S06.E12: Cold Storage

[PrincessPurrsALot]

The discovery of Prince’s true plan pushes Chuck to undertake his most dangerous gambit yet, one final all-in gamble that will see the loser sent to prison.

Season finale

Original air date 2022.04.10

[Bluesky]

I found this hard to follow.  So Prince had to give up $3.5 billion dollars rather than admit he’s a massive tax cheat and end up in jail.  Between that and all the money he blew trying to get the Olympics to NYC his worth is rapidly dropping.   
The woman he’s having one night stands with was ridiculous running in and telling everyone at work.  Big deal, he’s separated from his wife and they live on opposite coasts.   No one cares about that. 
 

[Bluerinse666]

3 hours ago, Bluesky said:

I found this hard to follow.  So Prince had to give up $3.5 billion dollars rather than admit he’s a massive tax cheat and end up in jail.  Between that and all the money he blew trying to get the Olympics to NYC his worth is rapidly dropping.   
The woman he’s having one night stands with was ridiculous running in and telling everyone at work.  Big deal, he’s separated from his wife and they live on opposite coasts.   No one cares about that. 
 

Yes, if Rien had just kept quiet, nobody would have known (or cared).

 

[meira.hand]

4 hours ago, Bluesky said:

I found this hard to follow.  So Prince had to give up $3.5 billion dollars rather than admit he’s a massive tax cheat and end up in jail.  Between that and all the money he blew trying to get the Olympics to NYC his worth is rapidly dropping.   
The woman he’s having one night stands with was ridiculous running in and telling everyone at work.  Big deal, he’s separated from his wife and they live on opposite coasts.   No one cares about that. 

1. Prince had to "remove Chuck Rhoades off the board" to make sure he does not continue to interfere with his presidential plans. He did this to send him to prison for the illegal confiscation of the first disk. This is why he was willing to give up the money.

2. As Rian knew, in this day and age any presidential candidate is going to be researched to such a degree that it BOUND to come out sooner or later (either by journalists or oppo research) as they were not really all that careful.  The issue is not that he had an affair but that is was with a subordinate at work. In today's cancel culture this is viewed almost like raping a minor. The fact that she consented or even say that she initiated it, is irrelevant. She just could not handle the publicity and sharing it early was the right move.

[paigow]

Prince has an excuse to start divesting assets so he can fund Mike Money and capture the moral high ground- such as it is....

[Broderbits]

I just don't believe that there was anything of actual value on those drives, not after Mike gave Rian that speech about appearances. He knew Dave would be watching him at the elevator.

Anyway, I'm out. There's no way I can sit through another season of despicable Chuck.

[aghst]

Once again, it's not a crime to want to run for the presidency.

Even if it means spending billions to try to make a name for himself on the political landscape with some UBI scheme which is far from a guarantee of him winning.

Chuck extorted and committed fraud.  On what basis would there be a warrant signed, just because Prince has an armored vehicle company which has only made one run of tiny cases?

I don't buy though that Prince would try to avoid paying taxes on crypto gains.  He probably pays tons of taxes on his income from all his businesses, though he probably has tax experts reduce his tax exposure using all the tricks in the books.

After all, he has these grand ambitions to run for the highest political office in the land and he's going to cheat on taxes owed on billions?

It's a lame way to retcon the character, to say "he's even worse than Axe because he pretends to be something on the outside but is different on the inside."

It's a stupid notion, which is why this show gets harder to believe.  A billionaire hedge funder thinks he can throw billions of cash around to run for POTUS but isn't paying taxes on those billions?

All the greedy traders and Wags and Wendy now talking like Prince is a sneaky evil guy, not an upfront evil guy like Axe.  Like they give a fuck if their boss, who's paying them millions, is evil. 

They did make Chuck look bad, pursuing a vendetta, abusing his office and then as private citizen, extorting Kate and then acquiring one of the safes under fraud.  But they want to keep this showdown plotting going, probably because they have no other ideas.

So they have to show that Chuck is right, Prince is evil on the inside, lusting for power and a tax cheat and he also used Rian!

All so they can keep producing seasons of this same, boring mano y mano stories.

