Industry (Seasons 1-3)

⭐ 9.5/10

This is a show that I hear about almost every week from one of my favourite podcasts because they have loved it from day one. I heard it described as Succession + Euphoria, and while I love Succession I haven't seen Euphoria because it looks like sex and drugs and no real substance. Well this show certainly has that, but a whole lot of substance as well. I started the first season over a year ago, and it took a while to get through that season, but at some point it finds its rhythm and I could not stop watching. I didn't even have time to review previous seasons because I was burning through them, and it all felt like one big story. Season 3 has a huge ending, and is clearly the closing of a chapter for the show, so before I start 4 I figured I should reflect.

Season 1 is about a bunch of new grads starting what is basically an internship at Pierpoint, a massive financial institution in London. If they do a good job and pass the final interview they will secure full time employment, and their dreams will come true. Pretty simple arc for a season, and it sets the backdrop for you of how this world operates. It is disgusting. Constant substance abuse, constant sex, just rich people living a hedonistic lifestyle, playing at being Gods on the floor of this money making behemoth. Our main character is Harper, an American girl who is genius but completely reckless, only doing what serves her and not following any of the rules. We also have Yasmin, a super wealthy girl trying to prove she belongs on her own merit, being used for her looks but also using that as her own power. And then my sweet boy Rob. His life is only drugs and sex, and he is a complete junky. More on him later. I didn't think this season was particularly strong, but by the end the politicking and backstabbing ratchets up, and the drama was just too good. The pilot episode is genius, I've maybe never seen a better introduction to a show.

Season 2 is where this show blasts off, really becoming a lot more like Succession. No longer the kids at work, its great to see them in their element. When they start yelling and executing trades when the pressure is on I have almost no idea what they are saying, but that's the power of the show. You don't know what the trade is, but you understand the implications, how it makes each person feel, and the shifting power dynamics of every episode as they constantly undercut each other. This show burns through plot! After episode one you think you know where it is going, but that is resolved by episode two. It covers so much ground, and I love that. I think a complaint about Succession is that time passes and a lot happens, but the characters can remain a bit static, their dynamics with each other always settling back to the comfortable patter. The allegiances constantly shift here, and each time they do it feels monumental. By the end that ground has fallen out for our core three, and the show has to shift dramatically for the next season.

Season 3 is an all time season of TV for me. Everything in Season 2 holds true, but the direction of each character is so unexpected but also feels so right. Harper is on her own now, still disrupting everything around her and being an absolute menace. Yasmin is dealing with the drama of her family's past and the trauma of her relationship with her dad, while also trying to understand her actual value. And my boy Rob is an absolute mess, his world has fallen apart despite sobriety and you just want him to get out so bad. There are so many massive moments, but at a high level the show zooms out a bit, less concerned with the money being traded, and more about the actual power players. The politicians, the upper upper classman who actually make the gears turn, and how our characters get involved with them. Its a show about class, and it always has been, but it becomes the focal point in 3 where some characters are trying to elevate, others trying to overcome, but where they come from is always inescapable.

The crown jewel here is episode 4, a bottle episode on Rishi. He is someone on the trading floor that has always been present, but almost as comedic relief, as you hear him in the background yelling the most obscene things you have ever heard. This episode is basically Uncut Gems, you watch him drown in addiction but somehow always manage to show up back at work and get his fix there as well. There is a scene in here where he is at a urinal peeing, holding his crying baby, wiping the coke off his nose, watching OnlyFans on his phone, and then wiping the blood that drips out of his nose off his baby's head. Degeneracy you can't believe. Its an absolute spectacle, a major achievement for this show, and it completely opens up the rest of the season. I couldn't believe how well it was done, and how a minor character could step in and carry this masterpiece. His season ends with a gut punch I never saw coming, and kind of wraps up the show for me in a way. In this financial world where they act like kings but the average person is never considered, we see real and serious consequences for the people in their orbits, and it is devastating. Reminded me a lot of Succession's Season 1 finale, where the idiotic choices of Kendall result in actual tragedy, and the fallout drives the rest of the show.

Through it all, Rob is the MVP for me, my Jaime Lannister. He is so unlikeable, so unmoored, but by Season 2 you want the world for him. In Season 3 its like his eyes are opened, he sees the evil of the world around him and is trying to escape it. But he is so lost, so alone, so helplessly in love with Yasmin, it is heartbreaking to watch. His final moments of the season are tragic but cathartic, the way I feel for him would have been impossible to believe in Season 1. Hard to talk about him without Yasmin as well, who I think is the most interesting character. She gets so many moments raging against this sexist institution, but at the end of the day she's a spoiled brat who can't live without her luxuries. Her final moments are also heart breaking, and shocking, as you get a better sense of the trauma she has been through, but also the callousness of her heart. She's like Shiv in Succession, if Shiv slept with everyone she met to feel powerful.

Finally, its worth mentioning the showrunners, Mickey Down and Konrad Kay. These guys are in their mid 30s! Apparently they started their professional lives in finance, and then instantly ran away from it, seeing the evil in it and what it does to the people involved in it at this level. The authenticity of this world in unmistakable, they are really giving you a glimpse behind the curtain of a world that is glamourized but creates monsters. It's easy to be drawn to this industry that seemingly controls the world, and I love how they can show you these monsters without judgement or having to explicitly tell you, oh don't forget this is actually bad. Their writing is getting funnier with each episode, but the intricacy of the plot has been there from the start. Can't wait to see where the show goes now that this main arc has ended, since it could literally go anywhere. Like I said, they burn through plot in a way I have never seen, so episode to episode you are always delighted with what happens.

I would say this is a perfect show, but the language and sex and drug usage is basically unmatched in anything I have seen. It slows down in Season 2 and then 3 as the story and themes gain depth (similar to something like Game of Thrones), but they do not shy away from the liberties HBO gives its creators. Not for the faint of heart, but a tremendously rewarding watch, as sharp and as smart and as stylish as anything I have seen.