TV Review: Industry Shows Money Corrupts The Youth
I knew I would love HBO’s Industry from its opening sequences of its characters’ job interviews. You just KNOW these people from the minute the show begins, and it is inviting to know the essence of protagonists before they even start their journeys. It is like knowing Romeo and Juliet will die for each other before even seeing how they fall in love. Something about that 30 second preview into their hearts and minds, particularly in terms of their career, makes you want to stick with HBO’s Industry, which premieres November 9.
Playing Mondays at 10 p.m. EST, there is an intensity to Industry that is undeniable because these are hedonistic characters. Set in a London financial firm, Pierpoint & Co, Harper (Myha’la Herrold), Robert (Harry Lawtey), Hari (Nabhaan Rizwan), Gus (David Jonsson) and Yasmin (Marisa Abela) embody the desperation to socially climb up, the exhaustion it takes to do so, and the Type-A personalities that keep trying. While each faces their trials, with some battling the prejudices of homophobia, classism, sexism, racism, and the pangs of addiction, they all share one thing in common: they want to rule. They are carnivorous in their ambitions, which is why you build an intoxicating love-hate relationship with them. They are not “good people,” necessarily: filled with the issues they cause and the ones they have with themselves. Yet, the lingering question is whether they are good at their job.
Industry: Official Trailer | HBO
Characters like the banally bullish Eric Tso (played phenomenally by Ken Leung) take up the role of the young cast’s powerful mentor and a symbol of a core problem in the business world: good business is usually not moral. Money is the root of all evil because it could care less whether you think its is doing good. Tso’s aim to inspire “coldness” within his proteges is what, in part, fuels their excessive after-hour activities: from sex to drugs. Lawtey makes Robert the epitome of a horny frat-boy while Rizwan’s Hari exemplifies an ambitious man way in over his head over whether he can handle his own ambitions, and Jonsson’s Gus teeters the lines of man that wants to be an executive of a world that questions his value as a human. Meanwhile, Abela’s Yasmin is Rachel Berry levels of desperate for validation, and Herrold’s Harper, though more personally leveled, has a gnawing, growing “Game of Thrones” swag that makes me excited for her future episodes. Ultimately, they are clashing between being powerful and being good, which is a theme that speaks to younger generations.
Industry: Official Teaser | HBO
I was enamored by Industry because it goes both hard and light in how it portrays the financial world and the youth that wish to take it over. I know these characters in real life, and, trust me, the show could go even crazier. In addition, while it is never clear about the issues and machinations of their job, the actors deliver in showing the anguish and cunning it takes to survive it. Thus, the show thrives by becoming a character piece rather than an actual financial drama, despite characters dealing with clientele. Creators Mickey Down and Konrad Kay entrap viewers by making every episode a challenge to characters’s core and whether they are cut to be the “kings” and influencers they wish to be. Thus, the show observes the fascinatingly ugly way power corrupts, even by just wanting it.
