The second season of FX’s Atlanta is proving to be unconventional, to say the least. Last season’s more streamlined story arc has been replaced with a series of vignettes — with each episode disjointed from another, yet giving us a deeper look at our main characters, sometimes individually, each week. Thursday night’s “Woods” episode was centered on Paper Boi (played by Brian Tyree Henry), the show’s local celebrity rapper. Like many episodes of Atlanta, you never really know where it’s going to go until it actually goes there. Last night, the show took viewers into the dark wilderness that is depression.

The episode opens with Paper Boi, whose real name is Alfred, asleep on the couch. The house is a mess, clothes thrown everywhere. Blurred in the background is an older woman, Al’s mom, cleaning up and chastising her son for sleeping in past noon. “You know good and well I did not raise a son this lazy,” she scolded him. “Get up!” Alfred, annoyed by his mother’s nagging, brushes her off. It’s a strange scene, considering we have never seen his mother in the show before, but if you’ve been paying attention since season one, you’d remember that Al’s mother actually passed away years ago. That’s when the dream or illusion of her voice telling him to get up struck me to the core.

The next scene we see an awake and fully alert Paper Boi ready to hit the town with a girl who’s “not his girlfriend” ( a bae, I guess), named Sierra. We soon learn that Sierra is a stripper turned Instagram celebrity — the American dream story of the new millennia. The casual couple seem to get along well at first, but their differences are quickly revealed as Sierra’s boss-bitch, do-it-for-the-gram attitude clashes with Paper Boi’s keep-it-real-and-low-key vibe. Like many others who interact with the rising rap star, Sierra can’t understand why Paper Boi doesn’t just own and celebrate his fame. Last season, Paper Boi was hungry for success and notoriety, but this season he seems to be disillusioned with the hype. According to him, he’s just not with the fake shit. Understandable, but his apathetic attitude towards everything from business responsibilities to upgrading his lifestyle, reads something deeper. Something typically mistaken for carelessness or laziness. Something that feels incredibly familiar to me and millions of others who’ve ever suffered in silence — depression.

The episode takes a sharp turn when Paper Boi and Sierra have a squabble at a nail salon across town, and the rapper decides to leave his bae/ride home and make his way on foot. While on his journey, he runs into a group of fans who are shocked to see the celebrity walking home, all alone with no sign of security. They praise Paper Boi for “keeping it real,” gush over how much they love his music, and then, of course, rob him. It is “Robbin’ Season” after all, but I think Paper Boi was robbed of something much more valuable than his watch and chain…but more on that later. The so-called fans jumped the rapper and robbed him at gunpoint. Luckily, Paper Boi managed to escape the attack by running into the woods. It’s here that Atlanta’s stellar writer Stefani Robinson gets really metaphorical.