After four years of Succession, none of the Roy kids wins a kiss from daddy. Ken in a sense does become his father, terribly abusing his siblings during the board meeting. But he only claims his birthright to cruelty, and not Logan’s business acumen and ends up doing something the old man rarely did: failed. His CEO dreams die by one vote, and he ends up the same sad sack he always was.
Instead, Tom Wambsgans triumphs as the lapdog CEO of the new company. Shiv unwittingly sets this in motion by saying her estranged husband will “suck the biggest dick in the room.” She means this as a passive-aggressive way to save Tom’s job but keep him at heel, but Matsson takes it differently. After Tom doesn’t push back against Matsson wanting to fuck his wife, the Swede realizes Tom will submit himself to Matsson’s real power, something Shiv would never really do. And so Tom, the empty suit, fails upwards into the CEO job—exactly how it goes sometimes in real life. Greg, with his combination of cunning/slackjaw-ness, is a similarly useful idiot to Tom, so of course Greg also ends up failing upward.
All this is true to life. Did anyone think the world of Succession was a meritocracy?
The night the Roys spent at their mom’s in Barbados was a parallel to how they bonded at the end of season 3 in a similar tropical location. It was also a parallel Earth, depicting how the kids could have just walked away from the company intrigue and enjoyed each other’s company and the billions they’d cash out with. I don’t fully understand their problem with Caroline. Sure, she’s a piece of work, but no less than anyone in their circle. They might have been better off with her. After Roman’s breakdown/beatdown, Caroline is the only one who actually says she’s taking care of him.
The kids skip out on her plans to go back to the board meeting. “Never had my plans ruined before by a huge board meeting,” their mother says. She’s passive-aggressive but right—I have some sympathy for how it must have been to try to build a life with the Roys and have it constantly interrupted.
The siblings compare notes and realize that at one point, Logan told each of them they could have the company. Shiv got her assurance a few seasons ago when she seemed to be on the upswing, and Roman inferred a more cryptic vote of confidence just before Logan died. Ken’s promise came at a Candy Kitchen at age 7, and he’s had to carry that warping burden ever since. After finding out Matsson is screwing her, Shiv decided to screw him and tank the deal. The three “anoint” Ken as CEO in a sweet bonding scene on a raft in the water (they always seem to bond over the water). The thing is, none of them are very competent. Roman never could have gotten it; he’s too all over the place and has too much work to do on himself first in terms of working through his child abuse. I always saw Shiv and Ken as about equal in terms of ability, but Ken might have an edge as he was more involved with Waystar than his sister. But really, none of them are serious choices to run a company.
The scene in the kitchen as the three blend together a vile concoction as “a meal fit for a king” was sweet and fun. It played on some untold history among the three and was a nice way for the show to say goodbye to them. They flew to Barbados separately and in a snit, but they fly home together.
The show also has a final goodbye scene to Logan, shown in a video of a recent dinner with his mistress and the grays. He’s relaxed, riffing on politics and singing songs. None of his kids was invited. They can put stickers on Logan’s belongings and claim them after he dies, but they didn’t break through to that true inner circle with their father.
Unity crumbles in the boardroom. Roman has a last heartbreaking moment of mourning the CEO position he didn’t get, wondering why it couldn’t be him. Ken hugs his little brother but in doing so, literally reopens a wound so he can claim his power. It’s a hug and an assault; a harbinger. The vote to sell is 6–6 with Shiv as the tiebreaker. Siobhan lives up to her nickname in the final moments of the show and tanks the deal.
Shiv’s motivations for this were likely complicated. I think she does believe, correctly, that her brother would be terrible as CEO. “I love you but I can’t fucking stomach you,” she tells her brother. Maybe a part of her also calculated that if the sale goes through, she’d be married to the CEO and could still stay in the game. Maybe voting to sell was just her exercising whatever power she could.
The scene in the glass-walled boardroom was the ugliest in the show’s history as the three backstab one another worse than they ever have. Kendall screams “I’m the eldest boy*!” at his siblings, showing all of Logan’s thunder but none of his power. Shiv brings up the waiter Ken killed, threatening to reveal that to the board. Roman makes some shockingly nasty comments about the biological parentage of Ken’s kids. Most alarming of all, Ken—who had previously defended his little brother against their father’s abuses—assaults Roman with a horrific face-hold that made it look like he wanted to kill him. Ken continues the cycle of abuse in his family, inheriting his dad’s cruelty—but walks away with nothing.
The siblings are shattered after all this. These are terrible people who hurt one another and somehow have still managed to retain a bond after everything, but the hurt may just be too deep to come back from this time. After all, they no longer have their father or the company to orbit around. If Logan had any wishes for them to remain together after he died, all that lasted about a week.
So where do they go after the final credits?
Roman Roy is finally free. “We are bullshit,” Roman says, almost as a thesis statement for the show. “It’s all fucking nothing.” He goes to the bar for a drink and while there is a twinge of sadness on his face, there’s also a smile. Maybe he can live for himself and find some peace.
Siobhan Roy’s future is uncertain. She’s married to the CEO and pregnant but their marriage is an ongoing disaster and Tom is still facing heavy criticism for his premature election call. Can she really be happy outside the center of power? As her father said, she married a man “fathoms beneath her” so he wouldn’t betray her, but he betrayed her anyway. In the car, Tom extends his hand and she accepts it, but half-heartedly.
Kendall Roy is completely lost. He came within a micron of power and lost it. He’s estranged from his siblings and his kids. Now all he has is a bodyguard he doesn’t need, and nothing really to do. He walks around and stares out at the river. He thought he could be his father and ended up with the old man’s worst qualities and none of the success.
Season 4 was a thrill ride, powerful enough to bring me to the brink of a panic attack over the death of someone I didn’t know, and to send me into despair about the election of a fictional fascist. None of the kids ended up with the crown but that was immensely satisfying to me and very true to the spirit of the show. Succession was never really a show about succession, but instead a show about idiots failing upward and stayed true to that until the end. It wasn’t about the destination but the incompetent bastards we met along the way.
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