Telechy

Seriously. I love the insights into the music industry on the show, and it's one reason I don't totally agree with the Dallas and Dynasty comparisons. Did anyone on those shows give impassioned speeches about how new oil shale extraction techniques were changing the market? Nope, the "oil company" was just something to make them rich and let them fight over it. While I would be surprised if the show ever went after individual artists or companies (that would burn bridges from a guest star perspective), I assume "artists" like Kid FoFo are there to show how creatively empty a lot of contemporary music is...which is interesting, because Lucious is obviously obsessed with his own artistic integrity and having a unique sound. Among his other accomplishments, I think Lee Daniels may have found a way to counteract multitasking, because if you take your eyes off the screen for 2 minutes, you could miss an attempted murder, a kid having sex with his almost-stepmom, and an appearance by Gabourey Sidibe. I just wish we could get 3 hours of extras for each show exploring the plots in depth. In particular, I want a spinoff about Ghetto-Ass Studio, which would mostly be people recording music while getting baked with the occasional shooting for drama.

That was one of my favorite bizarro moments. It was very Wizard of Oz/kingly, how Lucious--who never seemed to understand or respect his sons beyond how they reflected him back to himself or furthered his goals--suddenly seemed to have this deep insight into what made them tick. Being Lucious, though, I wonder if the "gifts" don't also have the seeds of their destruction. Lucious gave Hakeem a plane, but he also gave him symbolic freedom, and as we've seen, Hakeem doesn't have the most mature judgement when it comes to friends, lovers, and songs. He gave Andre something he could run for himself and that's connected to his newfound spirituality, but is Andre, who lives for business, going to be satisfied running around to donor dinners? How will Rhonda feel about getting shunted off to wine-and-dine circuit? And Jamal....oh my sweet Jamal, I'm so afraid for you. Jamal got power, but he also got the validation he's craved all his life, and by the end of the episode he was already showing a LOT of confidence in his ability to make decisions even with 0 experience in the business. I'm afraid this could turn out badly for him. (On a more practical note with the gifts, how fantastic is it to be rich, so you can find somebody on a day's notice to make you lion-headed scepter, buy you a plane, and sew a tiny replica death pillow?) The funny thing is, Rhonda not only inadvertently did Lucious a huge favor, but she's now technically the second biggest thug in the Lyon family. Neither Jamal nor Cookie managed to take down their victims. Maybe Lucious will have more than two words for her at the next family gathering. I'm with you on that, because they did such a good job presenting manic-depression as a physical illness that can be managed with treatment, and distinct from the other problems Andre has in his life. Spirituality seemed like a promising thing for him to explore since he was feeling burned out and hollow from his relentless pursuit of the prize, and I'm sorry he bailed on it just because Devil Lucious seduced JHud away from the church (if that's what happened). With all the "Lucious is God/Lucious is Jesus" references I was thinking for a while that Lee Daniels was taking it in that direction, which would have been fine but late in the game to introduce a supernatural/Christian framework for the whole thing. What I think is that to the extent the show is about the corrupting effect of the industry, power and money, he's going to all the wells for imagery that expresses that--Shakespeare, Machiavelli, the Bible. I LOVE that aspect of the show, and I love my favorite montage in the last 5 years of TV history: two shirtless black men going to town on top of a mogul's desk while JHud belts out a gospel tune surrounded by the Solid Gold Praise Dancers and a woman tries to smother her murderous ex-husband with a pillow. Lee Daniels, you have grabbed the HOH SHIT crown from Game of Thrones, and I hope you never give it back!

The cabin scene was hot as hell but pure Silhouette Romance, complete with a roaring fire and a bearskin (see what I did there?) rug. I laughed when Malcolm said he had been offered a High Level Government Job because no one actually talks like that. If the show didn't hand out plots like they were candy on Halloween, we would have scene Cookie realize that at least some of her feelings for Lucious were due to him being the only man she's ever been with. If Cookie is TPH's age, then she was 27 when she went into the slammer, so she was with Lucious very young--maybe late teens? Now she suddenly finds herself a mature woman and can enjoy a relationship but without losing her head or heart over it right away (yes, making out with Malcolm in the office wasn't exactly discreet, but she politely told him "no" about going to DC. And all my suspicions about Malcolm were apparently wrong to this point, because he was very gentlemanly, not judging her one way or the other when she said he was her second, and inviting her to take the lead, swoon. But then Malcolm vanished, never to be seen again in the episode. (At least he got more lines than Ryan, who was there to get nailed to a desk and then shouted for by Lucious. Seriously, where was BF Ryan when Jamal was Machiavelli-ing his way up to heir apparent?) Apparently TH acts his best while pretending to compose hip hop songs in a beat-up urban living room. I just wish the song had been better because the acting was very intense but vocally, Lucious and Jamal didn't mesh well together and as a poster on another forum said, Lucious's voice sounds like a hoarse frog from the '60s.

