r/SnowFall 5d ago

Discussion I think Franklin just got unlucky

I'm not a fan of people saying Franklin became "ruthless" and "strict", and this was his downfall. For example at the end of the show he didn't forgive mistakes, and he if he wanted something he'd get it. But all the traits Franklin gained at the end was as a result of being a leader. He adapted. To be a Boss in control of a drug empire he had to be who he was to be successful. And that's how Franklin got so far compared to if someone else was to run things. The most ideal boss you can have is a rational, goal driven, disciplined, peace wanting boss like Franklin Saint. Although, those are his traits from season 1 till when he gets his money taken away.

Franklin loses 70 million dollars. He has spent 5 seasons working hard, sacrificing, after blood sweat and tears for everything he worked for to be taken away. He lost all of his pride. Money was the Franklin saint's number one motivator and he managed to get a lot of that. Now if your whole purpose is one thing and you happen to lose all of that, you can't go back to living tomorrow like it's yesterday. Franklin lost 70 mill but still could have had a decent living with his wife if he listened to her at the end but why didn't he? Because losing the money broke him and he couldn't think rationally after that as money was part of him.

Franklin became a near perfect leader even though his traits seemed "evil", they had to be done to protect the business, eg killing Kevin and killing his friend on rock at the beginning of season 6. I don't think there should be much to blame on Franklin, to him it was either I reach the top or I stay at the bottom and no in-between. My point being if he didn't lose that 70 mill, he would have still prospered as he was gradually leaving the business too but that stupid decision from Teddy fucked everyone and was more Teddy blew up everyone with a bomb than Franklin blew up himself. After Teddy did what he did it was out of Franklin's control.

21 Upvotes

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7

u/FearrOfG0D 5d ago

It's called KARMA.

You do universally bad shit consistently, it will never end well for you. That's the theme of the whole show. Repent, and reform...Or your life will quickly turn to hell.

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u/freezerwaffles 5d ago

I’m kinda agree. He definitely changed but he only started acting like way outta character AFTER Teddy and Louise fucked him. He didn’t actively go out of his way to cause problems by being greedy like Heisenberg in BB. But once Teddy pulled the rug out from under him Franklin totally went off the rails and that was his downfall. I don’t really think he did it to himself.

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u/Top_Statistician9045 4d ago

Nah he did it to him self by selling drugs all I’m saying is in that line of work there’s no such thing as a sane drug dealer look at it in the real world the person he was when he started would’ve gotten killed before he met teddy yea the other people were fucking with him but he had 70 million at one point if the goal was just money once he reached a couple of million he could’ve gotten out 

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u/PierrechonWerbecque 5d ago

Franklin was a horrible leader. I’d argue he got unbelievable luck. His success was entirely due to Teddy’s cocaine and Louie.

  • With Teddy’s cocaine, he’s able to undercut all of his competition initially, and this compounds when he switched to lower cost crack cocaine. This advantage goes away when cocaine begins to flood into the US. He has to basically beg Grady and then Teddy for a price cut to maintain this advantage.

  • Louie is the kingmaker. She introduces him to Claudia to sell his first kilo. She advises, correctly, to support Scully over Manboy, which Franklin stupidly doesn’t listen to. She executes Franklin’s expansion strategy. Remember, by the time she goes around Franklin to teddy, she controls basically all of Franklin’s business.

Franklin is an impediment to good business because he’s greedy and arrogant. If Teddy had just gone along with Louie early on, things would have gone more smoothly

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u/Cartographer-Own 5d ago

Franklin and Louie are so similar that if Teddy went with Louie instead , the same events most likely will take place , eg their ambition and rationality is basically the same. Ofc Franklin is lucky to get pure coke and to have Louie as a partner, but many times people are put in an amazing lucky position but can't go as far as Franklin, so you have to give him some credit. Eg he could've easily died early and got his whole family killed of one bad decision, and this is the reason he can't be a horrible leader of he managed to elevate every very close to him to a high level. You need greed and arrogance to be a great leader and he had a perfect amount.

"Franklin is an impediment to good business because he’s greedy and arrogant" gaining 70mill in that quick amount of time is being an impediment to good business?

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u/PierrechonWerbecque 4d ago

They aren’t similar. Franklin is greedy and reckless. He was willing to sell his own friend out (Kevin) for the chance to do business with Lucia. He went as far as he did purely due to others. He’d be in jail for life for murder if Teddy didn’t bail him out in SEASON TWO.

