"Sportin' Waves" is the second episode of the second season of Atlanta. It is the twelfth episode of the series overall. It was released on March 8, 2018 on FX.
Premise[]
Trappin ain't easy, ya dig? Shout out to all my credit card scammers in the club tonight.
Plot[]
Alfred Miles buys weed from a longtime dealer fan but is robbed at gunpoint, having his keys taken as well so he cannot follow the dealer. The dealer tells him to get out of the car but realizes he left the child locks on, and they have an awkward moment where Al is forced to open the door through the window. The dealer apologizes for stranding him and promises to pay him back before leaving, and Al starts to walk home.
Al recounts the robbery to Earnest Marks as they walk to a meeting with the head of a music streaming service. Earn tries to present a sample of Al's music to the head of the company in the form of a disc, but he insists on playing the song on their wireless speaker system. It plays for a second then cuts out, and the employees try to fix it while Al, having been silent the entire meeting, stares blankly. Al records voiceover for the service's playlist in an unethusiastic tone, repeating himself but adding a racial slur at the end when the recorder insists on something "cooler." Watching from outside, Earn realizes the entire office is staring at him in silence while he has his back turned. As Al and Earn watch a black worker perform on top of a table for his white coworkers, they are approached by Clark County and his manager Lucas, the latter of whom Earn knows. Al and Clark trade compliments and Lucas jokingly tells Al to contact him if Earn is not meeting his standards. Al tries to perform a mediocre version of "Paper Boi" for the office, but leaves just as the vocals kick in.
Darius gives Earn his cut of the dog breeding money, which amounts to around four thousand dollars. Tracy enters and offers to double the money for Earn by scamming gift cards, but Earn declines. Al and Tracy joke about his wave hairstyle that he is preparing for his job interview that day. Reconsidering, Earn decides to take Tracy up on his offer. Al and Darius go hunting for a new weed plug and strike a deal with a fan, who discreetly takes a picture of them while the smell his product. Despite him pretending as though he did not, Darius notices the exact picture he took posted on Instagram. At the mall, Tracy detours into a shoe store with Earn, wanting to have something nice to wear for his interview. Earn coaches him on how to be confident around white interviewers and asks him if his gift card scam works in the shoe store. Tracy tells him he plans to just take the shoes without paying, as the store has a "no chase policy" for liability reasons. As an employee approaches them to try and convince Tracy to buy the shoes, he casually leaves with them. Earn and the employee stare at each other before Earn awkwardly follows Tracy.
Al and Darius strike a deal with a new plug, a much more laid-back fan who gets top quality weed from his uncle's farm. He claims his girlfriend is a "gangsta" and she is the one who put him onto Al's music. As Al and Darius get back in their car, the plug texts him a video of his white girlfriend performing an acoustic cover of "Paper Boi", which Darius is amused by but Al finds irksome. The plug adds Al to a groupchat with him and his girlfriend and they begin casually texting each other, and Al drops his phone out the window and drives off. Earn buys a pair of shoes with his card as he gets a text from Tracy, saying that their scheme has been found out and he has ten minutes before his card gets shut off. Earn panic-buys everything he can and, now encumbered with bags, wades out to the parking lot to find Tracy gone. He asks where he is, and Tracy tells him that he is at his job interview. A disgruntled Earn remarks that he is going to kill Tracy and lumbers away, still holding his bags. Earn makes it back to Al’s house, complaining that he had to ride the bus and that Tracy owes him money since he didn’t get to spend the entire $4000. He joins Al and Darius in sharing a joint and remarks how good the weed is.
Waiting for his interview, Tracy rehearses his strategy. When he’s called in, he takes off his rag, revealing his new waves. However, the interviewer tells Tracy that they’re fully staffed and no jobs are available. Tracy storms out of the office, knocking a few things off the man’s desk.
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