This Is Us Review: Honestly (Season 5 Episode 4)

Sometimes, all we need is for This Is Us to talk and for us to listen.

The honesty of This Is Us Season 5 Episode 4, “Honestly,” and its simple storytelling is a prime example of why we continue to come back wanting more after five seasons.

It’s not just the sincerity one admires during an episode like this. It’s this show’s innate ability to understand exactly what needs to be said and how to say it in a way that is so painfully human and honest.

Honestly, this episode is a prime example of how good This Is Us is at giving us everything with absolutely nothing.

I mean this episode has some shockers; Kate revealing that Marc got her pregnant when they dated, Randall’s birth mother’s husband finding out he exists through a viral meme, and the Big Three inadvertently laying the groundwork for some serious childhood reconciliation.

There are some big power plays happening that will affect this season’s outcome, they are just bundled up in a rather mundane episode of television where nobody dies and the worse threat to humanity is baby Kevin’s crying.

This can be a good thing because This Is Us does mundane better than any other series and can genuinely get me to care about things like sleep training.

But returning to these one-beat stories again and again, even when there is plenty of Milo Ventimiglia to justify them, still slows down the episode’s momentum.

Now Kevin and his latest film, that’s something new and exciting to sink our teeth into. Particularly because Kevin has a cool job and it would be nice to spend more time watching him actually do it.

So when he does win an Oscar with Rebecca in the audience, we can stand up in tears and say with utter confidence, “Kevin Pearson is not just a great actor, he’s the greatest.”

It’s not exactly fun to watch a director tell an actor they need to do better without telling them how they can do better. None-the-less, watching Kevin push through the process of analyzing the script and set out to defy these doubts is always a pleasure.

Underdog Kevin is worth rooting for all day, every day.

As Justin Hartley has proven in recent seasons with his character’s redemption arc, success for Kevin is a success for the larger story. But success has to be earning — even when it comes in the form of the talented Kevin Pearson.

As much as I want to hug Kevin right now, I would be remiss to not talk about the standout of this episode — the ever so fine Randall Pearson.

As Beth so candidly puts it, “There’s some things you can’t unsee and this is one of them.” But if I’m being honest, I never want to forget what we watched go down here today.

The decision to have Malik shadow Randall at work could not have been a better one from a story standpoint because their odd little bromance has already established itself as a highly entertaining dynamic to explore this season.

That being said, when I imagined these two reaching for greatness together I never quite imagined Malik being so wrapped up in loving his daughter that he broadcasts Randall’s six-pack to the entire city. When Malik accidentally sets a thirst trap, he goes big and I respect that.

I also respect This Is Us for using this equal opportunity moment to make us laugh over Randall going viral as a meme, while still establishing how Asante Blackk and Sterling K. Brown command the attention of their audience equally.

These two characters are motivated by two equally strong women and their own desire to achieve greatness in its many forms. This series is consistently re-establishing that just because Malik has a child at a young age doesn’t mean he is throwing his life away.

He is killing the academics and he plans to open a dope restaurant with three Michelin stars one day. The man has plenty to give this series going forward as This Is Us molds its story in hopes of creating a space outside society’s dusty boxes.

I beg this series to give us more of Déjà and Malik going forward because Lyric Ross commands her own space in the presence of Malik and Randall with a comedic-beat that is so spot on.

This Is Us continues to do a stellar job of reaffirming that even the strongest of family upbringings won’t be without the stress of societal pressures. Jack is a great dad but that doesn’t mean he didn’t hold his sons to society’s toxic notions of what a man should be.

It’s fascinating to see Jack, who is by definition the most perfectly flawed human in this fictional world, still fall prey to the notion that a boy being “soft” is a bad thing, a thing to be broken.

This series continues to explore the idea that a good man can still be flawed in his nurture and that’s important because it’s teaching the next generation of parents that they can always do better.

The episode has a beautiful way of teaching its characters tough lessons and sweetening the moment with a brother team-up that is adorable. Randall teaching Kevin a new work ethic that he takes with him into adulthood is another great thread for the brothers to follow on their road to relationship rehabilitation.

The Big Three’s lives have never been messier or as out of sync with each other as they are right now. Yet, they’ve never been more interesting.

I wish I could say the same about the decision to bring back This Is Us prematurely. A decision that ultimately leaves us without new episodes of the series for several months now.

And maybe a 2021 premiere would have been better, but it has been nice to get a small slice of this family back in our lives when we need them the most. For one small moment, we get to immerse ourselves in a world where things as arbitrary as Kevin’s sleep training and Jack’s ever-changing facial hair can consume us whole.

I want to say we will continue to survive just fine without this show’s comforting chats every week, but that wouldn’t be very honest of me, now would it?

What did you think of this episode of This Is Us? Share your thoughts in the comments below!

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This Is Us returns to NBC with new episodes on January 5, 2021.

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