Summary
The Beauty is biding its time again in “Beautiful Brothers”, at least a little bit, since there’s little meaningful progress for Cooper and Jordan here. But the additional context around Forst is worthwhile, and the promise of an unlikely team-up is a compelling idea.
Byron Forst is a bad guy in the most simplistic possible way, a greedy fatcat billionaire who is cruel to everyone and interested only in his own self-advancement. With that in mind, it’s a wonder The Beauty is so keen to spend this much time with him. Even though I lamented the focus on his backstory, it seemed worthwhile enough for the Vincent D’Onofrio bait-and-switch, but the explanation of how he came to discover the Beauty was a bridge too far. He featured heavily in the previous outing, which showed how he seduced the head of the FBI, and a big chunk of Episode 8, “Beautiful Brothers”, is dedicated to him and his family. There is such a thing as too much Ashton Kutcher.
He’s all over the opening, rehearsing a speech for his upcoming product launch, which is a bit of a ticking clock floating above this whole half-hour. The speech is supposed to be funny and ridiculous, which it is, but it’s also illuminating on some level. Forst’s marketing push has shifted more towards the dream he sold Meyer: a cure for aging, for disease, for limitation. But everyone in the outlandish advert designed to run with the speech is a major hottie, so it’s clear what the real draw is. The connection between genetic perfection and conformity to traditional Western beauty standards isn’t dwelt on, but it’s there if you’re looking for it. It’s the big underlying red flag around the product, sudden combustion notwithstanding (Forst speed-reading the side effect disclaimer at the end of the video package got a laugh from me).
The reality of the Beauty is the infected from the Condé Nast incident being held in a dirty quarantine area while they vomit grim fluid on the floor and eagerly drink gloop fed to them through a hose. The fact that they all get unceremoniously butchered by black-garbed commandos feels like a mercy — if a waste of the gloop — given the messier death sentence they were already staring down the barrel of. Remember this room, and this fate. It’ll come up again later.
Cooper and Jordan, meanwhile, are still guests of Antonio and Jeremy, though cracks in that alliance are inevitably beginning to show. You’d think that Antonio might have anticipated the FBI agents immediately telling Jeremy about the whole “going pop” thing, but perhaps the arrogance of beauty and perfection should be considered another of the side effects. Antonio is able to blag it a little bit, but you can tell Jeremy’s listening. Again, remember this. We’ll refer back to it.
In the meantime, Forst. As mentioned at the top, The Beauty Episode 8 has a lot of time for him. We finally get to meet his kids, for instance, Gunther and Tig, one of whom is dressed like the Riddler. But both are useless. We’re not supposed to empathise with Forst on any level, but as soon as his sons pitched a business idea called “Abroha”, described as a “streaming service for bros”, I kind of understood why he’s so fed up with the pair of them. Sure, he didn’t have to tell them, but enough’s enough.
We also get a bit of Forst’s business dealings. Having put all of his eggs in the Beauty basket, he has pulled out of a lucrative space exploration deal, and also out of some kind of AI/robotics arrangement with a woman he repeatedly refers to as “robot lady”. I think we’re supposed to be paying attention to this one, or specifically to the idea of her “deacons” already being out in the wild. Forst plans to leave them there — a signed noncompete means they’re his products now anyway — and see how long it takes people to discover them. If I were a betting man, I’d say we haven’t seen the last of robot lady and her deacons.
Forst’s big move in “Beautiful Brothers” is giving his sons the Beauty. This was supposedly to “save” them — they were both on ventilators after a bad batch of fentanyl — but it wouldn’t surprise me if that pretext was arranged by Byron himself. Either way, Gunther and Tig become the kind of bros they were planning to pitch their streaming service to. Gunther is also Black now, thanks to Byron being, apparently, 5% Nigerian. Nobody finds it worrying that Byron openly admits that “saving” his sons is basically just a redline test for the product, since their bohemian lifestyles will challenge even the most optimised metabolisms, but they’re past the point of caring. Franny, however, is not.
It’s now three against one in that regard, with even the boys pushing her to indulge in the Beauty herself so that they can all become one big, beautiful, happy family. But she still isn’t buying it. And with Byron having crossed a personal line by not leaving the boys alone, a part of me thinks she may become the unexpected ally that Cooper and Jordan need to bring Byron down.
And they could do with an ally. When Antonio and Jeremy deliver them to Forst, all four of them are thrown into the same quarantine room we saw earlier, guarded by the same black-clad commandos. This proves to Jeremy that Cooper and Jordan were telling the truth, which he takes to heart, trying to strangle Antonio to death over the betrayal. Cooper, meanwhile, is shocked to discover, when he’s taken away, that New Meyer is overseeing the operation. But his advice — “Do as you’re told” — is interpreted by Cooper not as a threat, but as a way out. He thinks Meyer is trying to help them. So, when the commandos return to take the gang away, they all play ball. Between Franny and New Meyer, the good guys might have a foothold in this fight after all.
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