Back to the Mafia style corruption of the Prohibition era Atlantic City although those involved were of Irish and Jewish descent as well as Italian,
I have been following the fortunes of Nucky Thompson as his brother-, the police chief- Eli Thompson gangs up against him with his former ward Jimmy with his father the former city boss The Commodore and Jimmy’s mother who the Commodore took as arranged by Nucky when she was still a school girl. There is an opportunity for reconciliation when their father dies but this only seems to fuel Eli’s resentment.
Over the next five episodes Nucky has to confront attacks on various fronts. I explained in the last report that he was saved by his partner who removed the books from their hiding place before the Feds went through everything in search of evidence to prove election fraud.
Nucky combats this by calling on favours of those who has helped into White House especially the Attorney General. They cook up a way to bypass the local justice system by arguing that because Nucky imported whores across the state line to help get votes this is a federal crime and opens the way for the Attorney General to find technicalities to have the charges dropped. This at least is the plan which for a time seems to work well. However there are other pressures exerted with the consequence that a new Federal inquisitor arrives uncorrupted and with missionary zeal.
Meanwhile Jimmy has been doing other deals on his own behalf as well as the Commodore with the consequence of closing the coastal waters which Nucky has used to bring in the booze from Europe. This all leads his woman Margaret to question if all the effort and risk is worth it and Nucky appears to be in agreement when first he resigns his post as City Treasurer and then suggests to Margaret that her children refer to him as father, However knowing Nucky this is no more than playing the long game.
Things appear to move back in Nucky’s direction when his previous mistress calls to see him. She has had a difficult pregnancy effectively locked up by the child’s father the corrupted evangelical and puritanical chief Prohibition agent Van Alden. Eventually a child is produced which Van Alden wants to bring up with his legal wife although understandably she is horrified at this goings on. Van Alden is himself under suspicion from his underlings who query what is happened to the cash which they are taking from raids. One underling is badly burned when he investigates Chalky White enterprise where Jimmy has planted a bomb. The underling makes comments about knowing what Van Alden is up to but is too ill to be understood.
When Van Alden throws out the child’s mother, Lucy, she turns to Nucky for assistance and he sees this as the way to blackmail Van Alden to learn what the Fed agents who have moved into Van Alden’s office and taken his desk are up to. Van Alden is incensed and his approach is to admit his infidelity and then provide the chief investigator with all his files on Nucky. He employs a live in Nanny to look after the child with the hint that he about to embark on another adulterous relationship.
I remain confused about the various business relationships. In episode 4 What does The Bee Do Nucky who Jimmy has stopped the bringing in booze via the sea by getting customs patrols on his side has done a deal with Arnold Rothstein of the New York Jewish Mafia to do a deal with Waxey Gordon to bring in booze from Philadelphia. These shipments involve supervision by Lucky Luciano and Meyer Lansky who are full of resentment at being Gofers, Chalky White is under pressure from his own folks for not getting revenge for the Klu Klux Klan killings but Nucky refuses to help and tells him to enjoy life and bide his time. As the eighth episode comes to an end and Nucky plots his return to power he tell Chalky to bring his followers out on strike to paralyse the city now under the control of Jimmy and Eli. It is in this episode that Jimmy’s mother confronts the Commodore with his treatment of her when still a school girl and she now puts her contacts fully behind Jimmy’s bid for power sidelining the Commodore although using his home as their base.
Margaret is having her own troubles as she decides to visit her brother and sisters who are New York. As she remains resentful over the lack of support given to her by her brother when she became pregnant he is suspicious of her new wealth and is not convinced by her tale of losing the child, marrying and becoming a widow with two children. Her youngest sister has become insightful and prophetic and appears to forecasting trouble ahead. Margaret’s offer of financial help and ongoing contact is rejected and she returns to Atlantic City in distress. The episode end with her daughter engulfed with fever. Before this her love hate interaction with the Irishman Nucky has taken on the recommendation of his Irish Republican contact had developed. Margaret has been critical of Owen Sleater’s relationship with one of her housemaids. Margate now has a sexual fling with the man. He recognises a traitor from the old days who he kills. This comes to attention of Nucky who uses this knowledge to ask for communication with the Irish republican leaders as a means of regaining his power and authority.
