War between the Harrigans and Stevensons explodes

MobLand episode 3, “Plan B,” kicks off with a literal bang, as an explosion rips through Kevin Harrigan’s (Paddy Considine) home, showering his lovely suburban street in fiery debris. Cut to Harry (Tom Hardy), who’s abruptly awakened, not by the bomb, but an urgent call from Kev: “Richie’s coming for all of us.” 

The Stevenson crime boss (Geoff Bell) is growing impatient waiting for Harry to find his missing son Tommy, forcing the Harrigans into a defensive position. While Conrad (Pierce Brosnan) and his clan circle the wagons at the mansion, Harry wakes Jan (Joanne Froggatt) and Gina (Teddie Allen) so he can move them to a safe spot.

Outside, Richie’s goons are already waiting with guns drawn. Harry puts Conrad on speakerphone, and they make the thugs an offer they can’t refuse. Upon narrowly escaping that sticky situation, Harry hides his family on a houseboat of an “old mate” who owes him a lot of money. 

Before he leaves, Jan reminds him he has a meeting later that day with a woman named Maria. Harry then calls Kevin back and tells him to go to “the yard” with Eddie (Anson Boon). On the road, he’s followed by Detective Fisk (Luke Mably), who wants Harry to know he’s being tailed.

In the midst of all the chaos, we’re treated to a bit of Maeve (Helen Mirren) and Conrad’s on-brand banter. The playful back-and-forth reveals that Maeve is no fan of stepdaughter Seraphina (Mandeep Dhillon), who we hilariously learn was born of an indiscretion between Conrad and a lap dancer. 

Meanwhile, Bella (Lara Pulver) — whose house has just been blown up — has arranged that meeting between her client Antoine and her estranged father. For the right price, her dad agrees to put Antoine in a room with the Prime Minister. After the encounter, we learn Bella was secretly recording her dad’s corruption. She wants the video evidence for herself, but Antoine insists on keeping it for “insurance.”  

At “the yard” — an actual shipping yard where Harry conducts business — it’s all hands on deck following the bombing. When Kevin and Eddie arrive, Harry invites them into a plastic-lined shipping container. Inside, tied to a chair and beaten to a pulp, is the club manager who chopped Tommy into tiny pieces. 

Eddie immediately denies knowing the man, but Harry already has the truth; after Eddie met Tommy by the Thames in the first episode, he texted the manager for a lift back to the club. The man left them alone, but returned later to find Tommy stabbed to death and Eddie in the wind. Eddie offered the manager £10,000 to “take care” of the mess. 

Upon hearing the truth, Kevin drags his son out of the container, gives him an earful of expletives, and zaps him with a taser baton. “Congrats, you’ve started a war!” he screams. Kev then calls Conrad, assuming he’ll read Eddie the riot act. But Maeve’s in the background, insisting her husband should be proud. To Kevin’s shock, Conrad tells him they’ll talk about it later, before hanging up. 

Maeve and Conrad then meet in their sauna, where they playfully plot the family’s next move against the Stevensons. They decide the only way out of the situation is to take out Richie and his inner circle. Maeve agrees, but she also wants to eliminate his wife, Vron, just to inflict as much suffering as possible on Richie. Conrad doesn’t love the idea and wants to put it on the back burner. They agree to first give their faithful fixer a go at sorting things out.

And that’s exactly what Harry’s doing. He doesn’t share details, but he tells Kevin he has an idea that could buy them some time before Richie rains down hell on the family for the death of his son. But before mitigating the mob war, Harry needs to meet with Maria, the woman Jan reminded him about connecting with earlier. 

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Maria is Harry’s cleaning lady. She refers to him as “Mr. Harry.” She needs his help getting her ailing mother into a fancy nursing home, so he meets with the care facility’s director. While he’s being told the home has a lengthy waiting list and can’t take Maria’s mom, he kindly interrupts to offer help with a plumbing issue they’re currently having. He knows a “guy” who owes him a favor and will fix it for free.

As Harry’s leaving — assuring Maria the home will call with an opening for her mom — he spots a man visiting one of the residents. Harry freezes and flashes back to his time in prison as a teenager. It appears the man he recognizes was a prison guard who beat Harry and another young man. Maria breaks Harry from his daze, and the two leave. While saying goodbye, she gives him a peck on the cheek, while Fisk snaps photos of them from afar. 

Harry heads back to the yard, where a group of Kevin’s Czechoslovakian hired heavies are preparing for war. Noting that his wife Bella’s been acting a bit strange, Kev asks Harry if he knows what she’s up to. But while Bella has tried to drag Harry into the deal between Antoine and her dad, he denies knowing anything. 

The two then return to the shipping container, where the terrified, bloodied manager is still bound to a chair. They begin to enact Harry’s plan, which involves a bit of good-cop-bad-cop manipulation. They ultimately convince him to take full responsibility for Tommy’s murder in exchange for letting his family live. 

Back at the Harrigan home, Eddie, Seraphina, and Brendan (Daniel Betts) trade barbs. But Maeve interrupts the bickering with a drink and a song to celebrate her beloved grandson executing a Stevenson. Maeve and Seraphina then go at it a bit before Conrad comes to the latter’s rescue. They go for a walk, and he tells her how much he appreciates her and what she contributes to the family, even if Maeve — “hard woman” that she is — does not share the sentiment. 

Seraphina also tells her dad that Brendan had approached her with a proposition. Conrad, who previously referred to his screw-up son as a “gobshite,” tells her to hear him out, get the details, but don’t give him a dime. 

With Harry’s patsy as prepared as he’s gonna be to cop to Tommy’s slaughter to his grieving father’s face, the plan is put in motion. Harry calls Richie to break the bad news of his son’s demise, then heads to Moody’s boxing gym — their neutral turf — to meet him.

Harry and Kev also swap vehicles to throw off the police surveillance, leading Fisk to follow the wrong ride on a wild goose chase. But while the detective loses Harry, he scores a win in the form of a call from dispatch: An anonymous tip has come in notifying the authorities of Archie’s location.

At Moody’s, the club manager — still bound to a chair — faces Richie, who’s sitting on the crate containing his son’s butchered remains. Harry watches as Stevenson asks the man about his family and if they’re being protected by the Harrigans. The manager lies through his blood-tinged tears and says he’s not covering for Eddie or his family.

Richie then fires two non-lethal shots into him and tells Harry to leave. He wants to question his son’s supposed killer “very thoroughly.” If there are any cracks in his story, he’ll be in touch with Harry soon. With nothing more to be done — except praying Richie buys the ruse — Harry calls Kevin to update him on the situation. 

He cuts the call short, though, telling Kev he has to meet “someone.” That someone turns out to be Kev’s wife, Bella, who has summoned Harry once again about the shady deal with her shady dad. She tells him Antoine plans to use the damning video footage of her father to blackmail her — if she doesn’t pay up, he’ll rat her out to her dad. Harry says he’ll take care of Antoine, to which she responds by asking Harry for a kiss. The fixer seems to contemplate the request but rebuffs Bella and tells her to call her husband. 

Before the episode goes dark, we catch up with Fisk. The detective is at a cemetery, where the police are exhuming a casket. As they pry it open, it’s revealed that the corpse of Conrad’s oldest friend is hidden inside, awkwardly squished against the coffin’s rightful occupant. “Hello, Archie,” Fisk says slyly.