Succession S4E3-E5
Tom really said "Your earlobes are thick and chewy like barnacle meat" ????
Major spoilers ahead. Please read once you’ve watched S4E3 of Succession.
Yes, yes I know. I’m extremely late to review possibly the greatest episode arc in Succession history. I’m sorry. It’s been a *fun* couple of weeks and to be fair I needed some time to sit with the events of S4E3.
Episode 3: Connor’s Wedding
Since its beginning, the imminent death of patriarch, billionaire and all-around terrible human, Logan Roy has been the core premise of the show. Logan’s death and deteriorating health has been alluded to since the pilot, with him suffering from multiple health scares throughout the course of show, effectively raising the question of his successor and his competency in steering the proverbial Waystar Royco ship.
By S4E3, in the midst of a petty but palpable cold war against his children, the prophecy is fulfilled and Logan Roy is dead. After playing games with the lives of literally every person around him through abuse, emotional and mental manipulation, Logan gets the death he truly deserves. Logan dies on the toilet in a plane that he’s only on because he decided to choose business over attending his eldest son’s wedding. Surrounded by his subordinates who fear and loathe him, Logan dies a pathetic, unceremonious death off-screen.
His children, who half-heartedly attend Connor’s wedding out of obligation, learn of his death through a phone call with Tom. Tom holds the phone up against Logan’s ear after he’s presumably already passed on, and each (excluding Connor) child takes turns trying to distill a life’s worth of internal conflict, indignance, and grace into a few sentences that fall on dead ears. Each sibling has their own way of handling it. Kendall can’t forgive him, Roman tries to assure Logan that he was a good Dad, Shiv breaks down, and Connor is convinced he never liked him anyways.
The episode is heart wrenching because their grief is so human.
“I was keen on doing it by phone call, because that’s so often how we get news, and people can be a bit adrift if you are in a different physical space from the drama of whatever is unfolding,” Succession creator Jesse Armstrong said to The New Yorker. The exorbitant wealth and access to resources that the Roys possess are suddenly of no use to the children, who are disarmed by their father’s mortality. Though they try, the Roys can’t buy their father back to life, they can’t teleport to where they are. Instead, they’re stuck on a yacht to process the loss of the person who they constructed their lives and their personalities around.
Logan’s sudden, abrupt death this early in the season is a testament to Armstrong’s writing. The Roy children don’t have the luxury of coming to terms with the fact that their father won’t be in their life. There are no contigency plans, no time to demand an apology for the harm he’s caused. No time to try to forgive or begin to name a successor.
Back on the plane, Logan’s body isn’t even cold before his associates start to talk shop, contemplating what the best way is to alert the shareholders and the public. It isn’t long before the inherent failures of the world that Logan has created come to light. The absence of Brian Cox’s Logan Roy is glaring, and no one has any idea what to do. Logan succeeded in creating a world where every person was reliant on him because he’s a textbook narcissist. With him gone, his kids are floundering with how to grieve, if it’s even appropriate to grieve, and how to stealthily take the throne.
In the end, I feel no sympathy for Logan, a credit to the pitch perfect writing and performances particularly in this episode. His hubris and selfishnesses is what put him on that plane rather than at his son’s wedding. He chose his death and he put the nail in his own coffin. And he deserved every last bit of it.
Episode 4: A Coronation Demolition Derby
And just like that, the games have begun. At Logan’s apartment after his passing, the overwhelming sense of grief and sentimentality from the previous episode quickly dissipate after the children sense that Gerri, Frank, Tom and Karl evidently begin to plan next steps. Each person puts themselves forward as the potential crown, while the kids try to figure out how they can maintain control of the company they once sought to destroy. When GoJo reaches out the rebel alliance, Mattson insists that the children go out to visit him in Scandinavia—seemingly dismissive of the loss they’ve just felt.
Kendall, Shiv and Roy dance around who the new CEO should be, trying desperately to preserve the sibling solidarity they forged by opposing their father. Kendall and Shiv want it so desperately it emanates off them in waves, but Roman seems to want to do whatever makes the most sense.
