He should of played that commercial as Harrow, that would of been so nice.

Im with you and Shaft.

What I love about BE empire is thats its more of a glimpse into a group of peoples lives that interlope in various ways. Nothing is forced, conflict arises in its own due time.

Its just great television....The interactions between Al and his son and his growth as a dad and a badguy (he totally had rapist look in his eyes when Torrio was acting all complacent).

I dunno, this is easily my second favorite show on TV right now with BB being #1.

Two storylines in the most recent episode exemplify both what I like and dislike about this show:

-So there's going to be a conversation between Nucky and Mellon. Means gives Nucky two pieces of information: that Mellon thinks Daugherty is a scumbag, and that he owns a distillery that isn't being used. Then Means says "the rest will be a tribute to your resourcefulness." Cut to this goofy club where Mellon is reading a book. Nucky has proven to be a cagey dude. Mellon is a master of the universe, but still human, someone with odd habits and emotions, as well as brains. It had the potential to be a interesting showdown. Instead, Nucky was polite and dropped the two pieces of information he had. Mellon listened and did the standard thing of throwing him out. That's all that happened. What could have been a masterpiece ended up being Paint By Numbers.

-On the other hand, Billy had that really good scene where she is ad libbing for the director, and then a tight, effective, up-and-down scene with Nucky, and finally the warm resolution in the bathroom to set up the KO. Three well-done small scenes to wind Nucky's conflicted gangster mind up even tighter, increase his thirst for vengeance, and move the overall storyline forward.

It's a show that does the solid, necessary stuff quite well, but rarely takes big risks.

I imagine it thinks the number of monologues and extended scenes without dialogue are risks. It's funny that BE would've likely been considered incredibly ambitious and daunting for a viewer 10 years ago.

so the pre-natal care storyline is obv leading too ...

Exactly how would you have made it any better? I thought it went down perfectly

Mellon clearly has no respect for people like Nucky. This is made clear from the beginning of the exchange and further confirmed at the end. So to begin with, Nucky is fortunate that Mellon was even willing to hear him out. Nucky has no power to attack Mellon in the same fashion that he did Daugherty previously, because he really has no leverage; as it stands he's about to be indicted. I'll further explain why I think his two pieces of information aren't that valuable to Mellon:

Again referring to a previous episode, I thought Mellon's disposition was very well summed up by his discourse in the government questioning. The board asked him "are we dealing with widespread corruption or incompetence?" To which Mellon replies "it is my experience that humanity leaves ample room for both."

To me this says that Mellon doesn't really care about specifically getting rid of Daugherty. Sure it would please him, but he is wise enough to realize that simply removing one corrupt agent in the government is not really going to change anything; he will simply be replaced by someone else. In the same fashion, getting rid of the biggest bootlegger in the country won't really change much. It will simply change who is the biggest bootlegger in the country. The process will not end by removing one lynchpin.

Considering this, the only reason Mellon agreed to any of this, is because he is content to replace Daugherty and get a piece of the bootlegging industry. It's possible he has other plans/motivations, as he clearly is a very different person from Daugherty, who routinely abused Nucky's ability to throw sexy parties.

I think if you're asking me exactly what I'd do differently then you're missing the gist of my post. It would take a world class writer to do that scene better. To distill the motivations of a master of the universe into a manageable five minute scene is ridiculously hard.

And yet, Mad Men did it. Remember the bar scene where Conrad Hilton meets Don? That scene informed every Conrad Hilton scene that followed. Hilton was a self-made man who felt dislocated in high society, who simultaneously envied, mocked, and wanted to conquer the upper class. He appreciated hard work. He didn't like people, doubted marriages, and was religious. All these great contradictions. And the way Don charmed him was completely awesome and earned.

On Boardwalk Empire, Nucky had a smooth opening about the stock ticker. He appealed to Mellon's sense of patriotism. Then he took words out of Mean's mouth and was like, "it's the little things that stick in my craw" regarding Mellon's distillery. He offered Mellon a likely inconsequential amount of additional profit. He was polite and flattered him. Input obvious data, output: complete success!

Flattery didn't get Don far with Conrad. In fact it was never exactly clear what did work with Conrad. He was an incredibly difficult cat to skin. But we knew who Hilton was. We knew about his earnest, foolhardy plan to bring America to everywhere in the world. On this show we have not even scratched the surface of what Mellon is about. My favorite line from that scene is the very end when he says "You've brought some color to my day Mr. Thompson, and I do appreciate that." That's the master of the universe style I'm looking for. But I have my doubts that we'll ever find out what's under the hood.

Yeah I thought the scene with Mellon was perfect as well. This was never going to be a meeting of equals. Nucky had to seize his opportunity, which he did. He was direct, honest and when it looked like things weren't going his way he accepted it. If he had tried to be too clever Mellon probably wouldn't have trusted him.

The same qualities that enabled Nucky to prevail here were the same ones that he used on the female public prosecutor in the last episode. He has excellent people skills and knows how to bend people to his will by being the exact person that they want him to be.

But Nucky wasn't flattering Mellon at all. It was clear from the beginning of that discourse that Nucky was taken aback by the disrespectful tone of Mellon. Mellon's views of Nucky haven't changed at all, he is using him. The very end of that conversation screamed that to me, when Mellon pretty much said thank you for your help now gtfo, without even looking up from his paper. Nucky is again taken aback by this gesture, giving one last frown before conceding.