The Rian thing was stupid beyond belief.  She thinks she'll be like Monica and other women whose reputations suffered for being involved with political figures.  Only is Prince married?  He doesn't even live with his wife/ex-wife and they seem to have an understanding that they will hook up with whoever if the other isn't around.

That kind of arrangement wouldn't play well but it wouldn't be fatal for the WH these days, not after some of the scandals real presidents have been involved with.

Prince gives her some advice on whether she wants to control the narrative or be controlled.  For that she now thinks he's a tricky good on the outside, evil on the inside guy.

Whatever show.  Next season, Prince is going to behave like Axe, not try to trick people any more that he's just as greedy and unethical as Axe ever was?  It would be pointless to have him continue to be this "principled" billionaire since it's now suppose to be a false surface.

[Bluesky]

32 minutes ago, Broderbits said:

I just don't believe that there was anything of actual value on those drives, not after Mike gave Rian that speech about appearances. He knew Dave would be watching him at the elevator.

Anyway, I'm out. There's no way I can sit through another season of despicable Chuck.

The one they were able to open had $150 million in it.  There’s no reason to think the other ones were any different. And all season they have shown him bleeding money.  There were hints dropped by employees about dirty money and changing the way things were done when he’s gone. 
 

It’s silly to think Dav would risk her job to partner with Chuck but it should be interesting. Listening to Prince’s speeches he’s not a stable man. We’ll see  

[aghst]

He's throwing lavish parties for his employees, gorging on caviar.

I don't think he's bleeding money at all.

And if they later say he didn't really have money in it, what indications are there to show otherwise.

 

None of the regular characters portrayed are hurting for money.

[Broderbits]

27 minutes ago, Bluesky said:

 There were hints dropped by employees about dirty money and changing the way things were done when he’s gone.

That's what Prince said when he took over Axe Capital. They all want to be "more ethical" until it's inconvenient and affects the bottom line. Talk is cheap. Even the AG's office is willing to ignore the law and fudge documents when it suits their purpose.

[SnapHappy]

I did not expect that.  So Dave is just as corrupt and morally bankrupt as her predecessor.  She's basically just Chuck 2.0, but in pearls and Jimmy Choo's. 

Rian was a bit annoying, but she was right to get it all out.  If everybody knows, it's just an "open" workplace and part of the corporate culture.  Now if Scooter & Wendy start hooking up, that would really sell it.   But I don't think she did anything wrong.  

I really thought til the end that Prince had it all planned out.  I even thought that momentary lean against the elevator bank was just for the benefit of Dave watching the CCTV.  

But maybe he is playing a longer game than he'll admit to even his crew.  I hope so, because I don't want to see Dave & Chuck win.  

[dwmarch]

I don't entirely understand crypto and how it works but I thought it was set up in such a way that every movement of it was public. That is what a blockchain is, isn't it? A public record of all the transactions? But apparently you can put crypto into a self-destructing hard drive and make money evaporate. That seems iffy to me. What is the point of a virtual currency that can be destroyed by a physical device?

I also found it absurd that there would be a meeting of all the enemies from the show (but no one else) where no matter what happens someone is going to jail. I am pretty sure that would never happen in real life and I am pretty sure if this whole mess had to be investigated, Dave would be forbidden from being involved because she is involved.

Sounded to me like they hinted that Scooter might have had a former mistress of Prince's killed before. Team Axe did a deep dive looking for skeletons in his closet already but I guess they missed the literal, actual ones.

It never occurred to Chuck that he was getting played by Sacker? She's wise to all of his shit, I don't know why he would ever think he had her when a seemingly obvious thing like what he went after her for comes up.

[aghst]

Shows what a POS Chuck is to try to blackmail her in the first place.  I guess that's not a prosecutable crime in Billions.

As for people losing crypto wallets, it's definitely possible.  Millions lost because password was lost or died with a person.

Or it's stored online and stolen.

 

I don't buy that Prince would put billions in crypto wallets in devices without knowing the password.

Plus he was moving it around to different companies he owned and there had to be employees watching the digital lockers?  Very expensive way to maintain it.