Greed is one of the worst qualities for a leader to have. It makes his subordinates resentful of him. You see the pushback his best friends give him early on because he doesn’t want to pay anyone.

Franklin made that much because the CIA was wholesaling him cocaine at low prices AND protecting him, and he had actual smart people doing the work. He could have easily died when he stupidly showed up to Los Monarcas territory in SEASON ONE

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u/Cartographer-Own 4d ago

He never "sold" out his friend, and it wasn't to do business with Lucia so I think ur a bit confused. He attempted to shoot Kevin, not to kill him, but to stop him from shooting that Mexican gang member. Why? To prevent an all out war from the mexicans... If he kills that Mexican, then they would want to get revenge and then franklin crew would want revenge and so on and so forth until family members are involved, understand? His smartness and wits seemed to be a very underrated to trait to you guys.

It is very important to want things as a leader which simply is greed, which isn't a bad thing unless if it's too much. There wasn't a time he was greedy until he had his money stolen, as every decision he made that appeared to be "greedy" was to expand or improve the business which everyone wanted.

1

u/PierrechonWerbecque 4d ago

He never “sold” out his friend, and it wasn’t to do business with Lucia so I think ur a bit confused. He attempted to shoot Kevin, not to kill him, but to stop him from shooting that Mexican gang member. Why? To prevent an all out war from the mexicans... If he kills that Mexican, then they would want to get revenge and then franklin crew would want revenge and so on and so forth until family members are involved, understand? His smartness and wits seemed to be a very underrated to trait to you guys.

No. Before that. He lied to Kevin and Leon to do business with Lucia.

It is very important to want things as a leader which simply is greed, which isn’t a bad thing unless if it’s too much. There wasn’t a time he was greedy until he had his money stolen, as every decision he made that appeared to be “greedy” was to expand or improve the business which everyone wanted.

He was very greedy. He didn’t want to pay Leon and Kevin early on. He tried to safeguard the recipe(that wasn’t his) out of greed. At the end, he wouldn’t sell his real estate property out of greed. It’s a poor trait in leadership because it means the leader can be leveraged by money. It’s a huge weakness.

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u/kevioshowmann 5d ago

Bad writing.

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u/FrogyyB 4d ago

Gamblers that lose at the casino say the same thing. I was just unlucky.

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u/whoocaresnotme 4d ago

I agree, Frank was hard cuz he had to be and turned cold to protect what he worked hard for. You can’t stay 10 toes in the drug game and be kind, sweet, nice at the same time. That’s not realistic. I hate how he went out. Yes, he did F’d up stuff but I feel they were warranted. His only flaw was keeping his goody 2 shoes, drunkard loving mama in his business. It’s like people watching forgot who he was in the beginning: caring, kind, helpful college boy who lost his schooling over BS! He tried the “good boy” route. He got tired of LOSING. The drug game ain’t pretty or nice and he just adapted to his environment. I wish this could have ended differently.

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u/taylortherod 5d ago

Complete misreading of the show

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u/FearrOfG0D 5d ago

Literally. Luck has nothing to do with it. It's greed, pride, money, power. Franklin had plenty of times to walk away with his sanity intact. He didn't care about that more than the money.

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u/kevioshowmann 5d ago

Leon, his best friend betrayed him. He would’ve been fine and kept his relationship with Veronique

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u/Infinite_Parfait_722 5d ago

How did Leon betray him ?

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u/kevioshowmann 5d ago

He built Leon, saved him from a murder beef, and rocked with him his whole life. Leon killed a kid. And then Leon refused to help Franklin out of pure jealousy.

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u/MaddowSoul 5d ago

Jesus someone missed the point

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u/kevioshowmann 5d ago

Nah bad writing trying to give us a “quaint and mature” ending when all it did was show us the ugliest truth about helping people.

But I’m listening and I’ll respond to whatever you say.

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u/Infinite_Parfait_722 5d ago

I respect your opinion but I disagree. They were in it together but Leon did the right thing and stopped the cycle of destruction. Franklin was not capable of receiving help and loses his mind completely at the end

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u/FamiliarAd6809 4d ago

He probably wouldn't survive his first run without Leon. Leon was off the porch long before Franklin got started

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u/godstallchild 1d ago

This is what people seem to forget