This Is Us Season 5 Episode 4 “Honestly” Review

Major Spoilers are included in this episode review. Please read with caution.

This Is Us brought much needed levity in this episode, just in time to go on hiatus until January 2021. Curse you, best television drama! I was getting used to watching you every week! Let’s talk about the storylines in this episode, starting with Randall Pearson and his embarrassing viral video.

Having agreed to allow his daughter Deja’s boyfriend Malik to job-shadow him at City Hall, the boy came late, fell asleep during a conference meeting, and then he forgot to turn off the live feed when Randall finished his zoom morning announcement to the city. Believing the live feed had ended—Malik’s one job, you seriously only had one job—Randall started to change out of his clothes and dance in his office for his morning run.

Malik lowkey pulled the “I’m a teenage dad” excuse, explaining how his daughter will always come first. Like yes that’s very noble and mature for a kid, being a single parent must be so hard especially at a young age, but I don’t know any other single parents who accidentally exposed their boss on the Internet. Apparently, Randall isn’t as mad as he should be, because he offers Malik an internship after this incident.

Then Randall passed on some fatherly advice to the young Malik. He should not have to make his dreams smaller for his family because that’s what he did when Jack died. Good work in therapy, Randall. You are now “dad bros” with a teenager.

The viral video also showed the audience how small the world really is, with Randall’s embarrassing video reaching the old Vietnamese guy. The old Vietnamese guy kept repeating Randall’s speech—before the humiliation—about William Hill, having recognized the name. Thanks to Malik messing up on the live feed and Randall being a natural embarrassment on the Internet, Randall will finally get some answers about his biological mother coming 2021. This is so funny!

Kate is next. She and Toby are officially too attached with Ellie, the surrogate mother. They even picked out a name for the baby. When Kate called the baby “Chloe” though during an ultrasound appointment, Ellie looked uncomfortable about it. Kate and Toby think they blew it, but Ellie explained that a girl from her high school was named Chloe—a bitch who told awful lies about her. The name just threw her off, so Ellie isn’t having second thoughts. Ellie also told Kate how she almost had an abortion, and wondered if Kate was judging her.

Kate said no judgments, but it did cause her to tell Toby a story from her past—something she never told anyone in her family. Then we’re flashbacked to 18-year-old Kate. Apparently, after she broke up with the jerk named Marc, and Rebecca and Randall left the house to visit Kevin in NYC, she found herself pregnant. I’m pretty certain we’re heading into an abortion storyline in 2021.

Kevin’s background is explored more than the others this week, and his history of being coddled by his parents. The baby flashback to Jack and Rebecca—sleep depraved—trying to get Kevin to cry himself to sleep instead of them running to him every time, the teenage flashback to him wanting to quit the football team, and how both ultimately connect to his present-day storyline about his new film role fleshed out more of Kevin’s character.

Kevin is struggling to impress the film director, who offers little to no feedback but continues to interrupt Kevin’s performance—while praising the female lead at the same time—during rehearsal. When Kevin eventually asks for some feedback on what he’s been doing wrong in rehearsal, the film director said he didn’t realize Kevin was someone who needed a “attaboy!”

While the film director was kind-of rude, Kevin’s need for approval does get addressed, and it connects back to eighth-grade Kevin having a rough time with football and wanting to quit. Then he overhears Jack and Rebecca’s argument about Kevin being soft and quitting everything. I didn’t like the argument, but it made sense that it happened as the show continues to dismantle the myth of Jack being the perfect father.

There was toxic masculinity happening in this episode—and the previous one with the workout, which lead to this incident—with how Jack treated Kevin wanting to quit the team, but it also came from a place of love.

So, it’s honestly a conflicting situation because Jack was doing his best to avoid making the same mistakes his dad made with him. Jack wants all three of his kids to know he does see greatness in all of them and that’s where we’re reminded that Jack may not have been the perfect dad, but he was a dad who always tried his best; he also wanted his kids to do their best, and that doesn’t mean quitting when the going gets tough.

As a result of Jack and Rebecca’s loud argument and Kevin overhearing it, he goes to his brother Randall’s room for help in studying football gameplays using his note system. When Rebecca goes upstairs to tell Kevin to quit football and sees the two brothers get along—a truly rare moment—she can’t help but be happy like the rest of us.

The nice brotherly moment also made me sad knowing Kevin and Randall currently have unresolved issues to deal with, but also hopeful when Kevin uses the same note system Randall taught him in present day to prepare for rehearsal. There’s still hope the brothers will fix their relationship.

Although, Kevin did show some Anti-Black behavior when he—over a phone call with Kate—dismissed Randall’s Black experience growing up in a White family, saying Randall was loved by both parents like that parental love had the power to protect Randall from experiencing life as a Black person or something.

Kevin’s behavior in this episode made me see what This Is Us was trying to teach us about his character. This wasn’t an episode dedicated to peeling back the layers to understand how Kevin became this person. Rather, this episode showed us how Kevin was always this type of person—a white cis man with no honest understanding of his Black brother’s experience because of his own personal daddy issues.

I’m truly hoping Kevin gets “the talk” from Randall as well at some point—better yet, Kevin needs to learn some other way that his Anti-Black behavior isn’t actually okay. It isn’t Randall’s job to educate his two White siblings—he made that very clear in the season five two-hour season premiere with Kate already.

Let’s be real here since This Is Us is forcing my hand. You can fight and disagree with your siblings over a lot of stupid things, that’s normal I suppose, but don’t be Anti-Black—or racist—about it. Don’t be Anti-Black, Kevin. That’s still your brother. Do better.

Overall, I’m loving the direction This Is Us is going this season with all the storylines, but the hiatus until January 2021 killed the vibe. I’m really excited to see what happens next with the Pearson family. Thanks so much for reading this episode review, everyone! I’ll see you all next year!