Summary
MobLand continues to widen and complicate its core story in Episode 8, introducing a wily police double-cross and a mysterious new Harrigan relative for good measure.
Well, MobLand is getting rather complicated now, isn’t it? I thought that last week’s international introductions were enough to be going on with, but Episode 8 has other ideas. Another Harrigan brother? Toby Jones as a corrupt ex-copper with his own sinister motives? Two more murders? Honestly, you’d be forgiven for failing to keep up.
Luckily, that’s where we come in, so in case you needed a reminder, here are the recent essentials: Brendan Harrigan proved his general uselessness by getting hacked to bits by a chainsaw under orders of Richie Stevenson, but Harry was able to save Seraphina and call off the Mexicans who were wielding the power tools by placing a call to Kat McAllister, a mysterious American crime boss who seems to know – and terrify – just about everyone. That move left Harry dangerously indebted to Kat, but since the Mexicans were compelled to turn against the Stevensons, a rather large hole in London’s fentanyl market was created which can hopefully be plugged by the Harrigans, despite the Mexicans having just sliced the heir to the Harrigan empire into several pieces on a live-stream. To that end, Harry has to pull in another favour from Kat, putting himself and his family even further at risk, but that is, after all, his job.
You might be surprised to hear this, but all of this constitutes a very tiny sliver of “Helter Skelter”, which has significantly more on its mind. We mustn’t forget about it, though, since things are heating up between Harry and Conrad, who didn’t know about Kat pitching him a job two years prior, and a later conversation implies that Harry knows full well who’s really pulling the strings at the Harrigan country manse (spoiler alert: It’s Maeve.) And he knows that’s bad news for everyone, him perhaps most of all. So, a coup may be coming – if he can stay alive that long.
As I said, though, most of the juicy stuff is happening elsewhere this week. Some key intrigue comes from a surprising source – Toby Jones’s character, D.C. Colin Tattersall, a retired old gang-buster turned freelance consultant who’s on-hand to essentially show Fisk and Mukasa how to do their jobs. He has been around organized crime for a long time and knows Richie Stevenson personally, but after having put him away for two long stretches, he can’t just waltz up to the front door and ask him to come out and play. That’ll be a job for Fisk and Mukasa, whose job is to sell him on the idea of helping the police set up Conrad in exchange for immunity.
You know there’s something slightly amiss about Tattersal from the jump, but we’ll return to him again later. Just know, in the meantime, that he seems to base all of his crime-fighting expertise on fishing analogies and is almost creepily excited to send Alice into the lion’s den – aka Conrad’s home in the Cotswolds, where he invites her to dinner, primarily to torment Jan – without the benefit of a wire. Keep an eye on him.
Anyway, for our sins, let’s briefly talk about Eddie. His torrid love affair with Gina continues into MobLand Episode 8, and word of it spreads through the house like wildfire. When it reaches Harry, he takes the opportunity to have a brief word with the lad, who is irredeemably smug about the arrangement and thinks his surname inures him from whatever deeply unpleasant things Harry is no doubt considering visiting upon him. But Harry’s smarter than he looks – and certainly smarter than Eddie thinks he is.
So, instead of giving Eddie a pasting, Harry gives him his blessing, which really throws him. But then he departs with the following, which should perhaps be taken as a bit of a clue:
“You are the future, mate. And whatever comes, I will be right by your side as you ascend. And then one day, when you’re at the top, and you’re looking down over all of this… I’ll be right there with you, mate. Right by your side. And I’ll push you off.”
Tom Hardy in MobLand | Image via Paramount+
This becomes more important than it first appears since it might not be a totally empty threat, given a few other developments. For one thing, Harry later meets with Freddie, the Stevenson goon whom he strong-armed into smuggling guns into Richie’s house, and asks for information on the fentanyl trade. But he also lays out a plan – that he and Kevin are taking over the Harrigan family because Maeve is running things now, and she’s nuts. This could be something he’s just saying to grease the wheels, but you never know.
Harry also confirmed that Archie wasn’t in bed with Richie on the fentanyl, but Freddie reveals that someone in the Harrigan clan was. But we don’t hear him say who, because Harry throws him off the roof of the parking lot to his death. Harry, though, is now armed with yet another highly crucial bit of information for him to deploy when he feels it necessary.
And check this out. After unconvincingly pretending to be concerned about Seraphina’s well-being, Maeve takes Kevin aside to tell him that she thinks Seraphina is making a play on the empire. It’s a nonsense claim, but it reveals another juicy titbit. She mentions that Kevin “or his brother” is the only true heir to the family, but she isn’t talking about Brendan – she’s talking about Kevin’s “other” brother, mere mention of whom causes Kevin to nastily snap in her direction.
Putting two and two together about Conrad’s past with Bella, I think the implication here is that Eddie is Conrad’s son. This would explain a lot, including Maeve’s ridiculous grooming of him into a pet psycho, and it would also track with what Harry said to Eddie earlier about one day being in charge. Which would mean Harry potentially knows about Eddie’s parentage. Is there anything this guy doesn’t know?
He certainly knows Kat, which lands him in hot water again when he has to secretively Zoom her and she agrees to broker the deal between Lopez and the Harrigans in exchange for a hefty cut and another favour from Harry, who’s now two in the hole. What are the odds that those favours require him to cut the head off the Harrigan snake in one way or another? Seems pretty likely to me.
Anyway, MobLand Episode 8 ends with Fisk and Mukasa visiting Richie’s pub to pitch their new working arrangement. It’s immediately clear that they’ve grossly overplayed their position, and in response to not having an adequate answer to Richie’s question of who really owns who, Richie shoots them both to death. This, in itself, wouldn’t be all that surprising, but Richie then heads into the other room where Tattersall is nursing a beer. He reassures Richie that he does, in fact, own the police, just like always, and Richie accepts the deal.
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