Congo

Lee Daniels confirmed that Oscar winner Common and Oprah will guest star next season. Hilarious that Queen O has her own black soap opera on her own network (The Haves and the Have Nots) that she won't guest star on but she'll do Empire.

The total number of viewers was higher than last week's episode though, so there was still growth.

According to Wikipedia, Macy was supposed to play another of Hakeem's lovers.

There is still a huge stigma about mental illness, regardless of race or class. I saw Cookie's initial refusal to accept her son's condition as that.

I think Rhonda was pissed because Lucious had promised each son 1M shares and then cut each one by 25% to give to Cookie, while keeping all of his own shares. I also love that Rhonda is the only Lyon who isn't intimidated at all by either Lucious or Cookie.

Good for him. To paraphrase Lucious, tell your truth Jussie!

According to Lucious, Cookie makes $3M a year in her position at Empire. With Anika gone, Cookie may well be promoted to head of A&R and make even more.

That song was beautiful, probably my favourite of all the songs that have been on this show so far.

The final numbers are in and Empire 1x09 got adjusted up to a 5.8. I'm calling it now and predicting a 6.0 for next week and a 6.3 for the finale. This show is on fire!

Well that escalated quickly...

"Oh, so Yoko wants to play on the song too. Well, Yoko, what can you do? Can you play the tambourine?" "If you want Cookie's nookie, ditch the bitch."

Just incredible.

Well I guess we know how Lucious feels about Rhonda now.

A Cookie/Porsha TAR team would be the greatest thing ever.

I was laughing my ass off when Giuliana pronounced "Vuitton" the way that Brad did and then she cracked up along with Kelly. But yeah, the Oscar show should have been 90 minutes, or hell, a full two hours because what else does E! have to air? They didn't even mention Cate Blanchett, Queen of the Red Carpet. I know her dress wasn't the best thing she's ever worn but they should have at least mentioned her. Plus they could have covered the after party dresses that the stars wore with the extra time.

I would love to see people dressed as Cookie come Halloween time.

According to the promos, just four more episodes, so it'll be an 11 episode season.

I think the pre-Rachel Rachel hit the nail on the head: Mike really does have some mental issues to work out! He has some sort of compulsive lying problem.

I really to see more of Rhonda and her relation status with the other Lyons other than Andre. Does Lucious like her? Cookie seems cool with her but is also wary. Rhonda and Anika seem civil to each other but not exceptionally close based on their interaction in the most recent dinner scene.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6vVk9a233rA Here's the most recent one.

I love that they are using Ta'Rhonda on the show's official Youtube channel to provide brief recaps of the episodes. She's hilarious.

"Hey Anika! Now THIS is an ass!" - Cookie. Always Cookie.

Yeah, the CEO of the motor company and Harvey both made it explicitly clear that loyalty was #1 for them above all else. I don't think Mr. CEO would take too kindly to Harvey designating Louis and a newb like Mike to be his new lawyers, even if they are all part of the same firm. Question for the legal experts: would a managing partner like Jessica have clients of her own, or would she be too busy overseeing the firm as a whole? We mostly just see her sitting on that damn couch in her office casually reading some document.

Timbaland's good friends with Timberlake, so maybe he can convince him to make a cameo. And Lee Daniels is good friends with the one and only Oprah, so who knows? I think the show has done a good show so far of maintaining the focus on the "true" cast while keeping the famous faces on the periphery.

I'd love if she got an Emmy this September. Taraji just completely owns this role.