Why not put it in a vault?  BTW, it's not clear if he had crypto in those digital lockers or actually sold crypto and made money from it.  He wouldn't owe taxes until he sold it and converted it to cash, , like with other assets like stocks or real estate..  So there is no tax liability or tax evasion, another gaping plot hole.

This elaborate trails of bread crumbs for Chuck to follow was obviously a trap.  There is no advantage in Prince handling billions in assets in this way.  Or they just wanted some footage of them serving warrants and confiscating it.  BTW, another possible factual problem, it was NY State police making these raids and some of the locations were out of state?  No they can't do that.  I think only the Feds can do that.  NY would have to ask other states to have their police go confiscate on their behalf.  Some states may not be in a hurry to cooperate.

Six seasons in, a show about billionaires, they don't seem to bother to come up with plausible financial details.

 

[paigow]

30 minutes ago, aghst said:

NY would have to ask other states to have their police go confiscate on their behalf.  Some states may not be in a hurry to cooperate.

One of the drives was picked up by NJ State Troopers

[Broderbits]

2 hours ago, dwmarch said:

Sounded to me like they hinted that Scooter might have had a former mistress of Prince's killed before. Team Axe did a deep dive looking for skeletons in his closet already but I guess they missed the literal, actual ones.

If that had happened, Axe's henchman supreme (the guy played by Terry Kinney) would have definitely found it. Hell, that guy was so good he would have found it before it happened!

[janeta]

-clutches head- There was so much that was illegal in this ep—and none of it by Prince— that I want to bang my head on the wall.  -thud- There. Now I feel better. I'll be so pissed if Chuck doesn’t go down in flames at the end of next season. 
 

I have no reason not to believe Prince didn’t have the passwords to the wallets. Those would be in some other password locker on some other drive locked up in some other vault.

Also, someone pls remind me: isn't Prince one of the people who were on that magazine cover as having at least $10B? Wasn't there a whole weekend retreat that people paid to attend just to listen to Axe and Prince babble on about making money? (That was Prince, right? Wasn’t that how he was introduced to the show?) So he had at least $10, and he's down the $2.5 he paid Axe (some of which he presumably has made back by now) and the hypothetical $3.5 he lost in the wallets. So he's not out of it yet.

1 hour ago, Broderbits said:

If that had happened, Axe's henchman supreme (the guy played by Terry Kinney) would have definitely found it. Hell, that guy was so good he would have found it before it happened!

The inimitable Hall. Love that guy.

[Screenwriter]

Well it looks like Billions has finally "jumped the shark!"   There are so many holes in this last episode as well as many others this season, it's hard to suspend disbelief anymore.   Too many implausible scenarios to stomach.   

First the fact that two adults have consensual sex that the female not only admitted to colleagues, but who also admitted that she initiated it is not exactly bombshell info that would sidetrack Prince's Presidential run.   Yes she is a subordinate, but she is a willing subordinate who admits to initiating it.  Not exactly the same as a superior abusing their power over a subordinate that the media would go crazy over.   And her actions about the affair were completely out of character for her.   She is the calm, cold and calculating type.  Not the school girl who runs and tells the entire office she had an affair with the boss in an anxiety ridden panic.   

And Chuck Rhoades is just going to throw away his entire life to try and nail Prince just on a hunch???   A career lawyer with years of experience all of a sudden has a lapse of judgement where he is willing to break the law and possibly go to jail if he is wrong?    

And what about the $150 million dollars they already found in the first crypto lock?   If they were looking for evidence, they already found it!  No need to open up the rest of the crypto locks...

I'm a screenwriter, so maybe I'm just picky, but Chuck Rhoade's motivation against Prince seemed forced the entire season.  With Axe it was easy to see why he was going after him, because Axe deserved it.  But all in all, Prince seems for the most part above board on most accounts.  He's not 100% clean, but he certainly didn't deserve the type of witch hunt that Chuck seemed determined to dish out.

And then the ending story twist where the DA gets Chuck out of jail and is actually faking everything to work with Chuck in the future is just ridiculous!  Story twists are fine, but they have to be "air tight" to be believed.

