In the second episode of MobLand, Richie got desperate about getting hold of Eddie and compelling him to tell him where Tommy was. So, when Eddie was being transported to the Cotswolds, Richie sent his men to straight-up kill him and start a gang war. But thanks to Zosia and Kiko’s quick thinking, Eddie managed to reach the Harrigan residence unscathed. Harry realized that Richie wouldn’t stop at this, and that he needed to find Tommy before things escalated. He tried to get Richie to calm down but ended up receiving death threats targeted at his family. Even though Harry probably wanted to snap Richie’s neck in half, he quickened the pace of his search and reached the club where this whole fiasco had started. After giving its manager, Valjon, a brutal beating, Harry did find Tommy. The only issue was that the lad was in pieces. The third episode of MobLand is all about Richie mounting a full-blown retaliation against the Harrigans, while Harry tries to put a lid on it. Does he succeed? Let’s find out.
Spoiler Alert
Richie Attacks Kevin and Harry
Episode 3 of MobLand opens with Kevin’s house being blown to smithereens by Richie. When Harry is notified about this attack, he immediately wakes up Jan and Gina and tells them to pack their things, because there’s a good chance that they are next. Before leaving, though, Harry gives Kevin a call and tells him to come to the yard with Eddie. Conrad protests this idea as he wants Seraphina, Brendan, O’Hara, and everyone associated with their family to get to the Cotswolds, because that’s apparently the safest place in all of England. When Kevin tells Conrad that Harry has found Tommy, he understands and tells Kevin and Eddie to get to the yard safely. Amidst all this chaos, Maeve criticizes Conrad for uttering Seraphina’s name before Brendan’s. In her opinion, Seraphina is a result of Conrad’s fornication with a prostitute, while Brendan is their legitimate child. Conrad counters that by saying that Seraphina contributes to the family in a positive way, while Brendan has incurred heavy losses; hence, the hierarchy. While this minor interaction accurately reflects the petty arguments that old couples have, it also sheds some light on Maeve’s obsessions with pure-bloodedness. Also, Pierce Brosnan and Helen Mirren’s prickly chemistry is just phenomenal.
Anyway, coming back to the plot, Harry exits his house with Gina and Jan. He tells Jan to start the car, but Jan notices an SUV with masked men parked a few feet away from them. Instead of making a run for it, Harry confronts them, and it’s obvious that they’ve been sent by Richie to kill him and his family. In his signature hilariously intimidating way, Harry disarms the duo by wielding his QWERTY phone instead of his gun. That’s because at the other end of the phone is Conrad Harrigan. In a matter of seconds, the masked gunmen realize that if they pull the trigger on the Da Souzas, they’ll never get to meet their respective families again. So, they agree to lie to Richie that, by the time they got to Harry’s residence, they had left. I love that when Harry gets back to his own car and Jan asks him what happened, he says that those guys are out trick-and-treating, thinking that it’s Halloween. I mean, what a funny way to not give his family a reason to panic. The writers deserve a round of applause for that, but Tom Hardy’s delivery is what really sells it.
Harry takes the ladies to his “friend” Mike’s place, which is actually a boat, but it’s safe because it’s the last place that Richie’s men will be looking for them. Mike is an author and a gambler who apparently owes Harry a lot of money, and he is essentially repaying his debt by helping his family. The interaction between the two is quite comedic because of the way Harry feigns his excitement about Mike’s kittens. The same can be said about the manner in which he doesn’t tell Jan and Gina what’s going on and why they are staying on Mike’s boat all of a sudden, but he is ominous enough to be taken seriously. However, since Harry doesn’t explicitly say that lives are at stake, Jan tells him to take care of Maria, their maid, and the problem that she is facing with putting her mother in an old-age home. And like the diligent husband that he is, Harry does eventually find the time to take care of Maria’s situation while ensuring that Richie doesn’t start an all-out gang war.
Maeve supports Eddie
DS Fisk and DC Mukasa are seen tailing Harry in the hopes that he’ll lead them directly to Tommy. Which he technically does by going to the yard; it’s just that Fisk and Mukasa don’t know that Tommy’s body is in there. So, while they wait outside like two dummies, Harry unveils Tommy’s dead body and a brutally bashed-up Valjon to Kevin and Eddie. And Valjon tells everyone a story that we’ve been dying to hear. As per the club manager, Eddie is the one who paid him to cut the Stevenson lad into pieces. He says that Eddie and Tommy exited the club after the stabbing. Then Eddie texted Valjon to come and pick them up, which he did, and he dropped them off at his club and then let them be. Later on, when he came to check on the kids, Tommy was dead because Eddie had stabbed him 50 or 60 times. And then Eddie allegedly paid Valjon 10 grand to hide Tommy’s body; the rest is history. Now, Eddie claims that Valjon is lying, but he never brings up his version of what happened on that fateful night. Yes, he doesn’t exactly get a chance to do so because a livid Kevin is whaling on him. However, it also seems like Eddie doesn’t owe anyone an explanation, and this sentiment is further bolstered by Kevin’s awkward chat with Conrad about this situation.
