Season 2 shifted the stakes and the storytelling forever, though.
In other words,Billionscould only be the story of Axe vs. Chuck for so long.
One of the great draws of this show is that it never stagnates.
Credit: Mark Schafer/SHOWTIME
The ground is always moving beneath the characters, and that makes for exciting, unpredictable drama.
As the finale gets underway, both battles seem to be cooling down.
For now, though, Axe has no idea what’s coming.
He’s so focused on the reputation of Axe Capital that he can’t see Taylor slipping away.
That kind of blindness makes him vulnerable, and the same can be said for Chuck.
The entirety of “Elmsley Count” is astonishingly propulsive.
From the get-go, the episode puts the pedal to the floor and doesn’t let up.
Once Axe realizes both Taylor and Mafee are missing, he begins to understand what’s happened.
All told, Taylor makes off with more than $3 billion of the money Axe thought was his.
Chuck, on the other hand, thinks he has Jock in his sights.
That gets the ball rolling, and sends Jock right to Chuck.
He asks Chuck to, essentially, make this all disappear.
He wants a few minutes alone with Cutler to “change his mind.”
While Chuck awaits that evidence, Axe has his own decision to make.
In the episode’s best scene, Axe confronts Taylor at the newly formed Taylor Mason Capital.
Axe compares the world he deals into the top of Everest, the “death zone.”
He says Taylor will run out of oxygen soon enough.
“Young lungs, so we’ll see,” replies Taylor.
The decision Axe has to make, though?
It’s a big one.
I mean, this is the same man who slaps Hall during a meeting.
Hall is the scariest dude of them all, and he’s put firmly in his place by Grigor.
Not a guy you want to mess with.
Axe turns down Grigor’s offer, and in the process loses all his investment money to Taylor.
So Taylor Mason Capital is off and running, and now Axe Capital has a new threat to assess.
Taylor says their firm will surpass Axe’s in three to eight years, depending on market forces.
That’s a number that Axe doesn’t like hearing.
Now Axe has a new enemy, one who’s his former protege.
It’s time for the tables to turn on Chuck too.
It’s the end for Chuck.
He’s been outmaneuvered, as Jock fires him, and Connerty takes his place as an interim attorney.
It’s unclear how this all came togetherdid Kate’s meeting with Connerty change things?
That all leads to a final, thrilling scene.
So, like she did earlier this season, she brings Axe and Chuck together.
Axe wonders if Chuck has any ideas about how he’s going to take down Jock; he does.
Chuck wonders if Axe knows how he’s going to go after Taylor; he has a few ideas.