Yes my beloved Billions, you have officially Jumped The Shark and you are hereby sentenced to join the ranks of Fonzi of Happy Days to take your rightful place in the dustbin of TV history!

 

[yourmomiseasy]

10 hours ago, dwmarch said:

I don't entirely understand crypto and how it works but I thought it was set up in such a way that every movement of it was public. That is what a blockchain is, isn't it? A public record of all the transactions? But apparently you can put crypto into a self-destructing hard drive and make money evaporate. That seems iffy to me. What is the point of a virtual currency that can be destroyed by a physical device?

I also found it absurd that there would be a meeting of all the enemies from the show (but no one else) where no matter what happens someone is going to jail. I am pretty sure that would never happen in real life and I am pretty sure if this whole mess had to be investigated, Dave would be forbidden from being involved because she is involved.

Sounded to me like they hinted that Scooter might have had a former mistress of Prince's killed before. Team Axe did a deep dive looking for skeletons in his closet already but I guess they missed the literal, actual ones.

It never occurred to Chuck that he was getting played by Sacker? She's wise to all of his shit, I don't know why he would ever think he had her when a seemingly obvious thing like what he went after her for comes up.

I know a few people that have a decent chunk of change in bitcoin that they can't access.  Back when it was new and folks were just playing around with it, it wasn't uncommon to have some sitting in a wallet you couldn't remember the password to (we used to play around with mining it on work servers).  I also know folks that had hard drives die without a backup with their wallets sitting on it.  

9 hours ago, aghst said:

Why not put it in a vault?  BTW, it's not clear if he had crypto in those digital lockers or actually sold crypto and made money from it.  He wouldn't owe taxes until he sold it and converted it to cash, , like with other assets like stocks or real estate..  So there is no tax liability or tax evasion, another gaping plot hole.

 

Yeah, I was confused by this.  It isn't illegal to just have crypto sitting on a drive with unrealized gains.  You don't pay taxes on unrealized gains.  

5 hours ago, janeta said:

Also, someone pls remind me: isn't Prince one of the people who were on that magazine cover as having at least $10B? Wasn't there a whole weekend retreat that people paid to attend just to listen to Axe and Prince babble on about making money? (That was Prince, right? Wasn’t that how he was introduced to the show?) So he had at least $10, and he's down the $2.5 he paid Axe (some of which he presumably has made back by now) and the hypothetical $3.5 he lost in the wallets. So he's not out of it yet.

The inimitable Hall. Love that guy.

I believe that the truck last week said Prince had $16B.  I'm not sure how accurate it was.

 

 

Am I supposed to be rooting for Chuck?  Because that guy is the worst.  Poor Dave, she was cool until this episode.

Edited April 11, 2022 by yourmomiseasy

[Readalot]

My husband was out a few episodes ago. I think I am too. I’ve had it with Chuck and Dave. It’s too bad, we enjoyed it throughly until this season. 

[Redcookie]

I’m assuming that $3 billion was what he gave his wife. Remember that?

[Bluesky]

On 4/10/2022 at 6:30 PM, aghst said:

Shows what a POS Chuck is to try to blackmail her in the first place.  I guess that's not a prosecutable crime in Billions.

As for people losing crypto wallets, it's definitely possible.  Millions lost because password was lost or died with a person.

Or it's stored online and stolen.

 

I don't buy that Prince would put billions in crypto wallets in devices without knowing the password.

Plus he was moving it around to different companies he owned and there had to be employees watching the digital lockers?  Very expensive way to maintain it.

Why not put it in a vault?  BTW, it's not clear if he had crypto in those digital lockers or actually sold crypto and made money from it.  He wouldn't owe taxes until he sold it and converted it to cash, , like with other assets like stocks or real estate..  So there is no tax liability or tax evasion, another gaping plot hole.

 

If he doesn’t report it there is no way to know if he sold any.  

[Starchild]

As a disappointed completist, I was really hoping this would be the last season. 

[aghst]

1 hour ago, Bluesky said:

If he doesn’t report it there is no way to know if he sold any.  