So, when Kevin calls up Conrad to talk about what they should do with Eddie and the Stevensons, Maeve barges in to give her two cents on the matter, even though nobody asked for it. It always feels like she is eavesdropping on Conrad. Like when Harry called Conrad to take the call on killing Richie, she just appeared magically and stopped the assassination. When Kevin and Conrad were having a conversation on whether or not Maeve’s assessment about Archie’s treacherous character was correct, she showed up out of nowhere so that she could put an end to that discourse. And here she is again, stopping Conrad from giving Eddie an earful for allegedly killing Tommy. Instead, she wants Conrad to tell Eddie that he is a true Harrigan. She is obsessed with this nonsense, and the way she says it makes it seem like she is not right in the head.
Yes, so far, I’ve been sticking to this theory that Maeve is a power-hungry woman who wants the Harrigans and the Stevensons to destroy each other so that she can sit on the proverbial throne. But now I am beginning to think that she is stirring up this feud just because she is bored. She doesn’t actually want the throne. She is in her twilight years. Hence, she wants to see some fireworks before the light behind her eyes goes out. Anyway, Maeve makes things so awkward that Conrad has to hang up on Eddie, Kevin, and Harry and deal with his wife. So, naturally, Eddie thinks that he is free to do anything because his grandparents have his back. Kevin and Harry step out to have a chat about how they’re going to deal with Tommy’s death, because Conrad and Maeve supporting Eddie doesn’t exactly solve anything. While Harry begins working on ensuring Eddie’s safety, because that’s apparently what Conrad wants, Conrad and Maeve have a chat about “taking care of the Stevensons” in their personal sauna. Maeve says that, in order to bring Richie to his knees, she wants to kill Vron. Conrad says that they should wait to see how Harry solves this issue, and Maeve accepts that suggestion while being adamant about killing Vron if Harry fails. And Maeve says it in a way that makes it seem like she wants Harry to fail so that they can worsen the enmity between the Harrigans and the Stevensons.
Richie Learns About Tommy’s Death
Harry orders Kiko to go to Valjon’s house and get footage of his family members and tells Zosia to take Eddie back to the Cotswolds. While Kevin waits for the Czechs to show up, Harry goes off to convince the director of the old-age home to take in Maria’s mother by basically showing off the fact that he knows every handyman in London and that they’d be a phone call away if the administration needs any repairs to their establishment. I guess it works because Harry is very confident that the director will give Maria a call and accept her mother’s candidacy. On his way out of the old-age home, Harry catches a glimpse of an elderly man who reminds him of a warden who abused him and possibly sodomized him when he was in juvie. We don’t get confirmation about whether that’s the actual guy who made young Harry’s time in juvie a living hell or if it’s a guy who just looks like a person that traumatized Harry. However, these bits and pieces of Harry’s youth give us an idea of what he has been through and how he chooses to be, for the most part, a polite gangster instead of a trigger-happy one.
When Harry returns to the yard, with Fisk and Mukasa still on his tail, he sees that the Czechs have answered the call and are ready to go to war, which is something that Harry most definitely doesn’t want to happen. So, he and Kevin go into the shipping container where Valjon is being held and use some morbidly hilarious reverse psychology to get him to take the fall for Eddie. Since Valjon is desperate to save his family from the wrath of the Harrigans, he accepts the deal. Once Harry is absolutely sure that Valjon will do everything that’s necessary to convince Richie that he is the one who has killed Tommy, and not Eddie, he gives Richie a call and informs him that Tommy is dead and that he has found his body.
This moment gives Geoff Bell yet another opportunity to show why he is one of the best in the business. I mean, so far, it has seemed like Richie has been threatening the Harrigans because it’s his duty. It felt like he doesn’t actually care that Tommy has gone missing; he just wants to use this as an excuse to attack the Harrigans and establish himself as one of the most dreaded gangsters in London. However, seeing Richie almost throw up after learning that his son has died has me convinced that he is a father first and a gangster second. The man is genuinely heartbroken about the fact that he won’t be able to see his son ever again, and he probably regrets not spending enough time with Tommy because he was too busy being a gangster. Hopefully, he is going to divide his time between his work and his family a little better than he had done before. Maybe he is going to become more paranoid than he ever was before. And given how Maeve has set her sights on Vron, Richie needs to ensure that she is protected at all times, because if that crazy old lady starts feeling bored again, she might go after Vron to stir the pot.
