The first thing you’ll notice about “Industry” is that it’s beloved by people who benefited from the 2010s. HBO’s sex, drugs and workplace indulgence could be the next “Succession,” the show talked about the most among elites. It’s scratching a very specific itch for the types of people in media who directly or indirectly shape the swirl of talked about/written about/watched that floats a show out of anonymity. But what is that itch? I find it hard to believe that it’s a desire to think about finance, the context for the show. Or to live in London, its setting. Or to hang out and do ketamine with a certain type of college kid. Or to just watch a trashy young adult sex drama, because there are hundreds of those. No. I think “Industry” is a fantasy for successful millennials who miss the office, a more glamorous and adrenalized version of our 2010s experience coming just at the moment when we’re romanticizing the highs and lows of a supercharged decade in work that was cancelled nine months ago. It’s right there in the title. "Industry" is about industry in the 21st Century and those who love it. That title.
We zoom in, in an unsubtle allusion to “Uncut Gems,” to a montage of the heart-pounding, super-charged moments of working in the hierarchical, bureaucratic corporations we thrived in just before the pandemic. The sound mimics the Cluster-inspired synth version of Hans Zimmer that Daniel Lopatin wrote for that same movie. The message is clear. The office is to us what the gem is to Howard Ratner. And for those of us who ended up, when the pandemic struck, with social or economic capital and relative comfort from which to enjoy it, we want it back. When Harper impresses and is brought under the wing of her intimidating and charismatic boss for speaking up in a dinner with a client, we want the rush of competition and validation back, the stakes our work used to have when you were there in the flesh with your idolized superior. When the whole team goes out for a dinner and several of them end up in the bathroom doing drugs, we want that messy, intimate acceptance back that can only be generated in the day-in-day-out trenches together. When Robert and Yasmin eye fuck in the world’s most sexually charged gym, we want a reason to look good and leave the house back.
That was the 2010s, and the office was the all-consuming source of and reason for excellence. The show takes us on a tour of the 10s. Bicep gets namechecked. Hinge is a plot point. The soundtrack is surely a marketing stunt for Spotify’s Faceless Garbage Chill playlists that dominated public spaces that decade. If “Industry” is the first thing in the culture to benefit from office nostalgia, it won’t be the last. Because this was how so many of us won.
The shorter stuff
Christopher Nolan called HBO Max the "worst streaming service." (THR)
Keith McNally: "I first saw the Balthazar space one early Sunday morning in 1995. It was a run-down leather warehouse called Aadar Leather." (VF)
Tony Hsieh was pushed to get help by his friend Jewel before he died. (Forbes)
Francis Ford Coppola and Al Pacino just changed the ending to Godfather III. Kind of a significant change, too! (NYT)
John Stankey and Jason Kilar took a sledgehammer to Richard Plepler's HBO. (CNBC)
Is there a worse combination of words than Tulum, Burning Man and COVID-19? (The Daily Beast)
This media placement is priceless for Chinatown Market, appearing on Lil Baby in the header image for Spotify's Rap Caviar. (Image)
Cyberpunk 2077's "edgelord marketing" worked despite the bad reviews the blockbuster is getting. (Polygon)
This is a must-read if you do not have the time or strength of will to care about TikTok and influencer culture. (Vox)
Molly Young calls Nick Kroll's "Big Mouth" "the greatest work of puberty-themed art ever created." (NYT)