Spoiler alert: This article contains mild spoilers for the This Is Us Season 5 episode, “Birth Mother.”
This Is Us fans are reacting to a teaser for the upcoming episode of the NBC drama series, titled “Birth Mother,” but not all of them are looking forward to the flashback-fueled installment.
On the official This Is Us Instagram page, a photo teasing the new episode featured a look at Randall’s (Sterling K. Brown) birth mother, Laurel (Jennifer C. Holmes). The caption noted that the adopted Pearson son has been wondering about his mother’s story for his whole life.
But in the comments section, some viewers were annoyed by what seems to be another standalone that won’t feature any of the other members of the Pearson clan.
“HE’S NOT THE ONLY ONE,” one commenter wrote of Randall.
“Ok so after this can you move on to other characters? I’m so sick of him,” another added.
“I’m so tired of these little travel eps bro,” a third user chimed in.
Some fans did acknowledge that Emmy winner Sterling K. Brown is about to give “an acting masterclass.” And others admitted they were excited that viewers were finally getting all of the answers to the character’s backstory.
“Looking forward to the whole episode on Randall! Haters be seated,” one fan wrote.
As seen in a new This Is Us promo, “Birth Mother” will feature Randall taking a road trip to New Orleans to meet up with Hai (Vien Hong), a man who contacted him about Laurel.
In an interview with Entertainment Weekly , This Is Us executive producer Ken Olin compared the “beautiful episode” that will tell the story of Randall’s mom’s past to Season 1’s “Memphis,” which showed Randall traveling to Tennessee to learn his bio dad William’s (Ron Cephas Jones) backstory. Olin told the outlet that while Randall made “certain assumptions” about William and Laurel, the trip to Louisiana helps him discover that there are “other truths that he didn’t know.”
While not all viewers are thrilled about another Randall-centric installment, Brown told People that he looked forward to “the excavation of this storyline that will be explored.” He described his character’s findings of his biological mom as “really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really cool.”
Fans know very little about Laurel so far. While William presumed she died of a drug overdose following Randall’s birth, Hai revealed that she actually lived until 2015.
