Previously on Billions: Season 1 Finale “The Conversation”

Previously on Billions…

Axe is waiting for Wendy out on the street. He is unusually wearing a suit. He comes bearing the gift of a new car as a present for their session in ‘Magical Thinking’. He is just about to go and meet Wags as they are on a capital raise. Wendy thinks Axe is ready, but the investors may not be.

source: Showtime

Lonnie is back at Southern District and Chuck puts him straight on to a tip about criminal activity by Bobby. This cannot be tied to Chuck who tells Lonnie to start with Mick Danzig.

Wags is carrying all of Axe’s paperwork because Axe is the principal who must arrive unburdened, apart from his brilliant ideas. They are on their way to their first capital raising meeting. The first one does not go well with them getting a ‘wait and see’ who else jumps on board.

Lonnie is looking through the arrest logs at Greenwich PD.

Axe and Wags are in another capital raising meeting. This one they win, but they aren’t that pleased as they see this investor as someone looking to make a name for themselves. A brilliant comic moment as Axe shuts the car door on Wags who still has his hands full with all those folders.

Officer Salter is being interviewed by Lonnie about not arresting Danzig.

Wags and Axe are discussing the troublesome day they are having. Axe tells Wags to go back to the office and he will go it alone. Wags is happy to oblige. Axe ditches his suit and heads to a shop to buy himself some casual wear. That is more like it!

Source: Showtime

We then see Axe looking far more comfortable in his usual get up. His sort of suit and he lays it out for Carter Staley. This is a fantastic scene as he explains why they need to get on board right now because when he walks out the room they won’t get another invite. Sold!

Axe arrives back to work to rapturous applause. Everyone has smiles on their faces.

Also getting a welcome back from Bryan and team is Lonnie who fills them in on the new Axe case he is working on. Bryan is not buying Lonnie’s pitch at all. He knows something is up.

Axe is stopped by the Police and it happens to be Raul Gomez warning Axe about the fact the US Attorney is looking into the Danzig case.

Emergency meeting between Axe, Hall and Orrin in an empty baseball stadium. Orrin lays it out flat how much trouble will be coming Axe’s way if one of the cops flips on the Danzig case. Hall initially thinks one of the cops has already flipped because Danzig does not know how they did what they did for him. Bobby tells Orrin he should leave for the next part and after he has gone Bobby tells Hall it is Wendy who has betrayed him. He admits to Hall he stupidly had a session with her. Hall will prepare the ‘materials’ for Wendy.

source: Showtime

Axe tells Lara that Wendy has betrayed them and that they need to put in place their contingency plan.

Chuck is happy to have Lonnie back and gushes over his ‘discovery’ of the possible bribery and firearms charges that can be brought against Bobby. He not so subtly puts Bryan down in this conversation implying Bryan lacks Lonnie’s guts and know how. I will just have to disagree with Chuck on that because Bryan has got more guts than Lonnie has when it comes to him.

Wendy arrives in Axe’s office with a big smile on her face. In fact this smile seems to push Axe over the edge as he inexplicably loses it and calls Wendy on betraying him. He stupidly makes it clear that he has pictures of her and he will use them if he has to. Wendy is too upset to properly defend herself here as she realises the only possible way there could be an investigation under way is if her session notes have been stolen somehow and she realises what Chuck has done. She flees Axe’s office in a bit of a state.

Lara is in a meeting arranging the Axelrod contingency plan. She seems a bit shaky here when it is suggested that Dean and Gordie will have to change their names. It is as though it may just be fully hitting her what she and the children are having to do for Bobby.

Bryan interrupts Lonnie’s lunch to speak to him about he obtained this new evidence on Axelrod. Bryan knows Lonnie got it from Chuck and tells Lonnie “we are going to get hurts in ways you can’t see.” But Lonnie isn’t listening he is just happy to be eating his burger again and Bryan can go talk to Chuck about any issues he has with him.

Wendy is waiting for Chuck to come home and they get into it. Wendy knows what Chuck did and he claims he had to because there is evidence in his own home. Wendy says she knows he cannot use what he found there and she would voluntarily testify against him if he tried. Wendy calls him on betraying her trust and he brings up seeing her with Axe. He tries to explain he was desperate and needed to see her. He wasn’t actually there to spy on her, but Wendy is not sold. He says Axe was having him followed. Chuck goes on the offensive and asks Wendy if she is there in amongst and working with those criminals what does that make her? She throws him out.

