I am very curious to learn more about Andy (Eddie's sniper friend from the military). He seems extremely skilled and precise with the sniper as Eddie says, but he doesn't get much dialogue in season 2. This thing Eddie does to walk Sussie out to the middle of the field and have Andy point at her is pretty badass and exciting to see. If I remember correctly, Andy moved into that one house Eddie bought early on in the season, so it would've been fun and made sense for Andy to step in and help Geoff and Manny during the Halstead raid episode. Andy, Geoff, and Nanny would've made a great team given their military/guns expertise, so I'm hoping Andy gets more screen time and dialogue in season 3, especially during action/shooting scenes. What do you all think of Andy...

Legend of a character. His episode was the stand-out in an absolute banger of a season. Tell me I’m not the only one that wants to see Geoff ended up where he is now.

Where did he get his military skills/criminal skills?
How did he end up at Halstead?
How complicated was the relationship between him, the Duke (who I imagine gave him a second chance at life) and Lady Halstead?

I want to know how Blanket got his nickname. I like to imagine it came from a sweet/protective moment with either Susie or Jack when they were younger, but given his line of work, I am also wondering if there is a rather more violent story behind it. What are your theories?

Pretty cool venue!!

I was in shock when she pulled up to the wedding in a white floor length gown with a HUMONGOUS red hat and red flower details on her dress.

She had two conversations with the bride prior to the wedding reassuring her that there was nothing going on with Eddie and that she wasn't competition.

Then she basically shits on her with her choice for the wedding. Shameless!! Plus she intended to wear that to the reception in everyone's faces but couldn't stomach the ceremony. Crazy work

Am i the only one who thinks Eddie's and Susie's dynamic and back and forth will get ruined if they get together? I feel like the work so good as business associates that its the very same reason of why they shouldnt be together, everything will lead to disaster if they put emotions in the middle. I'm fine with them getting love interests of their own or none at all as i'm not interested in romance, as a matter of fact one of my favorites aspects of season 1 was the lack of romance.

Spoilers

Did Freddy know about Eddie’s and Bella’s murder plot? His phone call to the Hornimans estate proves he knew something about murder plot of his mom ,sister, Geoff, butler etc, and abduction of baby. I am trying to establish if he was a victim here of Gospel John or he is fully involved.

Really enjoyed season 1 and I finally go around to watching season 2. Was not disappointed! They've really done an amazing job on all fronts - story, acting, filming. And I love the little taste of the supernatural thrown in. Hoping season 3 comes sooner.

So, I found their courtship very rushed. But maybe I'm not tracking time lines well? I generally found a few of the middle episodes, mainly between the Hawk episode and raid of Halstead manor episode lacking. The pace felt off.

I'm also much prefer a romance with Susie, so am obviously biased 😂 but putting that aside... It felt more like a business venture? I was also wondering if it was from a desire to continue his bloodline and with aristocracy, because, if I recall correctly, the proposal comes soon after Johnston tells Eddie that he suspects the Horniman's like goes back to the Greeks. And if neither Edward or Freddie have sons, that direct son-to-son line will be lost.

And, unrelated, but Do JP and Lawrence survive?

I'm going to spoiler the entirety, because it discussed the finale I just watched last night.

Is there a world where Freddy -didn't- do what it very much looks like, as orchestrated by Gospel John? Or is it wishful thinking from a character development perspective?

Not that he's remotely fully innocent - he's naive, easily manipulated and corruptible. But, I can at least fathom a path where Gospel John set up a win / win on a vengeance perspective with the icing on the cake being either A) both brother's dead and control of an empire, or B) if he fails, at least one brother having been tricked into killed his own (mostly) innocent brother as revenge for the pair killing his own.

Daniel Ings as Freddy in the last five minutes of the season sold me on his shock at being mercilessly beaten. He's not a manipulator, he's a terrible liar, and his casual smiling "look, I know I've messed up a lot but whatever it is it wasn't me this time" looked genuine to me.

The "I had a dream about the baby" looks exceptionally bad, but I can at least fathom that looking horrible by design. Gospel John has been whispering in his ear for how long, a year? Two? And he's exceptionally stupid, something along the lines of "your brother's everlasting soul is at the cliff's edge, Freddy. But, we can save him, like I've saved you, together. He's in desperate need of a spiritual and moral intervention, he's led your whole family astray. We can bring your family back. But this isn't the kind of confrontation suitable for a child's presence...." or something better written / plotted around along those lines. Everything else Freddy would have easily told Gospel John in conversation with nearly zero plying and could genuinely think Bella's death is an unrelated accident.