As others here have noted, it was laughably porn-ish, but I agree that it showed that he's been observing Cookie very closely, possibly for sneaky reasons (he appeared on the scene and very quickly took over "security" at Empire--is he a Creedmore plant?) An aspect to Cookie that I find very touching is that for all her bold presentation of herself, she has self-doubt about her attractiveness. She wears her fur and heels and fake hair like armor, but she was the one who told Elle to take all that crap off in order to get in touch with her real self. And is there any doubt that "You're So Beautiful" was written for Cookie, especially when she sang it to herself at a low moment in prison? The whole song (which is surprisingly sweet considering it was Lucious's big hit) is about finding a woman drop-dead gorgeous at any size, without a manicure, etc. So yes, I think Malcolm knew that appearing to be overwhelmed by his attraction to Cookie, so much so that he would betray his employer, was very attractive to Cookie and a good way to get past her defenses.

(Thanks to everyone for their insightful comments on this thread...I've been looking for somewhere to talk about my new favorite show beyond "OMG did you see that!" and it looks like I've found it!) I agree with the comments that Lee Daniels may be working off an older set of assumptions, including his personal experience, in portraying Jamal's journey, but in addition to not being beyond the realm of possibility in the NYC music world, I think it works in-universe. The sons' lives have been dominated by their powerful, generally absent father. There's a reason we see the flashback to poor baby Jamal being stuffed in the trash can multiple times--even though he's moved past it in his personal life, he's obviously haunted by it, and it may have been holding him back, along with the fact that although he's inflexible about his orientation with Lucious, he's still taking Lucious's money. That's how we see him in the beginning--living a comfortable but somewhat aimless life in his beautiful Lucious-funded apartment, singing at hipster dive bars and going to Fire Island with Michael for the weekend. He may feel he's being independent, but Lucious definitely holds the strings, keeping Jamal out of sight and away from the business. The first step in Jamal's journey of artistic liberation is telling Lucious to take his money and stuff it. It's more than just the trash cans of Bushwick and Ghetto-Ass Studio, it's that he finally fees free of Lucious's influence and also has a kick in the pants to change because he has to support himself as an artist. After that his ascent is pretty quick--the well-received performance on Sway's show, and his breakthrough performance at the White Party, where he really comes into his own as a charismatic performer as well as an artist. I loved the juxtaposition of the trash can flashback with that performance; hopefully it's the last time we'll have to see it, and it was a real "It Gets Better" moment when we see that he not only survived but thrived and was finally able to put it behind him (and how great was the simultaneous salute to/screw you to Lucious with the Roman salute?) It's a nice bit of character development that although Jamal can be hesitant with his choices (holding back from his music career, his mom and Lola at the beginning), he's the truest to himself and bravest of the three boys (how often does he have to stare down a gun barrel??). His struggle has obviously given him a lot of inner strength, whereas poor Andre seems to have been exhausted by it.

Since Lola is made of puppies and magic I'm sure there's some truth to it, and I loved the Dorothy-in-Oz way she delivered all her lines. Other characters may be deep as a sheet of paper at this point, but the Lyon family has been well drawn, and those adjectives provide some insight into what's going on inside the guys. Andre's M.O. was barely contained rage that first erupted into violence in this episode, and then dissolved into something much sadder. As he's reminded his brothers more than once, he was the only one old enough to understand what was going on with their mother, and chose a long, lonely road to acquire the skills needed to build the empire, knowing all the while that his father considered him an outside both for his lack of musical talent and his choice of wife. He looked so tired and defeated--I hope he got more help than just the "music therapy." As for the other two guys, Jamal has done a lot of brave things lately (including stare unflinching down the barrels of guns, TWICE) but he's gone from singing in coffee houses to stardom in a very short time, so I wouldn't blame him for being scared. As for Hakeem, we've only seen flashes of anger when Cookie reappeared, but I wonder how he'll deal in the long run with being his father's teen idol/protege/puppet. Andre and Rhonda started out like Lord and Lady Macbeth with a dash of Profitt thrown in. The revelation that Rhonda comes from a poor family is interesting, as she's never given off the high society/ice queen vibe that Anika did, and consequently seemed a bit cheap for someone like Andre. But if they bonded over feeling like outsiders and family rejects, and if she's stuck by Andre through bouts of illness, then there could be a lot more at play there.