After more than half a season of hurt feelings, harsh words, tears, madness and anger, This is usOn this week’s episode, Randall and Kevin discussed their issues in person. But did the hour (full of very nice work by Sterling K. Brown and Justin Hartley by the way) actually brings the Pearson bros closer? Read on as we break down what happens in “Brotherly Love.”
Won’t you be my neighbor?In a flashback to when The Big Three were toddlers, Rebecca and Kate are away on a girls’ weekend while Jack stays home with Kevin and Randall. A co-worker pulls strings to get Pearson and his boys in to watch a recording Mr. Rogers’ neighborhood, which films in Pittsburgh. Before the show, a production assistant mistakenly thinks Randall is there with another family; when Jack corrects him, Papa Pearson goes out of his way to make Randall feel special and loved… which has the effect of making Randall feel different and Kevin feeling less-than.
After the show, Kevin runs off, and Jack has to chase him to find him. So Randall crawls onto the set and sees the Daniel Tiger doll, who talks to him about imagination. “I have imaginary parents,” confesses little Randall.
This track features a scene from the very beginning of the episode where Randall fantasized that his parents were a TV meteorologist (played by Brandon Victor Dixon, power) and the local librarian (Janora McDuffie, Grey’s AnatomyWe will come back to that later.
PARTY ERROR In another flashback, Randall visits Kevin for the first time in Los Angeles when they are both college students. Randall is there with his Model UN team, but agrees to slip away for a night out with his brother. They drink a lot to play for, but then the micro-aggressions start to get hot and heavy from Kev. He gives Randall a fake ID for a much older man and says, “He’s a black man, you’re a black man, you’ll be fine.” And later, when they’re in a cab, Kev is such a jerk to the driver, who is Black, that Randall wants to call off all night. Kevin, angry, says he had to drink so much to be with his own brother. Randall says he drank so much because he’s “a drunkard.” They start to beat each other up a bit, and it escalates to the point where the driver stops and orders the two yahoos out of his car.
After they shake a bit, Kevin can’t find his keys. And by the time he realizes they’re really in his pocket, the brothers have calmed down a bit. They return to Kev’s apartment, where he unfortunately admits that he is a failure who cannot get a job. “You have everything, Randall: Beth, a huge future,” says Kev. Randall is trying to make him feel better, and they don’t really talk about all the hurtful, racist things Kevin did and said earlier in the evening.
THE MAIN ACT OK, now we are on the present day. Beth and the girls go ice skating for a while to give Randall and Kevin the space and privacy they need, and the boys rush right in after Kevin arrives. It’s striking how much of the talking Kevin does in the beginning, and how sorry he says he’s sorry IF Randall felt alone, and IF he ever played a role in making his brother feel bad. Kevin also details how Randall’s prom date, Allison, had a racist father, and says he’s sorry he didn’t say anything at the time.
When Randall says ‘thank you’ softly and appreciates the feeling, Kevin is easily irritated. “It doesn’t really look like you,” he says. Randall calls the speech a “beautiful monologue,” then steps outside while Kevin follows him, demanding what else Randall expects from him. As they sit on the stairs at the front of the brownstone, Randall shows his frustration and says it feels like Kevin is “apologizing for a miscalculated tweet” and “after all these days you’re still so tone-deaf, man . ” Then Kevin’s cell phone rings – he’s waiting for a call from Robert DeNiro, which he ticked off by walking off the set when Madison was in labor – and both realize the phone is in the house… and the door is locked.
So they keep arguing. Randall points out that Kevin just “wanted to feel like he was doing the right thing,” and Kevin spits back that Randall’s childhood was “glorious” because he was always singled out for being special. Randall tells him all he wanted to do was blend in, but his blackness wouldn’t allow it – and Kevin played a huge part in being different from him. While Allison’s dad was a jerk, “you were just thoughtless and deliberate in the dark, which somehow hurt more.”
‘WILD UNHAPPY’ They go to a neighbor to ask for the spare key she is holding. While they wait, Randall wonders if they would be in the same relationship if he were white. He takes it a step further by asking Kevin to admit that he resents Randall being black, and whether he ever considered that the day he became a Pearson was also the day he lost his biological mother and father . Kevin lashes out, calling Randall “hugely ungrateful.” But Randall says it does is very grateful – but always have to show that it is always ‘a prison’.
Randall’s neighbor, meanwhile, hands over the key and rags to Kevin’s Sylvester Stallone movie (ha!), Telling him he’s better at comedy. The interlude took a bit of the warmth out of Kev and Randall’s conversation; Once they get back to Randall’s house, Randall tells Kevin about his ‘ghost kingdom’, or the fantasy reality in his head ‘where you have the life you would have had if you had never been adopted’. Yes, the weatherman and librarian are there his parents – “they were the only two adults I consistently saw who looked like me” – but his ghost kingdom also includes Rebecca, Jack, Kate and Kevin “because I felt too guilty because I loved you too much. “
BROTHERLY BREAKTHROUGH That seems to get through to Kevin, who offers another – very sincere and “ like ” -free – apology for everything he missed during his childhood and might still not see. It makes Randall cry. ‘You are my brother and I love you. You’re the only brother I’ll ever have. You’re my witness, ”continues Kevin. Then Randall makes Kevin cry. “Daddy wasn’t ashamed of you,” he says. And the only reason I said it in our fight was because it was a cheap shot. I apologize. He was proud of you. I I’m proud of you, and I’m sorry I ever made you think otherwise. “They hug each other and say they love each other.
But we are not done yet! Kevin talks to DeNiro, who is not angry. Then he admits to him did resent Randall for seeing his brother’s special treatment as “mixed with you as black, and I wanted to push you up a notch.” As Randall starts to cry again – who can blame him ?! – Kevin apologizes for his super jealousy and taking horrible shots at his brother over the years. While Randall wipes his face, Beth and the girls come home, excited to see Kevin.
That night in bed, Randall dreams not of WeatherDad and LibrarianMom mixed with the Pearsons, but of Laurel and William cooking in the kitchen while Nina Simone’s ‘I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel to Be Free’ plays in the background – and it is the first time that has ever happened.
Now it’s your turn. What did you think of the episode? Sound off in the comments!