That is until Frank stumbles upon a document that suggests that Kendall was Logan’s choice of heir. It’s all the validation that Kendall needed to go full Machiavellian. He teases Shiv for not being included on the document when she questions its legitimacy, “Well, it sure as fucking shit doesn’t say Shiv.”
Kendall uses his Stewy friend card to get the board behind him and just like that, him and Roman are CEO and COO with Shiv having “full input.”It’s not long before Kendall turns to blackmailing Hugo and going behind Roman’s back on a media campaign that will slander their dead father.
Shiv, sensing that she’s getting pushed out, becomes extremely embarrassing and loses her shit.
A few things from this episode: the reason I am a Roman girly is because I think he’s the only one who genuinely wants to work with his siblings and cut the deals that are the best for the company. Kendall and Shiv are so obsessed with being the heirs because of their relationships with Logan that they will absolutely sacrifice foresight and basic common sense to win in the eyes of a dead man. It’s dark. After watching this episode, it didn’t seem like it would be much longer before Kendall goes full “killer”. I don’t think it’s unlikely that he’ll push out Shiv and Kendall. But, who knows.
Episode 5: Kill List
The whole gang now heads to Norway to meet with Mattson, just two days after their father’s death to discuss the GoJo deal. From the jump, it’s clear that Kendall and Roman don’t know what the fuck they’re doing. As a tech bro mogul, Mattson smells blood and revels at the opportunity to ridicule the boys for their inexperience.
Mattson’s team looks down at the Roys, making incest and dumb American jokes at every turn. Mattson himself is unsurprisingly revealed to be a total creep. He confides in Shiv about his obsession with his Head of Communications, Ebba. Turns out, he’s been sending her litres of his own blood as a joke, and he needs the help of “cool” women like Shiv to help him come out of this scandal clean.
Shiv makes a note of the sharper members of the Waystar Royco team (Gerri and Karolina, the women) who will help him navigate the storm with ease. While Shiv is canonically a registered Democrat who hypothetically disproves of Waystar Royco’s more serious crimes (murder, covering up a string of sexual assaults etc.), she cares more about being able to prove that she’s tough enough to put her womanhood aside to serve the interests of the company. That is, the interests of the abusers themselves. Her “business sense” in moments like these lies in her complicity.
In the episode’s climax, Kendall, Roman and Mattson take a stroll up the mountain where he rips into the sons about their incompetency. Roman, who tends to play the good-cop role, rips right back into Mattson—highlighting his cruelty towards the Roys and swearing to bleed GoJo dry through prolonged litigation. By openly stating that he’s going to act against the best interests of the board, Roman knowingly commits an SEC violation, but promises to play it off as a negotiation tactic.
Kieran Culkin’s acting here is insane, and we finally see him break out of his shell and stand up for himself. By the end of the episode, deflated and discouraged on a plane ride home, they learn Roman’s outburst got Mattson up to 192 million to acquire Waystar and their father’s beloved news network. In a strange final moment, Mattson asks Shiv to send a picture of her dejected brothers, and she complies. If you ask me, I think Shiv knows she has no shot up against her brothers (and why would she, she has little to no experience with the company), and is exploring other paths. Whether it’ll be any better than sticking with the boys is something only time will truly tell.
Some final thoughts on this episode:
Shiv is grappling with her pregnancy and imminent divorce in a truly unhinged way, and her interaction with Tom was so literary to me. The way she kicked dirt on his sneakers, him calling her earlobes “thick and chewy like barnacle meat.” These are not normal people and the writers just get it!!!
I worry that Roman will spiral after admitting how grief-stricken he is. Perhaps he will follow a Kendall trajectory after the cathartic monologue to Mattson. That’s my boy though, Roman hive we rise at dawn!!
It’s great to see that with each passing episode Greg continues to be a complete and total raging idiot. I once commented that I thought he had villain material, and sometimes bad bitches are simply wrong!
All weapons formed against Gerri and Karolina will not prosper they ate down this episode I’m sorry
Mattson offering that much money has to be a trap. I don’t trust that man one bit. I wouldn’t be surprised if he has something coming that will gut the Roys and provide shelter for the women who weren’t on the final kill list
If the deal does fall through, Kendall will turn on Roman in an instant. He needs to prove himself as the heir so bad, no one will be able to get in his way.