Jimmy continues to lead two lives as a businessman with his wife and children who has taken in his First World War comrade with half his face blown off and who he uses as a killer, and his ambition egged on by his mother to take over from Nucky and the Commodore as the ruler of Atlantic City. Jimmy is however reticent about killing Nucky but under pressure from Eli arrange for Al Capone to bring in a hitman from Chicago. The hitman fails and only injuring Nucky in the hand and is himself killed.
The main focus of Episode Five Gimcrack and Bunkum is a Memorial Day to mark the loss of lives in the First World War with Nucky creating a Memorial and calling on Jimmy to make a speech. Jimmy who is unprepared does better than expected with a powerful speech about those who did not come back. His friend Richard is also affected by the event but in a different way. He packs a lunch and goes into the woods with a riffle with the intention of enjoying the freedom and space, looking at the sky before putting the gun to mouth. He is stopped by a dog that runs off with his face mark until he runs into two woodlanders and spends the day drinking and philosophising with one of the men appearing to sense what Richard was up to. Renewed Richard returns but has still not reconciled his natural self with being a hired killer.
Previously it is Jimmy’s wife the talented artist who has drawn Richard without her mask. She is on the beach one day when a female visitor draws the wrath of the decent patrol which given that the City’s who economic function is based on tourists who come for the alcohol, gambling and sex is a hoot, especially when the woman slaps on an instant fine for wearing an above the knee costume. The visitor is a writer where it is not clear why she has chosen Atlantic City as a place to live. She holds bohemian parties reminding Angela of her life with the photographer and his wife where she developed a sexual relationship with both and had planned to run off to Paris with her son and the woman but who had left sitting on a bench while going off with her husband. Angela overhears Jimmy plotting to kill Nucky and realises the full extent of his business dealings and commences a relationship with the authoress Jimmy is also enjoying himself as the new city boss. Episode 6 is the Age of Reason with events already covered and as those of episode 7.
I have been following the fortunes of Nucky Thompson as his brother-, the police chief- Eli Thompson gangs up against him with his former ward Jimmy with his father the former city boss The Commodore and Jimmy’s mother who the Commodore took as arranged by Nucky when she was still a school girl. There is an opportunity for reconciliation when their father dies but this only seems to fuel Eli’s resentment.
Over the next five episodes Nucky has to confront attacks on various fronts. I explained in the last report that he was saved by his partner who removed the books from their hiding place before the Feds went through everything in search of evidence to prove election fraud.
Nucky combats this by calling on favours of those who has helped into White House especially the Attorney General. They cook up a way to bypass the local justice system by arguing that because Nucky imported whores across the state line to help get votes this is a federal crime and opens the way for the Attorney General to find technicalities to have the charges dropped. This at least is the plan which for a time seems to work well. However there are other pressures exerted with the consequence that a new Federal inquisitor arrives uncorrupted and with missionary zeal.
Meanwhile Jimmy has been doing other deals on his own behalf as well as the Commodore with the consequence of closing the coastal waters which Nucky has used to bring in the booze from Europe. This all leads his woman Margaret to question if all the effort and risk is worth it and Nucky appears to be in agreement when first he resigns his post as City Treasurer and then suggests to Margaret that her children refer to him as father, However knowing Nucky this is no more than playing the long game.
Things appear to move back in Nucky’s direction when his previous mistress calls to see him. She has had a difficult pregnancy effectively locked up by the child’s father the corrupted evangelical and puritanical chief Prohibition agent Van Alden. Eventually a child is produced which Van Alden wants to bring up with his legal wife although understandably she is horrified at this goings on. Van Alden is himself under suspicion from his underlings who query what is happened to the cash which they are taking from raids. One underling is badly burned when he investigates Chalky White enterprise where Jimmy has planted a bomb. The underling makes comments about knowing what Van Alden is up to but is too ill to be understood.
