As he prepares for the final season of his award-wining Atlanta series, Childish Gambino is responding to critiques that the show is not Black enough.
On Tuesday (Aug. 2), Gambino spoke at a virtual panel for the Television Critics Association along with his brother and co-executive producer Stephen Glover. During the talk, the rapper-actor addressed knocks that the show is not made for African-Americans.
“I do a lot of this shit for the people,” Glover said, according to Deadline. “So if you’re sitting there being like, ‘Oh, this is misogynoir,’ I’m wondering why you think that and why you think I feel that way when I’m nothing without my people. It’s just kind of whack to me. Some of that to me is just internet people trying to get hot, which is also something we learned in the system we’re in.”
“I feel like a lot of the Black criticism bothers me only because it sounds like [it’s from] Black people who don’t really know what we’ve been through,” he continued. “I don’t think they give a lot of credit to what we’ve gone through.”
The “This Is America” rapper argues that that assessment would mean Black people are monolithic, which is an idea he is against.
“There are better ways to talk about it rather than like with shit I’ve heard in fourth grade about who we are because I feel this is such a Black show,” he added. “To say it’s only for White people, it’s like we’re cutting ourselves down which is kind of whack to me … “
Atlanta follows Gambino’s character Earnest, a college dropout who is trying to manage his volatile cousin’s rap career. First airing in 2016, the show, which also stars Lakeith Stanfield, Zazie Beetz and Bryan Tyree Henry, has garnered numerous awards including multiple Emmys. After several delays following the second season in 2018, the third season aired earlier this year. The final season of the show is set to air on FX starting on Sept. 15.
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