I think your doubts wrt finding out more about Mellon are very premature. After all, this was only his 2nd episode. Sure he made it clear that they are never to speak again, but lets not be naive, nothing ever goes strictly according to plan

That's a bit of an unfair comparison. In MM as far as I can recall Don had no idea who he was talking to. They were just two guys at a party hiding from the rest of the guests hoping to grab a quiet drink. They were two men seeking the same thing and this created a natural relaxed atmosphere and solidarity between them.

Here though Nucky has come to Mellon with the express intent of making his acquaintance and getting something from him. What's more Mellon is completely aware of this. He has all the wariness of someone listening to the beginnings of a door to door saleman's pitch ready to slam the door in his face. He wasn't about to kick back and start telling Nucky about his woes, hopes, dreams and strategies.

To me lines like:

"I make no excuses for myself, I'm a businessman. A small businessman, and I'm sure you can understand that."

"Isn't yours?" regarding his sense of patriotism being offended .

"I don't envy your position. But we - I hope you'll allow me to say we..."

Along with his docile tone of voice, counts as flattery. All those lines IMO are just bad, would not work on Mellon, and should not have been uttered by a sly dude like Nucky.

It's not flattery. It's deference.

missing earring was a nice touch imo

I think we disagree on our definitions of flattery. To me this looks like standard manipulation of words by a political mind. Furthermore, I don't see why you think it "worked." Mellon did not come out of that exchange thinking more highly of Nucky, he sees him as a means to an end. This was purely a business deal and Mellon would have agreed to it regardless of who was making the offer

mellon couldn't be bothered the entire conversation with nucky. Someone like Andrew Mellon doesn't need nor want to truly deal with a plebe like nucky. Nucky represents the problems with the republican party at the time and Mellon comes from a ****load of money and a family that is truly influential. Nucky is barely a ****stain to Andrew Mellon. Nucky is a local political gangster that matters little to someone like Andrew Mellon. Like Dom noted, Mellon's tone was one that was much more of deference than flattery

The best part of that scene was what happened after, when nucky beat the snot out of that actor he said something like "damned interloper" which was the same insult that mellon used when he kicked nucky out of the club.

So Guinness Black Lager makes half your face grow back?!

This line is all a bit erroneous to me. Nucky didn't get the door slammed in his face; he got what he came for. Mellon made the only play to make by throwing him out regardless of his intentions. He can't be seen getting on with this man with whom he may soon enter into shady under the table dealings. Mellon coldly and effectively pressed Nucky to see exactly who he was being approached by and Nucky obliged like his life depended on it which it did. The parting 'color' comment revealed Mellon's true feelings on the subject imo; not as much before the remark and certainly not after.

he didn't get the door slammed in his face but he got treated like he treats others which isnt normal for him. In Nuckys world hes the big fish, in mellons world hes a **** stain on the underware of life to be used as he sees fit, if he sees fit.

I thought the scene with Mellon was great, which doesnt surprise me because Cromwell pwns.

Nucky is just lost in this situation with Mellon. He is just not accustomed to being around somebody who is just in another stratosphere in terms of money/power.

When you're dealing with Chalky White or even Rothstein you can and definitely need to be very cagey and clever. Playing multiple angles at all times to stay alive and prosper in a world full of sharks.

When youre trying to deal with a dude who might as well be God in your world, even putting yourself on his radar is really risky. Trying to be clever with him is terrible as he will find you out and kill/imprison you or whatever he wants to do with you, maybe make a rug out of you.

Anyway you tell him what you have to offer and hope he bites. Considering the outcome (Nuck getting what he wants) You have to assume Nuck played his hand very well indeed. He hit his two outer so to speak.

Think about it, how hard would it be for Mellon to get somebody to run that distillery for him if he REALLY wanted to earn max profit? It would have obviously occurred to him to think about the situation previously.

Nah, Nuck was just the right amount clever. Clever enough to get into that room, have some info and enough stones to ask moronic questions about patriotism.

Mellon sees something in Nuck, possible large scale bootleg profits.

Basically if had tried to "out-clever" Mellon he would have looked like an idiot. its the only rational outcome. It would be like the smartest animal on the planet trying to outwit you. In the end you can talk and have thumbs, even if the bear knows how to build bombs in theory he screwed.

Cromwell is a very good actor imo and this Mellon charecter works VERY well in this universe so the above theory might have merit. This could be a guy whos around for the next 20 episodes.

I think it's still somewhat hard to discern what mellon's end game is with this. Money from bootlegging is inconsequential to the money he gets from banking and the money his family has. The distillery is most like a red herring IMO

You can't just say a term like that then not define it. Thanks for making me google....dick.

Dammit you edited.

Thought the van Alden iron scene was hilariously bad. Also, Margaret's stuff is predictable and going downhill fast. Still, the Torrio, Billie Kent, and Mellon scenes were enough to make this a solid ep.

Sublimes post pretty much spot on imo. The entire discourse might as well have been Mellon sitting on top of a throne while talking down to a subordinate. Nucky started off with his usual tactics, realized they weren't going to work, and ends up using the line that Means pitched to him. From there it's all about recognizing what kind of business deal this was