Lonnie, Bryan and his team arrive in Chuck’s office for an update. Bryan immediately knows Chuck has been there all night. Chuck announces he is dropping the case against Axe as there is no gun and he doesn’t want Lonnie wasting his time. Bryan knows his hunch is right about Chuck feeding Lonnie the evidence on Axe. He just doesn’t know how Chuck got it or why he is dropping the case so quickly. Bryan is first to leave Chuck’s office.

Bobby is stunned to see Wendy his sitting in his chair. She has been waiting a while. She plays him a recording of her earlier conversation with Chuck in which she managed to get Chuck to admit he stole the evidence from her computer. Her name now in the ‘clear’ with Axe, she gets an apology, but that is not enough for Wendy. She gets her bonus doubled. Axe says he will treble it if she gives him that recording of Chuck. Wendy is disgusted and deletes the recording. Chuck is still the father of her children. She leaves Axe’s office with a file in her hand, presumably the one with the photos, but who knows. She also leaves Axe Capital with boxes, presumably her personal effects and patient notes (one of the boxes does say patients notes, but we don’t see what is on the others), but again who knows? What we do know is that she is gone.

source: Showtime

Bryan can’t sit down. He is clearly concerned about what is going on. He gets a call from Orrin Bach.

Chuck’s paranoia takes over, but he actually turns out to be right. He initially comes looking for Bryan, but Bryan has just left. Chuck suggests to Kate that Tara cannot have been the only leak inside the office and gets her to pull personal files and bank records for staff.

Axe finds Lara in some deep storage under their house with part of their contingency plan. He tells her Wendy didn’t betray them. This knowledge appears to be an inconvenience to Lara who dismissively tells Bobby she doesn’t want to talk about it and it is best Wendy is out the way because of Chuck. She is glad they don’t have to leave. She plans on returning all the money to the bank, but Bobby tells her to leave it here because “you never know”. Firstly, Lara seems upset about this ‘you never know’ and secondly I am not sure it is a good idea to have that much money in your house, no matter how deep in storage it appears to be. There was rather a lot in that Axelrod ‘safe’.

source: Showtime

Kate has found herself another mole and is onto the janitor. Chuck leaks him false information that there is still a bug at Axe Capital.

Bryan meets Orrin at Bruno’s and Orrin orders Bryan some nonna pie. Bruno serves Bryan his nonna pie and then leaves the locking up to them and heads home. Orrin then tells him how Chuck got the information on Axe and Bryan is not so impressed with that. Bryan confirms Chuck has dropped the case and Orrin says his part is done. In swaggers Axe from the back to take over locking up duty. Orrin convinces Bryan to listen to what Axe has to say. Bobby makes Bryan a job offer in a fascinating scene designed to show us how similar Axe and Bryan’s backgrounds are, but also how different they are. Bryan chooses not to answer yes or no to that job offer, suggesting he will at the least give it consideration.

source: Showtime

Bobby gets a call from Hall saying that his source says there is a bug at Axe Capital. Hall has a sweep underway.

Chuck is spending his first night alone.

Axe’s paranoia has taken over and literally orders Hall’s guys to tear the place apart to find the bug.

Hall’s men can find no bug at Axe Capital and Hall departs with the place in a mess.

Chuck shows up at Axe Capital, deeply amused to see the state the place is in.

source: Showtime

“I thought your kind can only come in when invited”  -Axe to Chuck

“You do know we never got a warrant to bug this place…there might be one buried in the ceiling, I can’t really remember.”  – Chuck to Axe.

Chuck presents Axe with his $9 million dollar cheque which Bryan had framed for Chuck.

Here we have a delightful face-off between Axe and Chuck. A back and forth about each man’s position and who started what.

We end with a clear threat from one to the other.

“There is nothing more dangerous than a man who has nothing to lose.”  –  Chuck to Axe

“When I pull a deal off the table, I leave Nagasaki behind.” – Axe to Chuck

To be continued…

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