Maeve champions Brendan and Eddie
Eddie, Seraphina, and Brendan arrive at the Harrigans’. Seraphina and Brendan berate Eddie for ruining their lives, while Eddie responds to their criticisms with lowkey racism and misogyny. Maeve, predictably enough, comes to Eddie’s rescue and starts yapping again about how he is a true Harrigan. She even goes as far as to say that Seraphina isn’t even a Harrigan. Seraphina responds by saying that at least she and Brendan have some Harrigan DNA, while Maeve doesn’t even have that since she has the Harrigan surname because she married Conrad. Maeve taunts Seraphina by saying that she shouldn’t be so sure about being a Harrigan because the line at the brothel where she was conceived was quite long; hence, it’s possible that Conrad isn’t her dad. While Maeve mollycoddles her pure-blooded Harrigan boys (who are nothing but failures), Conrad comforts Seraphina because he clearly prioritizes merit over nepotism.
By the way, the portrayal of an individual who has gotten an ancestral surname by marrying into a family being more proud of said family than its actual family members, also known as the zeal of the convert, is frighteningly realistic. I mean, I have personally seen men and women who are not connected to a family by blood be more protective about ancestral property and reputation, usually to the family’s detriment, than those who are directly a part of the lineage. I don’t know why that happens. Maybe it’s due to some kind of fear that stems from the fact that if they stop being the family’s biggest flagbearer, they’ll lose their footing and the actual pure bloods will be prioritized. And in Maeve’s case, it’s possible that she thinks that as long as Conrad is alive, Harry, Kevin, and Seraphina (all three of whom don’t really see Maeve as a leader) will get to call the shots, and good-for-nothings like Eddie and Brendan will be sidelined. I mean, in this episode, aside from Kevin, Maeve is the one who asks where Bella is, who is as idiotic when it comes to business decisions as Brendan. Why? Because, firstly, Bella is an outsider like Maeve, and secondly, Maeve knows that self-confident people can’t be persuaded to see her as their queen; those who are failures will cherish the attention Maeve gives them instead of learning something from Conrad’s criticism.
Speaking of Bella, she is seemingly unperturbed by everything that’s going on between the Harrigans and the Stevensons as she takes Antoine to meet her father, Lord Pennock, in what turns out to be a sting operation to expose him for taking bribes to get Antoine to meet the Prime Minister. FYI, there is a split-diopter shot here. When Bella and Antoine exit the building and ask for the footage, Antoine says that he’ll give it to her once he is done making copies of it. Bella realizes that once Antoine makes a copy of that video, he won’t have any use for her, and she’ll be cut out of whatever deal the Frenchman is planning to make with Pennock or the UK government. And that’ll also keep her from having the upper hand over her father, who she clearly despises. Later on, Harry finds the time to visit the hotel that Bella is holed up in. Bella, after revealing how she has messed up her deal with Antoine, tries to seduce Harry. However, since Harry isn’t an idiot, he tells her to sit tight because, at the moment, he has bigger fish to fry, and he’ll deal with Antoine later.
Harry Postpones A Gang War
At the end of MobLand episode 3, while Kevin takes Fisk and Mukasa on a wild-goose chase, Harry and Kiko reach Moody’s gym with Valjon in order to meet Richie and his men. There, Valjon narrates an alternative tale of Tommy’s death. He claims that he randomly found Tommy after he escaped from his club that night. When he threw Tommy into his car, he tried to stab him. So, Valjon stabbed him back. By the time he took Tommy back to his office, he had bled to death. Hence, in order to get rid of the body, Valjon chopped him up into pieces and stored him in a box. Did Richie buy Valjon’s story? Well, not exactly. He told Harry that he is going to spend the next few hours slowly torturing Valjon. If Valjon sticks to the script that he has currently read off of, maybe Richie is going to kill him and call it a day. However, if Valjon begins to break and even hints at the fact that he isn’t at fault, and Eddie is, the war on the Harrigans is going to resume.
Before the credits roll, we see Fisk and Mukasa finding Archie’s body. So, it’s safe to assume that the detectives are going to track down the maker of the coffin Archie is in. If the coffin seller isn’t extremely loyal to Harry, which I think he is, then the detectives are going to use him to nab Harry again. And this time, since they have a body on their hands, they’ll probably be able to jail Harry. Whether or not they’ll be able to get some useful information out of him is uncertain, but they’ll certainly be able to keep Harry from diligently protecting the Harrigans. Okay, now is the perfect time to crack open one of my theories: Fisk is working for Maeve.
Look, Maeve’s mission is to get Conrad and the Stevensons out of her way so that she can begin her reign over the drug trade in London and make sure that Brendan and Eddie don’t have to haplessly fend for themselves in the future. Harry’s mission is to avoid a gang war because it’s bad for business. Since Harry has successfully postponed said gang war, Maeve has anonymously informed the police about Archie’s body, as she knows that that’s going to get Harry arrested. If Harry can’t rein in the troops, then Maeve can do whatever she wants to exacerbate the strained relationship between the two crime families without thinking about how Harry is going to resolve it within a few hours. So, yeah, even though it seems like a war is going on between Conrad and Richie, the actual war is going on between Maeve and Harry. Anyway, those are my thoughts on episode 3 of MobLand. Please, let me know your thoughts on the same through the comments section below.