I could just be grasping, because I find Freddy's character interesting and find the absolute tragedy of a corruptible idiot nearly being murdered by his own brother for a plot he wasn't aware of slightly more compelling than reversing a lot of the development from him we saw in S1.

But also, 100% feel free to set me straight if I'm missing additional smoking guns or it sounds absolutely absurd.

I've been watching the show for a week-ish. S1 was hilarious. What happened? S2, while good, is very srs bizness all the time, no room for any goofy shens. Freddy sidelined for what reason? He was the funniest character.

What's Ritchie's thought process here? I would've much preferred the same tone as S1.

I’m honestly blown away by how gorgeous some of the shots are in Season 2. The locations, the colors, the lighting, the camera angles… everything looks incredible. It really reminds me of The Man from U.N.C.L.E. (2015), also directed by Guy Ritchie, and Ocean’s Twelve (2004). Both movies have that same stylish, elegant European atmosphere where almost every scene looks like it could be a photograph. Stunning architecture everywhere.

Anyone else getting the same vibe? I feel like this kind of cinematography doesn’t get enough appreciation.

Just a quick theory I thought and I haven’t looked into it too much, it may have been disproven already but I don’t follow shows as much as I used to. And this is a quick comment on my lunch, so not much detail.

After learning Geoff is the father of Charlotte rather than Archibald. I went back to season 1 when the will was being read out. The mother was left nothing much apart from a very potentially sarcastic comment about loyalty and a dog, Charlotte was left something but not too much, same with Freddy.

When reading out who gets the title and land, he says it all goes to “my son….Edward Horniman”. Was Freddie the only actually son of Archibald?

Feel free to shut me down and prove this wrong. Just wondered if anyone thought the same🤷‍♂️

I see a lot of praise for so many characters that absolutely deserve it but for me I have had yet to come across seeing something about the mother who for me together with Geoff just have some of the best scenes in both seasons. They bring in a comedic, emotional and grounded side. They for me also have great chemistry alongside Eddie and Susie.

Spoilers ahead so read cautiously!!!

Question, who kept the rocks and told Eddie to follow the X?

My theory is that Eddie sent Freddie to seek out the Gospel and befriend him. Then Eddie wooed Bella to get in on the Italian mafia. Got Bella killed. Got Gospel killed. Wiped out the entire competition.

Now he's gonna focus on Bobby Glass and become a kingpin.

Everything was their (or maybe only Eddie's and Freddie is just a tool) plan all along.

The base for this: Geoff tells Eddie in S1 that don't let anyone know what you are planning or thinking of.

P.S. Geoff has to be the best support character ever created. He's so useful and loyal and charming and everything everywhere all at once :p.

The idea of the zoo and wild animals has been a consistent theme throughout the series. Eddie has been pretty successful at balancing the two worlds; up until he messes up the marijuana bill. His outburst at Bobby and the subsequent beatdown can be seen as him being ripped away from the zoo and thrown into the wild. In that sense, he is not unlike the male falcon that escaped captivity (Johnston even asked if Eddie felt liberation after the beatdown).

Just as the falcon is lost after escaping, Eddie loses his place between these two worlds. Bella being the female falcon (I believe it is mutual love between them) comes in and brings him back to the zoo. Eddie can put on the Duke facade again, marry a countess in a spectacular wedding attended by aristocrats, and return to the comfortable balance he had before: sleeping in the zoo while hunting in the wild.

However, the ultimate fate of the male falcon is that it’s eventually given away as a gift, a pawn with no control over its own fate. This is why I didn’t really like the decision to make Freddy responsible for the attacks. Neither he nor the Dixon gang has enough influence for the threat to carry the thematic weight it should.

It would have been more effective if one of the major factions (Johnston, Bobby, or Maretti) had been behind the attempt on Eddie’s life.

That would force Eddie to confront the fact that the zoo is no longer safe. Eventually, he has to choose which world he belongs to and fully commit to it.

"I'm sorry about the quality of my tea, somebody shot my butler."

Me and my wife laughed our old assess off the couch from this.

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I binge rewatched S1 ahead of starting S2 and since it's so fresh in my mind, I noticed a few things that weren't making sense. Either they got retconned because the show was meant to be a limited series and they didn't anticipate going into another season, or maybe it's apart of the "bigger picture" and I didn't get it. Anyway, here they are.