If he still  had crypto in all those drives, he probably didn’t sell any.  

in any event, US authorities confiscated funds when some big transactions were attempted at exchanges so it may be possible to trace when people convert crypto to cash.

Edited April 12, 2022 by aghst

[PsychoDrone]

This show is stupid.  Chuck is Captain Ahab and not in an interesting way.  He is willing to sacrifice everything in his pursuit of the Moby Dick whale that is Mike Prince.  But, oh wait, it was all a ruse because Dave saw through it all and Chuck will return to fight another day.  Now, they BOTH will be Captain Ahab.  The funny thing is, how many people are really rooting for Chuck and Dave?  I mean really. Not a Mike Prince fan, but Chuck demonstrates a level of moral superiority where you want to see him fail.

Chuck's plot armor is strong and the only reason it played out with the "twist" is because the story demanded it.  The show has jumped the shark.  So what, they're going to do ANOTHER season of Chuck trying to outmaneuver and bring down a rich guy?  Six seasons and he still hasn't been successful.  Lost a marriage, a best friend (which he got back, which doesn't make sense), lost his job as AG, and his freedom (which should have been the end).  Mike Prince outplayed Axe in one season.  But, wait, next season will be different.  Alright, Don Quixote.  Keep tilting at those windmills.  At this point, even if Chuck "wins" next season, it won't be believable.  Regardless, I'm done.  i won't be back next season.

Edited April 12, 2022 by PsychoDrone

[Joimiaroxeu]

Caviar. Whatever. Prince expects his employees to sell themselves relatively cheap if they'resupposed to be wowed by caviar.

Rian really thinks a lot of herself. She assumes having slept with Prince would keep him from getting elected POTUS? I don't think that's a thing anymore unless the candidate holds himself and his wife up as an example of a long and faithful marriage.

Wait, is Rian basically bragging to her coworkers about it now? Why didn't she just keep it to herself? Even with the NDAs, too many people know about it for it to remain a secret indefinitely.

Lol, Wags wanted to solve the Rian problem by killing her. Does that mean he had some bimbo killed for Axe back in the day?

AFAIC, Prince basically put Rian in a thot position without her knowledge or permission. Because he could. There must be a media outlet somewhere he hasn't bought out because I want him to get #metoo'd hard.

Ugh, Prince can fcuk right off. Maybe he can stand to lose $3B just to eliminate Chuck but that kind of money could've changed millions of people's lives. Meanwhile, he's not guaranteed to win the White House just because he wants it real bad and can afford to buy votes.

Dave to the rescue. Yay? Dave butchering "Roxanne." Nay.

I didn't realize this was the season finale. Meh.

[Starchild]

3 hours ago, Joimiaroxeu said:

Dave butchering "Roxanne." Nay.

Yeah, what the hell was that about? Once was bad enough, but twice, yeesh.

[paigow]

3 hours ago, Joimiaroxeu said:

Ugh, Prince can fcuk right off. Maybe he can stand to lose $3B just to eliminate Chuck

A few years ago, Chuck sacrificed his own nest egg to entrap Axe in the Ice Juice sting...

[ahpny]

I just couldn't get past two glaring fallacies central to the plot of this episode. First, as many have already pointed out, there is nothing illegal about owning cryptocurrency. Moreover, owning cryptocurrency is not the equivalent of tax evasion or proof of anything. While owning cryptocurrency in the amounts presumed here might reasonably raise suspicions of real crimes, that's nowhere near what could have lead Prince to be "taken away in handcuffs," as Dave bloviated.

Second, others have also noted, while Dave may have the power to choose not to prosecute Chuck for extortion, fraud and misrepresenting himself as a government agent, her "fix" - preemptively obtaining some other type of warrant that Chuck would illegally backdate and lie about knowing earlier - doesn't really absolve anyone of anything. All that does in implicate her in a conspiracy that compound's Chuck's preexisting crimes. And just like Rein's sleepover, this will not remain secret.

