Scorpion – Faux Money Maux Problems

By: Kim Olson

In Faux Money Maux Problems, Norteguay’s ambassador to the US, Lucinda Durante (Patricia De Leon), kidnaps Team Scorpion, locks them in a room with toxic chemicals and shoots at them. What’s new? At gunpoint, Lucinda forces Team Scorpion to counterfeit 500 million American dollars to hurt the American economy! She’s going to hide counterfeit cash amongst real currency in the heart of cash disbursement – at a federal way station. Federal way stations are hidden treasury locations across the country where the government stores cash before distributing it to banks. By mixing a huge amount of fake cash in with the real, the value of the dollar will decrease. Once the public finds out about indistinguishable counterfeits, bank runs will begin as people start to fear that their cash is worthless. Panic will spread globally, inevitably crashing the world economy.

Ms. Durante has a very elaborate plan. To get Team Scorpion in her grasp, she tricks them into working a “case” for her at a winery – Crooning Crane. In the limo ride to the “winery,” she knocks them out by drugging the wine they are taste-testing with kevloturane. Thinking he’s pouring a glass for Paige (Katharine McPhee), drugged Cabe (Robert Patrick) pours the wine out on the floor! “I give a healthy pour,” he says. He insists they’re not drugged. They’re just “getting liquored up.” But nighty night Scorpion! Upon waking up, trapped in Lucinda’s compound, Team Scorpion has no idea what’s really going on. Paige asks her mom, “Did you have something to do with this?” and she replies “Absolutely not! As far as I know.” In Paige’s defense, no one trusts Veronica (Lea Thompson) at all! When Paige was little, her mom used to use her to help con people. In one blast from the past, Paige helped her mom out with a con by distracting a woman away from her valuables, long enough for Veronica to steal them by saying she got separated from her mom in a park. Enlightening Team Scorpion, Lucinda walks in and fills them in on what her actual plans are. She assigns everyone with tasks – Cabe, Walter (Elyes Gabel) and Sylvester (Ari Stidham) are to print the money on the ground floor of the compound while Paige and Veronica create a varnish for the bills on the floor above them.

From a window on their floor, Veronica sees a tree line the guys can escape to and through a secret message, created by chapstick on aluminum, informs them about it. With the room to themselves and the printer covering any noise they make, the guys drill a hole through the wall and escape. “They’re drilling through the wall! It’s faint, but I’d know that sound anywhere!” Veronica exclaims. “Don’t even wanna ask why,” Paige replies. Paige and Veronica watch from the window as the guys break out.

Paige and her mom are stuck together, alone, forcing them to have a heart-to-heart. Paige asks her mom, “Why can’t you stay in LA? What are you running from? Don’t you ever tire of running? Does it ever occur to you that disappearing will break Ralph’s heart?” But quickly their moment turns to tension like it always does. Paige yells at her mom, “Did you help me and dad every time you disappeared to run some con?! Every time you got arrested in front of me?! Every time you left us on our own?! You have never helped me, ever! You have only hurt me over and over! I swear, I can’t believe I let you back into my life!” In response, Veronica fakes a heart attack to nab the key card off the guard, Luiz (Danny Vasquez). Upon realizing the heart attack is fake, Paige is pissed. But if she knew it was fake she wouldn’t have acted like it was real and shown real concern for her mom. “First rule of the con artist: Believe the lie,” says Veronica. With the key card in hand, they bolt to the room the guys escaped from. The halls are suspiciously empty of guards. “I saw more guards on the way to the bathroom at Perryville Prison,” says Veronica. All the guards are in the room Paige and Veronica flee to. Of course! Lucinda is about to keep her promise and give Paige and Veronica the bullets with their names on them for being incapable of completing the job, but Cabe, Walter and Sylvester come back to save them just in time. Lucinda and the guards drive off with the money and Team Scorpion follows in hot pursuit to the federal way station.

At the way station, Lucinda locks Team Scorpion in and fills the space with kevloturane. This time she isn’t just trying to knock them out. She’s trying to kill them. Breathe in enough kevloturane and the tissue in their lungs will bleed out and they will drown in their own blood. Fortunately for Team Scorpion, kevloturane is flammable. They can kill two birds with one stone by lighting a matching and igniting the toxic air, causing an explosion, which will destroy the bogus bills. That means they will never hit circulation and allow Team Scorpion to escape. They set the money on fire! Scraps flutter to the ground. “You think any of this stuff is still passable?” Veronica asks. Homeland can now come in, quarantine the warehouse and reprint the original allotment of money. Good work team or as Walter would say, “good team work.”

