Source: FX / FX
In this week’s episode of Snowfall, the women assert their influence. Cissy gives Franklin an LSD-induced diatribe about her disapproval of him choosing money and a white CIA agent over his family. Veronique meets up with Kane, the man who ordered the drive-by that nearly killed her in this season’s fifth episode, to ensure he will maintain the peace truce he established. But, Louie is the matriarchal figure at the center of what could be a paradigm shift in the Snowfall universe.
Source: FX / FX
Throughout the episode, Louie strategically puts plans in motion to establish the autonomy of her drug empire. She secretly met with Teddy behind Franklin’s back to create a direct supply chain of cocaine between him and her without Franklin as the middleman. This is after she angrily fought to keep her and Jerome’s drug business from being a subsidiary of Franklin’s empire in previous episodes. After discovering Leon and Franklin decided to supply cocaine to Kane, the man who ordered the drive-by, which almost killed her, as a form of peaceful truce, she took it upon herself to organize a hit to assassinate Kane. Snowfall has slowly been building Louie as a significant player in the crack cocaine world for the last few seasons, and they have the historical precedents to support that decision.
The crack cocaine empires from the ‘80s Los Angeles that history remembers are ruled by men. But, Louie’s covert dealings with Teddy for a direct line to cocaine shipments, along with her ruthless and unilateral decision to employ a dirty cop to eliminate a threat, shows Snowfall is gearing up to introduce its viewers to a Black matriarch of a crack cocaine empire all her own. If you knew the story of Jemeker Thompson, you’d know Snowfall is setting Louie up for something big.
After she and her mother were evicted from their South Central Los Angeles home in the early 1970s when she was eight years old, Thompson “knew then that I wanted money and that I wanted to control everything,” according to her interview in the 2018 Netflix docuseries Drug Lords. That unwavering motivation to rise above her deleterious conditions eventually led to her entering the crack cocaine trade. Like Louie being introduced to the Snowfall audience as the scrappy girlfriend of a cannabis dealer named Jerome, Thompson also joined the new world of crack cocaine as the girlfriend of a cannabis dealer named Anthony M. “Daff” Mosley. According to Thompson’s memoir Queen Pin, Thompson and Mosley quickly started selling up to four kilos a week after having to perform oral sex on a bail bondsman named Willie to get her first ounce of cocaine in 1980. After Mosley was murdered, Thompson expanded the reach of her drug distribution network outside of Los Angeles and into Detroit. And she had the same entrepreneurial spirit Louie has exhibited in recent seasons of Snowfall.
Source: FX / FX
Similar to Louie informing Teddy she almost went straight to the Colombians to get her cocaine, Thompson not only thought about it, but she also did it. Similar to how Louie helped Franklin run the legitimate nightclub business to help launder his money, Thompson started a profitable and successful hair distribution business that law enforcement suspected was a front for money laundering. Thompson’s drug empire grew so successful, FBI agents informed her mother they considered her daughter “one of the biggest cocaine dealers in America.” With the Snowfall series ending next season, after Louie has effectively cut Franklin out of the drug business, she may grow her drug empire to the heights of Thompson.
Source: FX / FX
‘Snowfall’ Season 5, Ep. 8 Recap: Louie Becomes Queen was originally published on cassiuslife.com
