There's Alot Going On

*There's Alot Going On* is the eighth episode of the second season of Living Free. Written by Mike Barkhoff, it was Directed by Anessa Smith in her Directorial Debut and premiered on May 13th, 2022.

## Plot

Dylan broadcasts to his social media an attempt gone wrong of a new viral trend, the Hold Your Breath challenge. Mike turns on the news to hear about riots growing across the streets akin to the Black Lives Matter ones in 2020. Mike gets his cat water and prepares to meet Dylan for filming.

On the way to meet Dylan, Mike's car is shaken. Mike tells Dylan and, when asking what they start with for filming, Dylan reveals that they are first going to do photography for the film. Visibly irritated, Mike laments he could've done this at home and leaves in anger. Returning home, Mike's car is again shaken by rioters.

Mike tells Ron about his frustration with the riots, to which Ron suggests Mike be patient because he may not understand the entirety of the situation. Mike tries to relax but instead finds himself depressed and bored yet again. Mike laments on several aspects of his life that he wishes he could do differently, such as smoking. When he asks Conner for advice, Conner replies by yelling at Mike, getting it in his head that Mike is in the wrong.

Mike calls Dylan, who has been crying and is still at the sight of filming, and apologizes, promising to resume the next day. Dylan happily walks off. In an after-credits scene, Dylan returns to the film sight, having forgotten a personal rock he was using to mark a standing spot while filming, Dylan gets a phone call and, annoyed, says "Are you kidding me?".

## Production

Barkhoff was inspired by this episode following real life circumstances, especially as the season is morphed after 2020 to a degree. Barkhoff would remind people after the episode aired that the season is not set in 2020, and that the main takeaway he wanted viewers to have was that the process is going to keep repeating itself if nothing is done to change it.

Barkhoff wanted the episode to release on Friday the 13th, in May, because of it's content. This is why the season took a week off between Episodes 5 and 6. Notably, Barkhoff considered delaying the episode due to the night being a massive night for Live Free with the release of an artist's album -Mcee Detox - as well as the release of Kendrick Lamar's album following a five year absence.

The episode is the directorial debut of Anessa Smith. Barkhoff told people on set this was "the most 'Atlanta'" episode they had done, referring to two scenes where Dylan hyperactivly partakes in a viral trend, the Hold Your Breath Challenge, rather than knowing of the news, showcasing a trend's importance over politics to the youth.

Barkhoff wanted to do this as he expierenced it first hand throughout 2020, but wanted the trend to be fictional so it kept the season apart from the year as much as possible, feeling more like a cousin year with similar occurences. Barkhoff said that he "thought of the most ridiculous - but still somewhat realistic - trend I could. I could see the social media morons doing this one.".

## Reception

The episode was met with widespread critical acclaim, particularly for Dylan's comedic delivery, the camerawork, and the editing, as well as the episode's overall themes and messages. It generated a 9.9/10 on IMDb from 23 participants.