With season three, ‘Industry’s’ stock soared

This review contains minor spoilers for “Industry” season three.

Once you start watching “Industry,” good luck avoiding all-out obsession.

For season three, HBO moved the British-produced drama to its primo weekly Sunday night slot, once inhabited by the likes of “Game of Thrones” and “Succession,” the kinds of shows that received both intense critical acclaim (minus seasons seven and eight, in “Thrones” case) and commercial success.

But up until this season, “Industry” occupied sleeper-hit territory. It had critics’ approval, but as of a year ago, I was hard-pressed to find anyone else who had watched it. In fact, even I was a catch-up viewer, having binged seasons one and two in summer 2023 — a year after season two’s airing.

The show’s creators, Mickey Down and Konrad Kay, had never made a feature film or TV show before “Industry,” and initially, their lack of professional experience showed — in the best way possible. Much in the same way a debut album includes every provocative idea the artist has had in the first part of their life, season one felt experimental. Its two creators had clearly spent hours discussing not the plot they would portray, but rather the cinéma vérité camera placements, the ambient electronic score and the generally drug-addled vibe.

The second outing had a bit more polish around the edges and narrative through-lines that lasted from episode one to episode eight, but it still focused on mid-20s characters trying, and often failing, to prove themselves in a cutthroat financial arena.

It’s a world that “Industry” makes feel real with little difficulty, as Kay and Down worked in banking right out of university before jumping ship to try their luck as filmmakers. The show isn’t autobiographical, but of course it’s helplessly inspired by their experience of working in an old, affluent and culturally immobile institution as young people. The series wrestles with questions of company culture and the degree to which Harper (Myha’la), Yasmin (Marisa Abela) and Rob (Harry Lawtey) adapt to what their bank, Pierpoint, expects of them. One has to assume Kay and Down grappled with those ideas themselves.

In GQ’s great profile of the duo, writer Daniel Riley pontificates that what makes the creators’ journey fascinating is not how two former financiers became HBO showrunners, but rather how “two budding television makers were somehow allowed to become bankers.”

And in season three, viewers are left wondering something similar: why do these people persist with working in this brutal world where even an upwardly mobile salesperson can be made to feel insignificant in the company of aristocracy and real social power? That sobering inquisition drives season three and pushes “Industry” into new territory.

Kay and Down’s debut creative showcase has always had plenty to recommend it, but the core concept of “Industry” as a bildungsroman is where the show shines, even in season three when its characters’ ostensibly have grown into their jobs.

The show’s third outing functions as a reset. Harper finds herself at a new firm fetching coffee and setting meetings for an uninspiring boss. Yasmin now sits next to Eric (Ken Leung) in Harper’s old seat, and needs to print business for the first time in her career. Rob finds himself helping lead a green-energy IPO after experiencing two mentors’ deaths. Even the ever-competent Eric has just made partner at Pierpoint, but exposed himself to a new level of corporate bureaucracy in the process, while also dealing with a divorce.

As each of the show’s main crew have moved into new situations and roles, there’s no longer time for waffling in the way season one occasionally sat in low-stakes situations (even though the show has always made each moment feel impossibly high-stakes).

And waffle, Down and Kay do not. Season three tears through plot at a furious pace, taking the audience through an insidious web of finance, tabloid media and British politics that it becomes starkly clear exist to maintain power’s status quo.

Season three slithers its way into the upper crust of British society, setting the tone in episode one when Henry Muck (Kit Harrington) — the CEO of the green-energy company Lumi — invites Yasmin into the basement of a men’s member-only club where he and his lordly uncles are playing fives. In that moment, the viewer understands that we’ve been introduced to a new level of wealth and influence.

After years playing the deeply earnest Jon Snow, Harrington delights in his newest role as an aristocratic heir cosplaying as an entrepreneur trying to drive real change. The “Thrones” vet displays real comedic and satirical chops and his presence helps unlock the show’s journey into new spaces in a believable manner.

Sarah Goldberg, most recently of “Barry” fame, also joins Harrington as an addition to season three’s main cast, playing Petra Koenig, a new mentor and foil to Harper. On another show, adding a high-profile duo to an already large ensemble might derail the balance of character work, but in the writers’ and the editing rooms, Down and Kay led an impressive balancing act, using the Henry and Petra characters like black truffle on pasta, adding just enough complexity to the equation without overpowering the dish.

Leung dominates the season with his performance as Eric, bringing the character to both the lowest and highest places we’ve seen him in his life dedicated to Pierpoint, often within the same episode. And the elements that have always made the series great — its bang-snap dialogue, delicious camera work, Nathan Micay’s score and bold story choices — continue to provide “Industry” with a high floor for success while still shooting for the stars.

Thankfully for its loyal viewers, “Industry” will return for a fourth season after HBO announced its renewal before the season three finale had even aired. Plus, the network signed Down and Kay to a three-year exclusive overall deal, meaning they might get their mitts on other HBO shows. Now that they’ve directed a couple “Industry” episodes, could we see the pair direct for another series, à la “Girls” creator Lena Dunham shepherding the “Industry” pilot? Don’t count it out.

The creators’ confidence has grown with every season, which will surely continue into their fourth outing, but season three gave fans a leap even the most optimistic watchers might not have expected.