In its two seasons Atlanta has been widely celebrated, and awarded, for its honest, melancholic, darkly funny and often surreal take on black America. (His brother Stephen serves as co-writer and head story editor.) The show follows rapper Paper Boi (Brian Tyree Henry), his cousin/manager Earn (Glover) their friend Darius (Lakeith Stanfield) and Earn’s girlfriend Van (Zazie Beetz) as they maneuver through the Atlanta rap scene. The video was directed by Hiro Murai, who also directs Atlanta, the half-hour series Glover, 34, writes, produces and stars in. “I think it’s critical when says ‘I got strap, I have to carry it.’ He’s not bragging about having a gun, he’s like ‘I have to, this is America, this is the way things go here.’ The fact that he has to is really important to the message.” “This is the thoughtful discussion of the place of violence in the American landscape and how guns are a perpetual and tragically necessary part of living in America,” says Touré. I don’t know who was supposed to see that and feel reminded or called to enact justice, because I don’t know that the real killings we’ve seen have brought us closer to justice.” So when I saw Glover re-enacting, I don’t know what the purpose is. “Usually the argument made is that transparency will bring us closer to justice, but we’ve found that it hasn’t. “Over the past few years we’ve seen so many young African Americans killed, and it’s been recorded and retransmitted over and over for our consumption,” says Blair Kelley, a history professor at North Carolina State University. Such reiteration of tragically common violence has for some been unsettling. Meanwhile, limp bodies are casually pulled out of the frame. The guns are handled with great care, being wrapped in red cloth some believe symbolizes red-state second-amendment reverence. Gambino goes on to kill a gospel choir in a moment evoking the 2015 Charleston massacre, in which nine people died during a prayer service at one the country’s oldest black churches. The implication is that the brutal violence and general mayhem is no different than daily life in the US, where guns, entrenched racism and police brutality against black Americans dominate the headlines. This is when he declares the song’s guiding principle: “This is America.” The video’s background action commences immediately after the video hits it pivot point: Childish Gambino pulling a gun from his pants and shooting a hooded man in the back of the head, execution style. This Is America has dared us to decide what to make of it. “This is one of the great performers in modern America,” says TV host Touré, whose books include 2012’s Who’s Afraid of Post-Blackness? “He’s showing a really interesting ability to do soul music, television, movies, comedy and drama and to make art that has political substance, but not so much that it becomes propagandist or preachy.” Since debuting This Is America during last week’s episode of Saturday Night Live – for which he served as host and musical guest – Glover has refused to reveal the video’s message, telling TMZ “that’s not for me to say.” What’s certain is that This Is America is a brilliant, career-defining moment. YouTube videos investigating these Easter eggs have more views than many actual music videos. Its symbolism has been linked to Jim Crow, Michael Jackson and the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. While Childish Gambino is surely the star – playing the role some have suggested is America itself – viewed in context of the background action, the video is dizzying, hypnotic treatise on racism, gun violence, joy, spirituality, hip-hop and entertainment in the United States. There are kids lost in their cellphones, car fires, SZA sitting on the hood of what appears to be a 1986 Camry. ![]() There are chickens, girls on bicycles, money in the air, mobs running in riot-like pandemonium. ![]() ![]() There are people running across the upper level of the space that looks increasingly like a prison as the video progresses. There is a white horse with a hooded rider. There are children in school uniforms doing dances of African and American origin. So instead, try directing your attention on all that’s happening in the background as Childish Gambino – the musical moniker of multi-hyphenate artist Donald Glover – moves through a spare industrial space in a succession of meditative tracking shots that serve as steady foundation for the frenetic action they capture.
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