Dave created an urgent conversation about mental health in the black community

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The fifth episode of the FXX comedy, based on Dave Burd's real-life hype man Davionte “GaTa” Ganter's experience with mental health, was of the most important episodes of TV this year, says Julian Kimble. “I was bipolar for a while,” says GaTa, noting that he was officially diagnosed 10 years ago. “But over all the years of traveling, touring, and always being on the go, I didn’t even know it until I had a manic episode.” As Kimble points out: "On a show that had already treated viewers to cringe-heavy comedy and in-depth descriptions of Dave’s surgically repaired penis, the weight of the episode was completely unanticipated. It cemented GaTa, who up to that point had been all unflappable confidence and inextinguishable energy, as the show’s emotional anchor and breakout star. But it also established Dave’s depth beyond its quirks." ALSO: Dave gives us a wider lens through which to view what it means, as a person of privilege, to insert oneself into a culture that is not one’s own.