Succession is one of those shows, like The Americans, where I easily understand the emotional content but have a harder time with some of the plot. It’s one of those shows where things happen in whispers and winks and I don’t always grasp developments right away. It’s another reason why I wouldn’t make it in that environment. So I’ll start with a few things I didn’t get right away.
I’m not sure what’s going on with Nate and ATN. Is Ken promising that the network will be friendlier to the Democrats? Is it in exchange for the Democratic presidential candidate doing something or other? I’m slow on the uptake here. I was also a little fuzzy on what happened with Ken’s daughter. I got that the show is saying the election is causing rising hate and discrimination in America but was the hate the girl experienced in the street directed at her or was it a more general vibe? The election plot seems a little undercooked this season. I know the general idea is Mencken is a fascist and I believe he was down 4 percent in the polls (shades of 2016) but I lost track of it in the confusion of the party. I knew Connor would be the Ralph Nader/Jill Stein of this election and draw votes from a major candidate but in this show, it’s the Republican he’s drawing from.
I definitely understood the emotional content of that vicious fight between Shiv and Tom—for like 45 minutes—on the balcony. None of this was just things you didn’t mean said in the heat of passion; you don’t bring up that many specific grudges unless you’ve been stewing about them for a long time.
George and Martha just laid into each other like never before, two scorpions on the attack. Shiv tells Tom he only wanted her for her DNA and that his family is a bunch of conservative hicks. Tom tells her she shouldn’t be a mother, which visibly wounds her. “I have given you endless approval and it doesn’t even fill you up because you’re broken,” Tom says. Shiv says she doesn’t care, which always comes off convincingly when you’re crying. Shiv tells Tom his betrayal at the wedding kept her away from her father in the final months of his life, something so true and hurtful to someone like Shiv that it was ice water in the face.
Tom is upset because Shiv is spreading around rumors that he’s going to be fired from ATN, but his wife says it was more of a light implication. Oh, OK then! An implication from your wife about your firing isn’t as hurtful as an outright statement. Shiv is giving Matsson inside information on her brothers’ plans to use the regulatory power of the SEC and DOJ to stop the sale of Waystar to GoJo. She tells Tom she’s “fucking her family” so she can get the huge payout she expects to get. I only have limited sympathy for this. I understand wanting to betray her brothers after they froze her out, but if she’s really that conflicted about it, she could just, like, not do it. “Fucking my family” is a loaded choice on the part of the writers. There’s no actual incest happening in the Roy family apart from some jokes, but they’re definitely insular.
Tom might get fired after laying off dozens of ATN staffers with some fake tears, saying what a difficult day it is—for him—and leaving the dirty work to Greg. Can you imagine how low you’d feel being laid off by Cousin Greg? You work hard for years and get the ax from, as the one Swede calls him, a “fucking dingleberry.”
So when is this funeral? Logan’s body must be embalmed to hell and back. I guess it has only been a few days since he died but the show seems to be getting Game of Thrones–esque with unrealistic travel times. They’ve had trips to Norway, California and who knows where else this week. The Roy siblings spent three seconds planning his funeral at lunch and left without eating. I haaate that—people on TV dramas always go out to dinner and leave without eating. I don’t know how many episodes of Dallas I watched where Sue Ellen went to lunch with someone and before they could even order, Sue Ellen told the other woman “stop screwing JR” or whatever and stomped out in a huff. I obviously love to eat so I don’t like this. That bread looked pretty good at the Roys’ lunch. I would have stayed.
It's a bit of a Gift of the Magi to see Ken and Matsson accusing one another of fraudulent business practices. As we saw last episode, the Roys edited Logan’s posthumous video to say falsely that Living+ would double the company’s revenue. Now we find out that Ebba, GoJo’s truly dangerous communications woman, that her company doubled its number of subscribers in India (I knew there was a reason why Matsson needed a quick sale). Both of these are blatantly illegal, so both sides are screwed in this deal.
The next episode will be election day, wo we’ll get some clarity on the election plot. Some of the Roys seem concerned about a hard-right president, but they’ll be fine no matter who wins, because they’re unimaginably wealthy. It must be nice to live in a triplex that’s so big that you have a spare room you can use for dozens of coats for your fancy party.
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