The Homeliest Little Horse”, properly kicks off with Earn (Star Wars‘ Donald Glover) telling his cousin Al (Brian Tyree Henry) that he’s driving to a therapy session. Al gently ribs Earn for this, but the episode gradually makes evident how much Earn needs those sessions.
During one of the most dramatic scenes in all of Atlanta, Earn Marks tells his therapist why he left Princeton. Earn’s exit from the prestigious university was briefly touched on at the beginning of the series, albeit never explored in detail. As Earn explains, with increasing indignation, he was friends with a white woman named Sasha during their time as resident assistants. They quickly grew close, with Earn trusting her offer to hold on to the suit he plans to wear for an important job interview. But when that interview draws near, Sasha is nowhere to be found, refusing to return Earn’s calls or answer his texts. So, confused and hoping to retrieve the item, Earn used his master key to enter Sasha’s room.
That decision is what dooms Donald Glover’s Earn. Sasha turns furious that Earn entered the room without her knowledge and she begins to deploy coded and charged language to describe what happened. She paints Earn, one of the few Black students on campus, as a predator and the situation escalates to talk of expulsion. “You were hurt by someone you trusted,” the therapist concludes and then continues: “Like the family member who abused you.” There’s no lingering on that second revelation, which is for the best. The therapist has established a warm understanding with Earn, well before the audience of Atlanta were allowed to peek in to their conversations, and it’s enough for director Hiro Murai to zero in on Glover’s face as a few tears fall from under his eyes.
Earn Is Fueled By Pettiness, And Atlanta Hilariously Shows Why That’s A Bad Thing
Earn shares the episode with a struggling children’s book writer. All at once, things start going her way. Viewers are left to wonder if they’re watching another Atlanta anthology, such as the one focused on reparations, or maybe the author is somehow connected to Sasha. In the end, the connection is made clear: the woman is Lisa Mahn (Brooke Bloom), an airport worker who ruined one of Earn’s recent trips with his family by racially profiling him. In response, Earn has devised an elaborate setup of hiring actors to make Lisa believe that she’s on the cusp of getting her book published.
Through these actors, he gets her to quit her job and brings her to financial ruin and public humiliation. Al is weirded out that Earn has gone this far for an old grudge. “I can’t tell if this is extreme, extreme pettiness or terrorism,” Darius (LaKeith Stanfield) observes, dryly. Atlanta seems less than impressed, as well, leaving Earn to plainly restate his need for therapy. It’s not a question of sympathizing with Lisa as much as it is a reframing of the show’s ostensible lead character.
Earn doesn’t trust anyone, or so he says, implicitly including Al and Van (played by Zazie Beetz), the mother of his child, in the statement. “The Homeliest Little Horse” asks fans of the series to revisit and rethink everything they thought they knew about Glover’s character, and every argument he’s had with those closest to him, and pulls it off in a way that is entirely in keeping with the singular style that Atlanta is known for.
New episodes of Atlanta season 4 air every Thursday at 10 p.m. ET/PT on FX. It also streams on Hulu the next morning.
