Industry – Season 3 Episode 2 Recap & Review

Smoke and Mirrors

Episode 2 of Industry Season 3 starts where we left off as a power-cut causes a crisis on the floor at the same time as the company – Lumi’s IPO Launch. Eric asks the bankers to try and maintain the purchase of Lumi’s stocks but given chaos, there are constant phone calls that the bankers are left answering.

At the same time, Eric tries to check up on Yasmin who is still reeling from their night of drugs and partying. She ends up tripping but Eric picks her up and motivates her to continue working. Eric gets upset with the bankers when Rishi claps back at him for coming to the office high.

At the same time, Anna calls Yasmin and asks if the news about Lumi being bankrupt is true. She blames Pierpoint for getting her to make a bad investment. Yasmin asks Anna to trust her and Eric realises how big of a mess they are in.

Henry and Robert argue the latter panics about the stocks of his company falling further down. Robert suggests that Henry should interview some reporters to save Lumi’s public image and stock price. On the other hand, Petra confronts Harper and tells her that Eric has called her nine times to make sure she does not hire her.

Petra asks what went wrong there and Harper tries to avoid the question by stating that Eric is being dramatic. She notices how Anna is getting upset about the Lumi IPO situation and asks Harper to help hedge their company’s exposure to prevent them from incurring further losses. She asks for Harper to help her connect with the most naive banker at Pierpoint. Harper suggests she should talk to Yasmin. On the other hand, Henry agrees to a live video interview with a reporter.

Robert suggests that he do a print interview instead to make sure there are no hiccups but Henry is adamant. The report talks to Henry about the review from Ashford and Henry tries to talk to the reporter without considering Robert’s advice. Henry announces that he is going to allow customers to buy the company’s stock via the Lumi app but later backtracks when the reporter calls the idea bad.

Henry tries his best to save face during the interview and states that buyers are not losing anything if they purchase more Lumi stock. After the call, Henry gets upset with Robert for trying to intervene in his interview. On the other hand, Rishi gets mad at his colleagues but William shows up on the floor and tries to resolve the situation.

Eric realises how this is a threat to his position considering the ease with which William was able to manage the case. The floor finally seems to get calm as the stock percentage rises. However, Yasmin states that a tweet about Henry was trending which suddenly caused the stock price to dip. Robert tries to calm Henry down but the latter gets upset. He states that Robert does not understand his situation.

Henry has a breakdown about the lives of his employees being ruined but Robert points out Henry’s double standards. The two end up in a fistfight as Robert calls Henry greedy. As Robert is leaving the Lumi office, he gets a call from Venetia and the two chat about the situation at Pierpoint. She talks to him about the night before and asks Robert to come back to the office.

Petra seeks Harper’s advice to hedge their exposure. She tries to disguise the conversation from Anna but Harper provides her with all the help that she needs. Petra uses Harper’s help to buy different stock from Yasmin. Anna gets mad when she learns that Petra traded a different stock. She yells at Petra for being a bad friend and yells at Harper for going behind her back.

Petra leaves for the day but Harper sticks around in Petra’s office. She calls Pierpoint but cannot speak up when Eric answers the call. The board members talked to Henry about the way he changed up the numbers to kickstart Lumi’s IPO launch. The board members point out that Lumi’s CFO had resigned and they suggest Henry reconsider his position in the company.

Henry panics and leaves the meeting. Robert sneaks into Nicole’s house but is found by his daughter. He reveals that Nicole was his client and adds that he is looking for some documents. The two chat about Nicole and Robert tries to console her for the loss. The girl tries to hook up with Robert but he refuses.

The girl kisses him and eventually leaves, stating that she is still in school. On the other hand, Eric checks up on Yasmin who seems like she is having a hard time. He tries to motivate her and comments smoke and mirrors, pushing her to make every mat Eric when he learns that he has fired Kenny. The interview Henry had given caused the stock price to further drop.

Yasmin tries to get in touch with Robert, asking him to stop Henry. Robert calls Henry and apologises to him. He learns that Henry was hiding in the bathroom and had taken drugs for his anxiety. Yasmin leaves her desk and goes to help Robert trying to calm Henry down. She pushes him to get dressed and asks him to follow her.

Yasmin uses her connections and the fact that the paparazzi is following her. She snaps photos of Henry with influential businessmen. This raises the stock price for Lumi which works in their favor. That evening, at Pierpoint, William is happy about the overall progress made by Lumi but gets worried when he learns that Rishi had made no profit nor any loss that day.

He asks Eric if everything is going okay on the floor and wonders how Yasmin is doing. Eric backs Yasmin up and asks his new hire to settle in. At FutureDawn, Anna celebrates the successful IPO launch with the rest of her employees excluding Harper and Petra. Meanwhile, Yasmin tells Eric that the rise in the stock price of Lumi was her doing. He gets upset with her and asks her to stop cosying up with their clients.

Yasmin tries to remind Eric about his behaviour with her from the night before which helps him calm down. He leaves to go home when Yasmin gets a dinner invite from Henry. At the same time, Petra learns that Harper manipulated her past knowledge of Pierpoint to buy stock at a lower price. She tells Harper that she should not cheat to win, no matter how badly she was treated at her last job.

At dinner, Henry tries to woo Yasmin and helps her by using his sources to delete the article about her. Yasmin asks Henry to hook up with her in the bathroom but he leaves her with a bottle of wine. The wine reminds her how badly her father treated her after she had found him hooking up with the pregnant server on the yacht.

The episode ends with Yasmin drinking wine on the bus ride back home when she spots a man taking a video of her in her drunk state.

The Episode Review 

Only when things were getting better for Lumi did Henry have to go back in and ruin it by trying to hook up with Yasmin. Moreover, he also did not go through with the hook-up which adds to the drama that I am sure will follow in the next episode.

I am looking forward to Eric and Harper’s interaction because as much as he tries, he cannot have the same reaction to Yasmin as he had with Harper in the last two seasons. Harper is an asset and not having her degree cannot reduce her skills as an investment banker. I wish she would be allowed to go back to Pierpoint this season.

The fact that Robert almost hooked up with a 15-year-old girl had me scared. You can see how he is having a very hard time trying to manage his emotions and now, with Nicole dead, he has nowhere to channel it. I am worried he will end up doing something tragic and I hope Venetia realises this and helps Robert.