LUCIOUS LYON SAYS WHOOP THAT TRICK CODE

And Cookie doesn’t ever think Hakeem would cross that line. But there are lines they don’t cross with regard to family members. They come together when the company is threatened. But they protect the company at all costs. They’ve all done some pretty unsavory things.

LUCIOUS LYON SAYS WHOOP THAT TRICK CODE

In the Lyon family, there’s a code - and it’s a complex, twisted code. I don’t think that Cookie ever would have done it if she even had a moment of doubt. When she signed over the proxy, saying to Hakeem he knew what the right move was, there had to be a small piece of her that knew Hakeem might wind up voting to strip Lucious of his CEO position, no?

We discussed whether it would be Hakeem - and at a certain point, as we moved through the season, it became clear that this was Hakeem’s story, that it should be him. Really, the question for the writers was who would be the one to play that fateful vote that loses the company for Lucious Lyon, something previously unthinkable. We knew Lucious was going to lose his company in the mid-season finale. Did you ever think about having Hakeem side with Cookie? TVLINE | The moment where Hakeem looks out from the boardroom and sees Camilla and Cookie - these two crucial women in his life who are lobbying him to go in completely different directions. And as Mimi goes off to get treatment, Camilla steps into that role in a much more vengeance-minded way, as you can imagine. What we’re saying essentially is that the baton has been passed to Camilla Mimi has been a shill for her. Now that she’s gone off to continue her cancer treatments, can we assume Camilla will take over the role of the thorn in the Lyon family’s side? I had just assumed the comeuppance would be hers. TVLINE | You’d told me several episodes ago that Marisa Tomei’s Mimi arc would end in Episode 8 - and would end with a comeuppance. I certainly enjoyed it in a personal way. TVLINE | Given how homophobic Lucious has been throughout the series, it’s kind of delicious that the lesbian character brings him down. And we realized pretty early on that those two stories needed to be married - quite literally - to one another. And we also knew that we were going to bring Camilla back - and that she was back for retribution.

We knew that Mimi was going to play that role of the usurper, that Lucious was getting in bed with the enemy, and that she would take his company away from him. How early on did you plot that? Did you know the minute you introduced Mimi that she was in cahoots with Camilla or did that come later? TVLINE | I did not see that twist of Camilla being Mimi’s wife - and returning to take control of Empire… which I guess puts me in good company with Lucious, Cookie and everyone else. On that note, let’s cut right to Chaiken’s insights Empire’s wild, gasp-inducting, final hour of 2015. This doesn’t stop Lucious from declaring him “fixed” (ugh, GROSS) by a woman’s love - or spreading the word to Jamal’s wealthy gay David Geffen-y patron. * Oh, in other news, Skye figures out that her one night of passion with Jamal isn’t going to bloom into a full-fledged romance, since at the end of the day, he identifies as gay. If she or her fetus survive the fall - and hours laying without medical attention - it’ll be a miracle on par with Tiana’s awful new song being viewed as a viable single. Later, an intruder breaks into Rhonda and Andre’s house - and pushes Rhonda down her epic staircase in epically horrifying fashion. * Meanwhile, Rhonda’s pregnancy hormones are clearly dulling her usually vicious instincts, and she allows a wild-eyed Anika to hang out at her house and practically hiss with rage about her one-time-almost-future-daughter-in-law-then-sister-in-law’s fab life. * Lucious winds up shooting up his study as Jamal and Andre sit downstairs - and it’s Cookie who intervenes, offers perspective and tells him that he needs to pull it together to protect the family legacy. But instead of a congratulatory Champagne toast, she gets a brutal load of Cookie’s spit directly in her face as the takeover plan is finalized. * In the boardroom, Hakeem goes against his family’s wishes and votes with Camilla - who is immediately installed as Empire’s head honcho. Cookie decides she needs to stay behind to reconnect with a prison buddy who’s just received a life sentence for killing her cellmate - girl, she’s not going anywhere! - and passes her proxy power to Hakeem. * Cookie and the ASA-snubbed Hakeem are off the grid, performing at Family Day at Wallace Correctional Facility’s Family Day, until Andre tracks them down with news of Mimi and Camilla’s takeover bid. She calls for an emergency vote later that night to oust him from his perch as chairman and CEO. * Uh-oh, Mimi’s been secretly recording her conversations with Lucious, and reveals to the Empire board of directors his utter disdain for following the rules of a publicly traded company.

Lucious lyon says whoop that trick