Putin, Russia’s president since 2000, with one stint as prime minister from 2008 to 2012, plays a central role in Blowout. The opening story of Lukoil’s first gas station in America, on a nondescript corner in Manhattan, serves to illustrate Putin’s fingerprints on the global oil and gas industry. A former KGB operative, Putin’s desire to maintain a healthy dose of espionage by gaining an upper hand through intelligence is evident in the anecdote of the Russian Illegals. Putin’s rise to the Russian presidency, which included blackmail by means of a fake sex tape, was spurred by his ambition for a Russia free from the capitalist ideologies and mechanisms of the United States.

Mitchell is a pioneer in the oil and gas industry and the de facto trailblazer for fracking in America. His life story is a complicated mix between capitalist parable and cautionary tale. A native of Galveston, Texas, Mitchell was the son of a Greek immigrant who worked as a goat herder. After studying petroleum engineering and geology at Texas A&M, Mitchell became an oil and gas entrepreneur. Even when virtually all conventional wisdom in the industry led away from fracking, Mitchell remained resolute in finding a way to extract