When Van Alden throws out the child’s mother, Lucy, she turns to Nucky for assistance and he sees this as the way to blackmail Van Alden to learn what the Fed agents who have moved into Van Alden’s office and taken his desk are up to. Van Alden is incensed and his approach is to admit his infidelity and then provide the chief investigator with all his files on Nucky. He employs a live in Nanny to look after the child with the hint that he about to embark on another adulterous relationship.
I remain confused about the various business relationships. In episode 4 What does The Bee Do Nucky who Jimmy has stopped the bringing in booze via the sea by getting customs patrols on his side has done a deal with Arnold Rothstein of the New York Jewish Mafia to do a deal with Waxey Gordon to bring in booze from Philadelphia. These shipments involve supervision by Lucky Luciano and Meyer Lansky who are full of resentment at being Gofers, Chalky White is under pressure from his own folks for not getting revenge for the Klu Klux Klan killings but Nucky refuses to help and tells him to enjoy life and bide his time. As the eighth episode comes to an end and Nucky plots his return to power he tell Chalky to bring his followers out on strike to paralyse the city now under the control of Jimmy and Eli. It is in this episode that Jimmy’s mother confronts the Commodore with his treatment of her when still a school girl and she now puts her contacts fully behind Jimmy’s bid for power sidelining the Commodore although using his home as their base.
Margaret is having her own troubles as she decides to visit her brother and sisters who are New York. As she remains resentful over the lack of support given to her by her brother when she became pregnant he is suspicious of her new wealth and is not convinced by her tale of losing the child, marrying and becoming a widow with two children. Her youngest sister has become insightful and prophetic and appears to forecasting trouble ahead. Margaret’s offer of financial help and ongoing contact is rejected and she returns to Atlantic City in distress. The episode end with her daughter engulfed with fever. Before this her love hate interaction with the Irishman Nucky has taken on the recommendation of his Irish Republican contact had developed. Margaret has been critical of Owen Sleater’s relationship with one of her housemaids. Margate now has a sexual fling with the man. He recognises a traitor from the old days who he kills. This comes to attention of Nucky who uses this knowledge to ask for communication with the Irish republican leaders as a means of regaining his power and authority.
Jimmy continues to lead two lives as a businessman with his wife and children who has taken in his First World War comrade with half his face blown off and who he uses as a killer, and his ambition egged on by his mother to take over from Nucky and the Commodore as the ruler of Atlantic City. Jimmy is however reticent about killing Nucky but under pressure from Eli arrange for Al Capone to bring in a hitman from Chicago. The hitman fails and only injuring Nucky in the hand and is himself killed.
The main focus of Episode Five Gimcrack and Bunkum is a Memorial Day to mark the loss of lives in the First World War with Nucky creating a Memorial and calling on Jimmy to make a speech. Jimmy who is unprepared does better than expected with a powerful speech about those who did not come back. His friend Richard is also affected by the event but in a different way. He packs a lunch and goes into the woods with a riffle with the intention of enjoying the freedom and space, looking at the sky before putting the gun to mouth. He is stopped by a dog that runs off with his face mark until he runs into two woodlanders and spends the day drinking and philosophising with one of the men appearing to sense what Richard was up to. Renewed Richard returns but has still not reconciled his natural self with being a hired killer.
Previously it is Jimmy’s wife the talented artist who has drawn Richard without her mask. She is on the beach one day when a female visitor draws the wrath of the decent patrol which given that the City’s who economic function is based on tourists who come for the alcohol, gambling and sex is a hoot, especially when the woman slaps on an instant fine for wearing an above the knee costume. The visitor is a writer where it is not clear why she has chosen Atlantic City as a place to live. She holds bohemian parties reminding Angela of her life with the photographer and his wife where she developed a sexual relationship with both and had planned to run off to Paris with her son and the woman but who had left sitting on a bench while going off with her husband. Angela overhears Jimmy plotting to kill Nucky and realises the full extent of his business dealings and commences a relationship with the authoress Jimmy is also enjoying himself as the new city boss. Episode 6 is the Age of Reason with events already covered and as those of episode 7.
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