Summary
Top Boy expertly progresses its narrative and character dynamics, heightening the stakes considerably while also ending on a moment of real tragedy.
This recap of Netflix’s Top Boy Season 3 Episode 2, “The Tour”, contains spoilers.
After the events of Episode 1, things are changing in Summerhouse.
For one thing, there’s now a lifelike mural of Jaq and Mandy painted on one of the walls of the estate after their combined efforts managed to prevent Kieron from being deported. But on the darker side of things, Sully thinks Dushane might be responsible for the Irish taking out the Moroccans, Emilio, and his family, and making direct threats against Sully and his daughter, Tasha.
And if he isn’t responsible, which he claims not to be, that means Jonny McGee is getting his personal information from somewhere else.
To make matters worse, Jaq, Sully’s right-hand woman, is preoccupied with Lauryn and needs some time off to bond with her. Sully’s reign is looking likely to come crashing down before it even got started.
Netflix’s Top Boy Season 3 Episode 2 Recap
It stands to reason that Sully’s undoing will come at the hands of Stef, Jamie’s younger brother, who has now taken to wearing Jamie’s chain, training at the same gym he did, and flirting with Mandy’s daughter Erin, whose father, Dris, was also killed by Sully in Season 1.
Stef knows it was Sully who killed Jamie, and it seems like most of the streets know too, but he has never confirmed it to the police or anyone else. But he’s starting to hang around with Jamie’s old crew, act a little older than his age, and just generally attempt to morph himself into the spirit of Jamie. And we know how that turned out for him.
Stef invites Erin to a rave, and things are going pretty well until Jamie’s chain gets stolen by some older boys who push Stef around. Stef calls on Si and the gang to retrieve the chain at gunpoint outside a petrol station, and Stef gets a few licks in with a baseball bat. Erin seems mildly impressed by all this, but one doesn’t imagine she will be for long.
Why can’t Dushane access his money?
Despite recent successes for Summerhouse, Dushane still isn’t keen on the idea of the police roaming around the estate, and he’s quick to blame Mandy for it when he goes to pick Shelley up.
And that’s the least of his problems. Shelley manages to negotiate the cost of the salon chain down to £1.8 million, but it’s due in cash in seven days. When Dushane goes to see Lithe, he finds her office completely empty. She has cleared out and disappeared, her phone is off the hook, and Jeffrey, who can’t seem to log into his online banking, hangs up on him too.
Dushane goes to see Jeffrey, who tells him that Lizzie is missing and has locked him out of all of their bank accounts. Dushane makes it clear that if Jeffrey doesn’t find both Lizzie and Lithe and bring them back to London ASAP, he won’t live to see the weekend, but when he gets back in the car to text Sully, those heart palpitations from Season 2 start up again.
Dushane also retains the services of a very discreet and obliging detective through Wilson Lee, but we don’t meet him in this episode.
What is Jonny’s surprise for Sully?
Sully, in Jaq’s absence, is forced to meet with Jonny alone and take him on a tour of his operation. They visit the trap where Kieron, Samsi, and Bradders are working, and then Jonny takes Sully for “a surprise”.
The surprise includes an introduction to Jonny’s great-uncle Pat, Tadgh’s father, who is in a nursing home. The McGee’s apparently own many of these places to make money on London’s limitless supply of old people, but in a room downstairs is the real surprise — Billy, bound, gagged, and in a particularly bad way. As it turns out, the Irish aren’t particularly well-disposed to traitors, and Jonny’s gift to Sully is the opportunity to do whatever he feels like to the man who sold him out.
Sully isn’t above murder, as we know, but he also isn’t keen on being someone else’s plaything, so he stands by while Jonny beats Billy to death — though he’s sure to take a good look at the surroundings while he’s there.
Netflix’s Top Boy Season 3 Episode 2 Ending Explained
Who dies in “The Tour”?
At the end of the episode, Dushane meets with Sully at Summerhouse to tell him about Lizzie and Lithe disappearing. He checks in on the status of the Irish problem, which Sully says he’s handling, but given Dushane has made some pretty major financial commitments and needs the money in short order, he insists on helping Sully deal with the McGees. Sully says he’ll think about it.
Finally, Jaq and Becks return home after a date night. Throughout the episode, Jaq spent time pampering Lauryn, seemingly improving her state of mind considerably. Shelley promised her a job at the salon, she got her nails done, and she finally decided on a name for her son — Jack, after “the best aunty in the world.”
But when Jaq and Becks get home Jaq finds Lauryn dead in the bath, having overdosed on heroin, perhaps unintentionally and perhaps not. The final shot of the episode lingers on the crinkled foil the heroin was wrapped in.
You can stream Netflix’s Top Season 3 Episode 2, “The Tour”, exclusively on Netflix.
