Donald and Stephen Glover Explain Meaning Behind 'Atlanta Robbin’ Season' Title

Donald Glover reveals how the latest season of 'Atlanta' was inspired by 'Tiny Toon Adventures: How I Spent My Summer Vacation.'

Stephen Glover and actor Donald Glover attend the 69th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards.
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Image via Getty/Frazer Harrison

Stephen Glover and actor Donald Glover attend the 69th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards.

Details surrounding Atlanta Robbin' Season, the title of the second season of Emmy-winning FX show, continue to trickle in. After the network officially announced the premiere date for the long-awaited second season, the show's creator and star Donald Glover revealed on the Television Critics Association panel on Friday that the series got its inspiration this time around from Tiny Toons: How I Spent My Summer Vacation

"In the writers room, we spent a lot of time talking about How I Spent My Summer Vacation by the Tiny Toons," Glover said, perVariety. "That was kind of the inspiration." Atlanta executive producer and writer Stephen Glover described how Tiny Toons shaped their approach to this upcoming season. "Tiny Toons Summer Vacation was broken up into a bunch of episodes, but if you watched them all together they were a movie,” Glover said. “We took that idea. It’s a whole story, but told in a bunch of little parts." 

Stephen explained the meaning behind the Atlanta Robbin' Season title, which describes a time period during the holiday season in Atlanta, prior to Christmas, when robberies exponentially increase. "People have gifts, have more stuff, and money," he said. "You might get your package stolen off your front porch. While we were there, my neighbor got her car stolen from her driveway. It’s a very tense and desperate time. Our characters are in a desperate transition from their old lives to where they’re headed now. And robbin' season is a metaphor to where we are now."

During filming of Atlanta Robbin' Season, the title of the show hit a little too close to home when production was suspended because of a shootout. "At the end of the day, it’s where their lives were," Brian Tyree Henry, who plays Paper Boi, said. "It’s where the environment was and that’s the universe we were creating. That’s literally why it’s called robbin’ season. That fear, that uncertainty, that not knowing. Not that you forget your old life, but now it’s different, so what do you do?"

After hinting at a February and April 2018 return, LaKeith Stanfield, who plays Darius on Atlanta, went on Instagram to brag about knowing the premiere date all along, saying, "Told y’all it’s coming in March." 

 

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