While the rest of Team Scorpion is in trouble, Happy (Jadyn Wong) and Toby (Eddie Kaye Thomas) are at Crooning Crane goofing off and drinking wine. Because they were awake all night the previous evening “in a wedding venue rabbit hole,” they forgot a piece of equipment for the mission of the day and missed the limo ride. Thinking Walter’s punishing them, they decide to enjoy their time at the vineyard. Toby’s just chugging down wine! “They have sixteen varietals. It’s not my fault I’m thorough,” he says. Talking about Happy, he tells a woman who works there, “This one isn’t used to classy places,” and then, with utmost manners, proceeds to burp. “When in Rome,” he says, drinking his glass of wine. “Why don’t we roam around the grounds?” Happy proposes grabbing hold of Toby’s hand.

Happy notices a guy in a brown jacket who’s holding his arm close to his waist and possibly packing heat has been tailing them for five minutes, maybe even longer. Happy tries to lose him. She grabs Toby and kisses him passionately! She asks Toby to go to the barrel shed with her. Walking fast, he says, “The booze must be affecting my receptors. I had no idea you were feeling frisky.” She tells him, “shut up, you idiot” and fills him in on their new friend. “You’re just telling me now?!” he asks. “Well you wouldn’t shut up about the sturdiness of the pinot noir,” she says. Realizing Walter is not punishing them, Toby feels slightly guilty. “The guys must be in trouble and we’re goofing off drinking wine,” he says. “What’s this about ‘we?’” Happy retorts. When the man following them starts shooting, Happy trips him with wine barrels, giving her and Toby a head start on foot. They run to the parking lot and hot wire a truck. “You drive! I’m pickled!” Toby declares. Their pursuer is still shooting at them. With liquid courage on his side, Toby crawls through the back window of the moving truck and stands in the bed. While being shot at, he uncorks a barrel of wine and sets it on fire with a lighter, creating a bomb. That boy is a genius! It explodes in the middle of the road, causing the other driver to swerve off and crash! “That sobered me up,” says Toby. With their stalker knocked out, Toby and Happy check him for ID and Happy finds zip ties in his car. “Bet you these were for us. Lucky they’re one size fits all,” she says, handcuffing their attacker. They head back to “the genius lair” to help their friends.

Back at the garage, after the drama of the day has cleared, Happy and Toby take some time to themselves to plan their wedding, namely look at wedding venues. “Maybe it’s cause we almost kinda got kidnapped there, but I took a liking to Crooning Crane. Let’s tie the knot there?” suggests Happy. Ready or not, it’s honesty time. Toby can’t afford his half of Crooning Crane. He tells her, “I stopped gambling, but that doesn’t mean I stopped owing money to a few people…. It’s like student debt, except I make payments to the University of Bruno. I have been holding off on telling you and I’m sorry.” Happy walks away in silence and Toby looks dejected. But, to his surprise, his fiancé comes back to him lugging five figures worth of rare motorcycle parts. “I have a problem,” she admits, opening up to him. Happy has five figures worth of “junk” in her trunk! At least $10,000 worth! They’re both broke! “That’s great,” says Toby. “’Cus the truth is I would marry you in Kovelsky’s parking lot. I don’t care as long as we say our I do’s.” Happy doesn’t care either. They just want to get married. “But let’s not get married in a parking lot,” she says. “I could pawn a couple carburetors,” Toby jokes. “No,” she says, moving her toys away from him protectively.

Best Lines:

• Cabe: When Ali asked me if I liked vegan food. I said yes. I like broccoli and carrots. I just left out that I like them next to a steak.
• Paige: This team gets into a lot of trouble, but we never get kidnapped. Sly: Toby got kidnapped. Paige: We don’t get kidnapped en masse!
• Sly: We make em, we fake em, we turn em over to you, you take em. That’s our motto.
• Luiz: I should paint the walls red. Sly: I think that was a euphemism. Not about redecorating.
• Veronica: Remember when I worked at a graphic design firm? It was less graphic design firm and more fake bonds scheme.
• Sly: I was not in the Marine Corps, but I was in student council.
• Toby: Most devastating way to poison someone… inject them right in the heart.
• Toby: Agreeing with actual fiancé.
• Walter: Scorpion is not a democracy! It is a logical dictatorship!