Previously on Billions: ‘Magical Thinking’

 

 

Previously on Billions…

Bobby waves Mafee into his office, but Mafee stays where he is. Bobby is perplexed until Wags explains Mafee wishes to talk about BioLance so has sent Wags in to get permission because Bobby told him he would be fired if he brought that up. Mafee thinks that they are about to lose £400+ million and is basically saying Bobby has this one wrong. Since he is executing the trade, Mafee fears if he does not speak up now, he’ll be fired after they lose the $400+ Million. Bobby sees how this could be a sticky one.

Bobby loves Mafee though so permission is granted.

Mafee has been losing sleep over this BioLance trade and he sleeps like a bear. Axe does that thing he does and asks Mafee what type of bear he usually sleeps like.

There is a special announcement call about BioLance in 9 minutes and Mafee is uneasy. Bobby, however, is giving Mafee no leeway when it comes to the actual information as Bobby understands the risks and has done the homework. So, despite the fact that the other analysts agree with Mafee and him being so loveable, Mafee is the one standing in front of Bobby and Mafee is fired.

He tried.

He is still there 9 minutes later when the announcement is made that BioLance has not gotten FDA approval. What does this mean? It means that Mafee would be perfectly entitled to jump up on the desk and scream “I told you so”. However, Mafee looks genuinely disappointed by the announcement. If he is fired, why does he care that Axe just lost $430 Million dollars for being an over confident and dismissive ass? Mafee might just be a team player.

The news has hit Bobby like a ton of bricks, but it is not really the fact that he just lost $430 million that is bothering him or that he really owes Mafee an apology. It is the realisation he has lost his mojo. He was wrong. Him! Bobby Axelrod.

Bobby
Source: Showtime

Continue reading “Previously on Billions: ‘Magical Thinking’”

Revisiting the Role that Gave Us Nicholas Brody: Keane

So, as I prepared to continue my series on the love story in Homeland, truth be told, I got to the scene of Brody’s dream, a gun to his head singing the Marines’ Hymn through gritted teeth as he’s being ordered to bury Tom Walker and, gah, the pain. There’s his pain within the dream and then again after he wakes from it. It never really lets up, does it. And Carrie sees the pain too, in all its rawness, on the other side of the cameras in his bedroom. Then, she’s a witness as well to Brody crouched in a corner of his room in the dark, like a wounded bird, not moving for hours. The sheer torment of it all is still so fresh sometimes, and I got a bit hung up on it. Anyway, now that I’ve started the series, no going back now, I’ll be continuing soon enough. For now, let’s take a break to revisit the role which determined Damian to be the perfect fit for Nicholas Brody: Keane.

keane1

Continue reading “Revisiting the Role that Gave Us Nicholas Brody: Keane”

Life with Charlie Crews: Season Two, Episodes 1-3

Welcome back, everyone! It’s Tuesday, and we’re spending all our Tuesdays this summer with our favorite fruit-chomping LA detective, Mr. Charlie Crews!

Alternate universe boy band album cover
Alternate universe: boy band cover photo

When we last saw Charlie, he was celebrating his full exoneration. His case and conviction had been previously overturned, but the doubts had still lingered. If not Charlie, then who? Well, through diligent detective work, Charlie spent season one tracking down the answer- Kyle Hollis. We left him dragging Kyle through the squad room, and then enjoying a fruit cup, alongside his partner, Dani Reese.

new phone who dis?
new phone who dis?

What I left off was the cliffhanger ending-episode 11 of season one ended with one doozy of a twist. The damsel in distress, the darling brunette, the devoted but caught-in-the-crossfire daughter of Kyle Hollis, was none other than Rachel Sebold. Yes, the daughter of Tom, the remaining member of a slain family. She was not only in the house when her parents died, but also through some twist, Kyle felt compelled to atone, to be “cleansed” by the fire and take responsibility for the girl he orphaned.

And we found out, through a phone call from Jack Reese, that Rachel was in Jack’s care. The last remaining witness, an innocent victim still in this whole debacle-injured and in the hands of the enemy, stolen from the hospital and taken to who knows where!? Continue reading “Life with Charlie Crews: Season Two, Episodes 1-3”

Damian Lewis on James Bond: Books, Movies, and Rumors *UPDATED*

source: GQ
source: GQ

Rumor has had it since June 2015 that Damian Lewis is in “the running” to be the next James Bond… It’s a rumor… So probably not true. But it is an EXCITING and FUN rumor that we have blogged about earlier here and are still having fun with it! And I have been having fun personally not just because my favorite actor may be in the running for such a high profile role, but also because it just cracks me up seeing how opinionated everyone is about the whole James Bond enterprise. Everyone is so fired up pushing their favorite Bond candidate — say he is Damian Lewis, Idris Elba, Tom Hardy, Michael Fassbender, Henry Cavill, Richard Armitage, Aidan Turner, or Tom Hiddleston… A pretty impressive list!

And what tops the fun for me is how the possibility of Damian being the next Bond has divided people on Social Media with tweets commenting on, YES, his hair color! “Yes, the world is ready for a ginger Bond” versus “Do you really want to have a ginger Bond?” tweets have come in proving the point we’ve made here on the blog earlier that people just cannot be indifferent to the guy’s hair color. Freakin’ unbelievable!

okot10

Damian Lewis portraying MI6 agent Hector Meredith in Our Kind of Traitor on big screen has helped revive the question about Bond nowadays. Here is Today Show’s Savannah Guthrie being pretty direct about it.  Continue reading “Damian Lewis on James Bond: Books, Movies, and Rumors *UPDATED*”

Value of Loyalty and Bobby Axelrod’s varying degrees

A warning for those just starting to watch Billions in the UK, this blog will contain spoilers for all of season 1.

To know who Bobby Axelrod is means having an understanding of where he has been and how he has gotten to here. At the moment we just have ‘the here’ with a couple of anecdotes thrown in. Granted the 9/11 reveal was fairly big, but in the end just added more questions.

The simple view of Bobby Axelrod is a husband, a father and the owner of Axe Capital. Digging under the surface the clear picture starts to blur.

His wife loves him and is loyal to him yet it is clear there are things she does not know about him or about how he will react in certain circumstances. In Magical thinking Lara tells her sister Lu that she needs Bobby “to give her something” i.e. she needs him to share with her. It probably hurt her knowing he was off sharing his feelings with Wendy. In ‘the Conversation’ we see the first slither of doubts cross her mind even as the words she speaks say the opposite. I found it interesting that Bobby decided to leave all that money in the house rather than return it to the bank. Is this a test for his wife? At this stage I wouldn’t put it past him. Lara did not appreciate the inference of having to up and run soon by keeping the money in the house. Nor did she appreciate the affection with which Bobby spoke of Wendy in the same scene. It seems to me Mr & Mrs Axelrod may be about to hit choppy waters. I hope that boat came with life jackets.

Source: Showtime
Source: Showtime

His boys look up to him but then they are children who still think that dad knows best and are still at the stage where they prefer ‘cool’ dad far better than ‘realistic and responsible’ mum. The reality is that cool dad is not doing himself or his boys any favours. They are childish enough that they thank him for his undermining of whatever their mother says and does. They will grow out of that eventually. Continue reading “Value of Loyalty and Bobby Axelrod’s varying degrees”