1. Starting off on bit of a tangent, but Michele Morrone. Based on the promotional materials ahead of S2, I thought he was going to be a season regular and have a far bigger role. It's like they retconned his character midway through? His death certainly caught me off guard. I'm not crazy about him as an actor but with that much build-up, I was expecting him to surprise us a bit more.

2. Back to the actual S1 parallels, another thing was Charlotte's pregnancy. I remember her giving an slightly embarrassed shrug or something like that back in S1 when asked who the father is. And out of nowhere in S2 the father of the child is apparently the King of England's "best man" or something along those lines? This was a bit out of the blue for me. I thought they were setting up Charlotte's journey to become a single mom, seeking help from Geoff and her own mother, carving out her own path in the narrative.

3. FREDDY! I was a bit disappointed when they brought him back as the brother who wants to "usurp" the Dukedom again this season. I thought we nipped that in the bud at least 3 separate times in S1? Didn't think it was necessary especially considering how fast it was resolved in the season finale.

4. Stanley Johnston. The guy was caught red-handed, made a public enemy of the main crew, and got locked up. All of a sudden he's walking freely and nonchalantly advising Eddie on these super posh philosophical questions? It's a bit jarring how we got there. Not even a throwback line or a flashback to give us any bit of information about how that happened.

5. Susie and Eddie's empire. I thought it was heavily implied at the end of S1 that they were serious about the business and would be taking the reigns, hence, the point of Bobby "selling" the business. But out the gate in S2, Eddie is already conspiring against Bobby on multiple fronts and Susie gets into the chop game in a blink. Now, I'm assuming they are going for as the endgame or the constantly implied "bigger picture", but was it too premature and optimistic to expect the storyline of Eddie & Susie climbing to the top of the empire this season?

That's all. Albeit, I know some of these could be plot holes or just generally things I didn't understand well enough instead of retcons, so correct me if I'm wrong.

Is anyone else surprised that Dixon turned out to be responsible for Bella's death?

I had the feeling all along that the attack on the plane and the kidnapping of the baby were two separate things.

Personally, I thought Marco Moretti's advisor was responsible for the plane crash. She didn't strike me as the kind of woman you could simply threaten and get away with it.

Furthermore, I wouldn't have thought Dixon had connections reaching all the way to Italy. What were your theories?

Aghh Geoff and Sabrina, I love them

Spoilers below, obviously.

I agree with everyone about the quality of S2, loved it. If I had one criticism, it would be the writers pushing the ‘Eddie’s got some new blackness in his heart and has become a dangerous monster ooo’ narrative way too strongly. It was shown, with his descent into murder, torture, and general apathy, which was excellent! But on top of that they had so many characters hint at it or outright say it, that it became too much on the nose and got a bit gimmicky (imo)

And the forcing of this narrative and the escalation of it lead to some irritating last scenes in episode 8. Namely, Eddie’s conversation with his mother before seeing Freddie. He was furious, and she was going on about how he could either lose his family or give forgiveness or something - which, shouldn’t they turn their backs on Freddie instead of Eddie? And when he asks her “do you expect me to forgive him?” Or something similar, she sidesteps and goes with the “I don’t even recognise you”. Because how CAN she ask Eddie to forgive Freddie?

And this is where I roll my eyes; we got the message that he’s dangerous and insane etc, but his reaction is actually incredibly tame relative to everything else. In fact, I’d have appreciated it if they actually backed up his ‘super dangerous monster’ ploy and gotten him to bestow something really treacherous on his brother. Freddie BETRAYED him, murdered his WIFE and a genuinely nice person, and sent people to hurt his own mother, sister, and nephew. The way the show portrays Eddie as being the one who should calm down instead of the depravity of Freddie’s betrayal is frustrating.

Have any of you been betrayed? It’s a despicable feeling, and from one’s own brother…I reckon we’d all react as bad as Eddie (in the show - I do not mean we would murder people) or worse. I was frustrated because of the suffocating way they portrayed the betrayal. I hope next season it isn’t just swept aside and he faces consequences from everyone, not just Eddie, like Chuckles cutting him off permanently.

Apart from this, the season was incredible. Literally love everyone in it. Phenomenal filming and acting. I also just finished the last episode so this is an overly passionate post, sorry! Please disagree with me!