But speaking of that, I also didn't understand why sleeping with Rein was such a big deal, or why, in this day and age, that could possibly be the political blackhole that all apparently thought it was. Yes, sleeping with your employee is not a good look for a the head of the company (and a Presidential candidate), but at least so far, no one has been fired, threatened to be fired, demoted, or reprimanded for anything (though the ostensibly hypothetical discussion of whacking was worrisome). Nevertheless, the very fact that everyone is already looking at her differently and probably treating her differently, subconsciously or otherwise, means it wasn't nothing, and that's why you shouldn't sleep with your employees regardless of whether you're running for President. 

I wasn't aware this was the season finale until several days after I watch it. It lacked the gravitas of the season finales of many other series, whose season-finaleness was clear from the episode alone.

[Carolina Girl]

They should have ended the series with Chuck stomping his feet at the heliport after being thwarted by Axe and Prince.  End it like HBO did "The Sopranos" - abrupt fade to black (I remember hearing about many people thinking their cable had gone out).  Perfect.  Write your own ending.  

[Nathuli]

On 4/11/2022 at 12:39 AM, Broderbits said:

I just don't believe that there was anything of actual value on those drives, not after Mike gave Rian that speech about appearances.

Prince already accepted to the employees that he lost 3.5B that night when he returned with Kate at the bar! Then, he told Kate "now, you know". He just told Rian what he has ended up convincing himself; doesn't mean that he has everything under control.

[Nathuli]

On 4/13/2022 at 2:13 AM, Joimiaroxeu said:

Lol, Wags wanted to solve the Rian problem by killing her. Does that mean he had some bimbo killed for Axe back in the day?

Not quite so, I thought. Wags just stated that everyone else is thinking it, though they are not saying it. In fact, Scooter was the one who said to Wags something like: "this is when you say you know a guy". lol, Scooter and Mike are both bloody hypocrites. I don't see any main character in Billions as innocent. Not sure how others see Mafee as though.

[Broderbits]

On 4/12/2022 at 4:43 PM, Joimiaroxeu said:

Lol, Wags wanted to solve the Rian problem by killing her. Does that mean he had some bimbo killed for Axe back in the day?

He would've tried to farm that task out to Hall; but Hall only took orders from Axe and spoke up when he thought an action was ill-advised. Those particular still waters ran very deep.

[The Solution]

On 4/18/2022 at 10:51 AM, Carolina Girl said:

They should have ended the series with Chuck stomping his feet at the heliport after being thwarted by Axe and Prince.  End it like HBO did "The Sopranos" - abrupt fade to black (I remember hearing about many people thinking their cable had gone out).  Perfect.  Write your own ending.  

Billions is like The Sopranos continuing for just a few more seasons with AJ as capo.

That's it. I'm done.

[Ottis]

This was the least interesting, most contrived, episode yet. They could have started with what was on the drive, skipped how it got there and just moved on.

Compared to everything else that has swirled around Prince, sleeping with a willing subordinate who will say she was willing is barely a speed bump. If it had been a thoughtful examination of a modern issue, it may have been worth the time. It wasn’t.

At this point, it is two guys who are trying to outdo each other in self-destruction… for what? Not my entertainment.

 

Edited August 11, 2023 by Ottis

[Dianaofthehunt]

Damn it, Kate, STOP MUMBLING !

Ms. Rashad’s diction is for shit.

Edited August 13, 2023 by Dianaofthehunt

[Anela]

The girl ending up dead, would have *everyone* asking questions! Especially with him running for President. The media's eyes are already on him, even more than they were. Taylor would talk, as well. 

I liked the ending. 

[Anela]

I stopped watching a couple of months ago, after two of the characters were devastated that, after taking a plea deal, or something, they would only be left with 300 million. That's a slap in the face, even from fictional characters, because people like that do exist. 

I guess now I'm just ready to see how they end it all. Dave said that if Prince was willing to lose that much money, he was willing to do unspeakable acts to get to the White House. He may have had his man take care of things, like Wags - the whole "the girl ends up dead" thing, had him admitting that he wouldn't actually be against that. Both of them have pretended to be shiny, happy, moralistic people, who are more concerned with helping people, than they are with money, but that isn't true. They want that *power*. 

Edited August 27, 2023 by Anela
I think I used too many commas