Industry Season 1, Episode 7 recap: Pre-Crisis Activity

With Reduction in Force Day looming, the graduates do whatever it takes to secure final recommendations from their superiors in Industry Episode 7.

In the penultimate episode of the first season, the grads scramble to do whatever they can to ensure they will get hired on Reduction in Force (or RIF) Day, which is right around the corner. Industry Episode 7 begins with Daria taking over for Eric, now that he’s been ousted. The company is buzzing with theories on what happened to him, but no one knows the real story apart from Harper, Daria and Sara.

Since Daria the new manager and has taken over Eric’s accounts, she wastes zero time instrumenting some changes on the floor. She wants people to focus more on teaming up and providing services from the company, not as individuals. Clement isn’t thrilled with Daria’s way of managing, but as she puts it, he doesn’t have room to talk considering he lost his only client. None of this puts Robert at ease, since without Clement around, he’s not sure he’ll retain a job. And, as expected, Clement is called into a meeting with Daria and the other higher-ups.

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They force him to “retire.” He boxes up his years of work at the company into a few little boxes within just a few minutes. Adding to Robert’s problems is that he takes a meeting with Usman.

With Kaspar gone, their company is going to move in a different direction. It doesn’t matter how much fun he had partying with Robert, they’re moving away from Pierpoint. Now Robert doesn’t even have a client to bring to the table come RIF day. Put simply, Usman doesn’t have faith in a team comprised of “an old man and a kid.”

Meanwhile, Gus is busy combing the field for other jobs as he’s grown tired of the political atmosphere at Pierpoint. He attends an interview at Godman Sachs, in the hopes they’ll be a better fit for him. He doesn’t believe that Pierpoint lets truly talented people rise through the ranks, and he knows that while he’s there, he’s going to be viewed differently by Sara because of his connection to Hari.

As for Harper, now that the entire Eric think is settled, Sara and Daria impress upon her the importance of keeping her real bonus a secret. All of the other grads only received £25k, while she received £50k. It’s in her best interest to keep that information to herself.

In Industry Episode 7, Sebastian & Yasmin host a dinner party that tests their relationship.

Sebastian and Yasmin host a fancy dinner party for most of Yasmin’s co-workers. Seb has a plan to make fancy sushi but it gets out of hand quickly when it becomes obvious he doesn’t really know what he’s doing in the kitchen. Yasmin goes out with her mother last-minute and gets really drunk, so when she returns home, the party and Seb’s mess combines and make her lash out at him. She calls him a deadbeat and humiliates him in the middle of the party.

Elsewhere, Robert tells Harper that her calling him an addict genuinely rattled him. He’s tried to be sober since, although I don’t think that’s going to last. I think seeing Clement getting high on heroin also affected him. The dinner starts out decent until Harper starts hearing the other pompous dudes at the table talk about how they dispersed Hari’s bonus. She interjects to tell everyone she made £50k.

Robert is also affected by the money talk since he’s pretty confident he’ll be out of a job soon. That didn’t stop him from blowing through his bonus on a motorbike though. At least he somewhat regrets it later. But things get awkward when he’s hanging out with Harper, Yasmin and Seb doing cocaine and he loses a £50 bill. To the others, it might not be a big deal, but since Robert knows what it’s like to have nothing and is coming close to that point again, he gets angry quick at the idea their other friend Sasha might have taken it.

Luckily, Seb finds it. But Yasmin implies that he stole it, since he doesn’t have money on his own and recently lost his job. Robert and Harper clear the room, leaving Yasmin and Seb a chance to chat. She tells him that she has an urge to humiliate him and she’s not sure why — but it’s not good. She thinks it would be a good idea for him to stay somewhere else that night.

Harper and Robert continue flirting and hanging out, stumbling into a room upstairs where they start hooking up. Yasmin interrupts and suggests they have a threesome. That’s like one of the few sexual situations this show hasn’t conquered yet so I wasn’t too surprised! Harper tries but then realizes she’s not into it. Yasmin excuses herself and Robert tries to pick up where he left off with Harper, but the mood is ruined.

Gus makes a brief appearance at the party and meets a cute guy there, who he takes home. At work the next day, he tells Robert he had a Robert-style weekend and they both have a good laugh about that. At the end of the episode, Gus actually looks relaxed for once as he shoots a dirty text to the new guy he’s seeing — someone who isn’t tied up in another relationship like Theo.

In the aftermath of Harper’s confession at the party, it gets back to Daria that she blabbed about her bonus amount. Daria tells her that now she’ll have to repay £25,000. Later, Daria and Harper go to meet with Nicole. It’s the first time Harper has seen her since she made a drunken fool of herself at the holiday party.

She confronts Nicole to try and see if she’ll vouch for her come RIF day. It gets awkward fast as Nicole tells her she doesn’t really “know” Harper. After, Nicole curtly tells Daria they won’t be trading with Pierpoint anymore. Daria gets pissed at Harper because she won’t tell her what happened in the bathroom. “I’m sick of your lies Harper. It’s a pattern, isn’t it? And a pattern makes a person.”

Yasmin meets with her manager, Hilary, and he tells her that they discovered messages between herself and Maxim. In them, they realized the depth of deprivation she has been exposed to by Kenny. But instead of being supportive of Yasmin coming forward, Hilary strongly implies that she should keep quiet and brush it under the rug — be a “team player” so to speak. If she does decide to make a formal complaint against Kenny, Hilary insinuates that her career will be over, because this will follow her around.

In the final moments of Industry Episode 7, Harper visits a local casino and starts playing slots. Is she gambling away the £25k so she doesn’t have to pay it back?

What did you think of Industry Episode 7? Let us know your thoughts and opinions in the comments below!

Industry Season 1 is now streaming on HBO Max and through other HBO-partnered services. Episodes will also continue to air linearly Monday nights at 10:00 p.m. ET/PT on HBO.