MobLand season 1 episode 5 saw the war between our crime families ignited and burning wildly after the grisly murder of the Stevenson matriarch, allegedly on Maeve’s (Helen Mirren) orders.

In episode 6, insight abounds in the wake of Vron’s (Annie Cooper) death as Conrad (Pierce Brosnan) twists the knife, Maeve (Helen Mirren) schools Eddie (Anson Boon) in the art of chess, and Brendan (Daniel Betts) and Seraphina (Mandeep Dhillon) go rogue. This week’s recap also finds Richie (Geoff Bell) completely devastated, then vengeful, as he fires back against the Harrigans and sets the stage for a war full of carnage.

Across the criminal line, DS Fisk (Luke Mably) realizes the severity of what’s about to happen if the crime families aren’t stopped. It seems the police have a big decision to make.

In the aftermath of Vron’s death, the Harrigans urgently meet in the Cotswolds, where Conrad reveals it was he who gave the order, not Maeve. In fact, Vron’s car had been rigged to blow up for a full week before it actually did.

Kevin (Paddy Considine) is angry; he knows what happens when dying empires get into wars like this. When asked why he did it, Conrad says he will not stand for Richie mouthing off to him like he did at Tommy’s (Felix Edwards) wake: “We are at war, and we’re going to take the Stephensons out one by one.” As the father and son argue nose to nose, Maeve leans in to slurp it up like the energy vampire she’s proving herself to be (and we love it).