The Billions Stock Watch is a weekly accounting of the characters on the Showtime drama. Decisions will be made based on speculation and occasional misinformation and mysterious whims that are never fully explained to the general public. Kind of like the real stock market.
STOCK UP – Chuck
Things are not all great for Chuck. There’s a new Attorney General in office, a blustery Texan who is from both horse country and baseball country, depending on what particular metaphor is being made in the moment (yes, I did picture horses playing baseball at the end of the scene, and yes, I will link to the thing about Mr. Ed hitting a home run off Sandy Koufax), and the new hands-off approach to financial crimes is already driving him nuts. The arrangement with Dake on the Ice Juice prosecution is dicey at best and I don’t think I’d want to owe that Scarecrow-looking Calvinist any kind of favor. His dad hates his guts. And so on.
But Billions is mostly a show about Chuck and Axe trying to ruin each other at any cost, and so, if these are the major costs so far, Chuck can live with them. Because…
STOCK DOWN – Axe
Axe has problems. The Ice Juice case is taking up all of his time. His wife took the kids and left him and brought freaking Jerry O’Connell along to inspect the books. He’s licking his wounds in a Manhattan penthouse and Wendy compared him to big sad bird after about 90 seconds of their therapy session. And, perhaps worst of all, all of his personal and professional funds were frozen until he voluntarily gave up his trading license.
He has a plan now, sort of. He’s planting stories to reporters and handing the crown to Taylor on a trial basis and smirking in extreme close-up. Axe will bounce back at some point because Axe always bounces back and because this show would become pretty boring if he just goes broke and starts spending all day day-trading in a ratty bathrobe from a Staten Island studio covered in half-empty takeout containers (they’d have to change the name of the show to Hundreds). For now, though, stock down.
STOCK DOWN – Dickens
STOCK DOWN – Egg creams
I thought egg creams had eggs in them until I was in my early 20s. I feel silly now, obviously, but not that silly, because, like, come on. It has egg right in the name. It not like I’m the crazy one for assuming it had some sort of egg-based product in it. “Egg cream” sounds more like a first draft of the name for mayonnaise than a drink made of seltzer, milk, and chocolate syrup. I don’t want to drink mayonnaise. I barely want to put it on my turkey sandwich.
Change the name.
STOCK UP – Taylor
Taylor is the closest thing the show has to a sympathetic character. I want to like them. I do. And when this episode picks up they’re leading the firm in Axe’s absence, which one has to believe is ticking off some of the oldest longtime Axe employees. I want Taylor to succeed.
And yet…
Even in that triumphant moment at the end, when Taylor is standing at the table with New York’s biggest hedge fund types staring them down and Axe unable to officially assist on anything due to his agreement to turn over his trading license, I just… I’m troubled. Are we implying Taylor is going to become Axe 2.0? Is that the character journey here? I want more for them than to become Michael Corleone. So yeah, stock up, tentatively.
(The Godfather analogy works really well here, if we want it to. Axe is Vito, Taylor is Michael, Mafee is Fredo, Dollar Bill is Sonny, Wags is Tom. But like a Tom who does drugs and shouts at people in saunas. God, I do love Wags.)
STOCK UP – Wags
STOCK UP – Wendy
Wendy has a lot on her plate, man. Her husband executed a criminal ruse that destroyed his father and best friend and emptied out his inheritance, and he did it all to trick her employer and dear friend into poisoning people to manipulate the stock. Everyone around her is throwing themselves in the toilet and expecting her to remain strong and in charge. Some more than others. Which brings us to…
STOCK DOWN – Standard couples therapy
Look, sometimes, if you watch Billions, you’re gonna see a shirtless Paul Giamatti tied up in leather and asking his dominatrix wife to explain an affair she had in sparkling, salacious detail while whupping his pale white tush with a paddle. That’s just the deal. It works for them.
STOCK DOWN – Dake
I realize there’s something hypocritical about punishing Dake in the same breath that I pointed out how Chuck owing him a favor could be a big deal. I feel like Dake is playing the long game, somehow, and all of these short-term L’s will pay off. Or maybe he’ll just get railroaded and left for dead like everyone else who comes between Axe and Chuck. Who knows? I just don’t like him. That’s all. Please re-read this italicized intro if you need further explanation.
STOCK UP – Glenn Fleshler
Glenn Fleshler is the actor who plays Axe’s lawyer. He’s been in everything: The Night Of, Boardwalk Empire, True Detective, etc. He’s one of those guys who pops up in all of your favorite shows and you’re like “Oh wow, that guy is always good.” I bring this up for two reasons: One, I think it would be nice to put his name on the record. Two, he’s also playing a Chechen mob boss on Barry right now, which means from 10:30 to 11 this spring, you could see him on HBO and Showtime at the same time.
Good for Glenn.
STOCK DOWN – Jerry O’Connell’s character, whose name I will probably remember at some point
Jerry O’Connell is the opposite of Glenn Fleshler. Every time he pops up on a show, I’m like “Yo, it’s Jerry O’Connell.” They’ve said his character’s name multiple times on the show. I could look it up right now. It would take five seconds. But I know I’ll just forget it and be like “Yo, it’s Jerry O’Connell” again the next time he shows up. I recognize this is my problem and not anyone else, but I think it’s good to be honest with yourself.
Anyway, tough night for Jerry. Axe mocked him to his face and then Lara called his airplane a sardine can. I’ll never learn his name at this rate.
STOCK UP – Brian
Brian is rightly suspicious of the Dake/Chuck deal and absolutely cooked my guy Glenn Fleshler — oh no, now I’m Jerry O’Connelling him! — outside the ping pong club. Man, I hope I never get roasted like that outside a ping-pong club. Does not seem great.
STOCK UP – Staring out over the city skyline while thinking about various ways to defeat your enemies
Undefeated.
