Billions · Season 1 · Episode 1 · 17 January 2016
S1E1 Pilot
THE MOMENT The first scene - played entirely for character revelation rather than shock value - signals that Billions will be smarter about its provocations than its premise implies.
The pilot establishes the Chuck-Axe combat engine with full efficiency: a BDSM scene that immediately declares the show's willingness to transgress, a wiretap investigation that maps the legal cat-and-mouse, and two lead performances of extraordinary containment. The first hour does not waste a minute establishing the show's pleasure principle.
Full episode analysis below. Spoiler-light verdict above.
Updated
The Billions pilot opens on a scene that announces the show's operating register immediately: a BDSM sequence involving Chuck Rhoades that is constructed not for shock but for character revelation, establishing that the show's most powerful man is not uncomplicated by what he requires in private. Creator Brian Koppelman, David Levien, and Andrew Ross Sorkin then map the Chuck-Axe combat engine with efficiency - the wiretap investigation, the hedge fund world's specific ethical ecosystem, the spousal dynamics that complicate both men's positions. Paul Giamatti as Chuck and Damian Lewis as Bobby Axelrod occupy opposite poles of the same corruption: one exercises power through the law's enforcement; the other exercises power through capital's accumulation. The pilot's pleasure is watching two actors of equivalent force calibrate their containment in the first encounter. NPR noted the show's ability to paint a compelling portrait of how powerful men move the world; Variety called Lewis's performance some of his best work post-Homeland.