History Series / Atlanta

* BittersweetEnding: "The Big Payback." [[spoiler:Marshall has made his peace with the reparations tax, found a good serving job at an upscale restaurant, and is working extra hard to pay his debt off early. However, for society at large it's implied a new age of slavery has begun, and seeing that all of Marshall's fellow servers are people of color, it seems nothing has improved for anyone but African-Americans, meaning eventually resentment and rebellion will start up again]].

[[caption-width-right:350:''Everything is made up, stay woke'']]

** ''Season 3'': "Three Slaps," "The Big Payback," "Trini 2 De Bone," and "Rich Wigga, Poor Wigga."
** ''Season 4'': "The Goof Who Sat By The Door."

** Season 3: "Three Slaps," "The Big Payback," "Trini 2 De Bone," and "Rich Wigga, Poor Wigga."
** Season 4: "The Goof Who Sat By The Door."

* StandaloneEpisode: Season 3 and 4 both feature anthological episodes focused on standalone stories where the main cast doesn't appear.

** Invoked in "Tarrare,” in which Van, pretending to be a twisted ''Film/Amélie''-type, carries around a baguette with her all day, only to use it to visciously beat a man in the middle of a museum (in front of his partner, no less.) It’s even lampshaded by Xosha and Shanice.

* ArtifactTitle: Season 3 shows Alfred's European tour, so only the non-cast episodes are even set in the U.S.

* ButNotTooBlack: What it means to be black and black enough is discussed continuously throughout the show. It's also the focus of "Rich Wigga, Poor Wigga", where a light-skinned black guy has to try and pass as black having apparently spent his whole life passing for white.

** It's heavily implied that "Three Slaps" is AllJustADream of Earl, as the episode ends with him waking up and commenting that he had a weird dream. There are more "anthology"-style episodes later in the season, but they lack the "dream" reveal at the end.

** There's also semi frequent references to "the new ''Film/BlackPanther'' movie by various characters. Given how much these are spread out and how they word it, it's actually suggested that Marvel Studios has made ''multiple'' sequels to ''Black Panther'' in rapid succession between 2018 and 2022, in contrast with reality, where its [[Film/BlackPantherWakandaForever first direct sequel]] was released in 2022, amusingly premiering a day after the finale of ''Atlanta''.

** The first episode of Season 3 is very clearly based off of the case of the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hart_family_murders Hart Family]], as it depicts [[spoiler:two white women neglecting and abusing their adopted children of color while putting on a veneer of progressive happiness to the rest of the world. However, unlike the tragic and disturbing story it's based on, the children are able to escape at the end of the episode.]]

* NeverTrustATitle: ''Atlanta'' is an accurate title for the first two seasons, but the third season is (almost) entirely set in Europe, with Van, Earn, Paperboi, and Darius all on tour.

* BrickJoke: In "The Club," Darius tells Paper Boi that Marcus Miles acquired an invisible car, and even shows pics of Marcus posing with it (which naturally show him posing next to nothing). Alfred sensibly calls it bullshit. [[spoiler:During a parking lot shooting at the end, Marcus Miles is seen driving away in an invisible car, even accidentally hitting several people]].

* RippedFromTheHeadlines: The first episode of Season 3 is very clearly based off of the case of the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hart_family_murders Hart Family]], as it depicts [[spoiler:two white women neglecting and abusing their adopted children of color while putting on a veneer of progressive happiness to the rest of the world. However, unlike the tragic and disturbing story it's based on, the children are able to escape at the end of the episode.]]

The series is set to air for four seasons, with the most recent third season airing on March 24th, 2022. The final season concluded on November 10th, 2022.