Appointment Television
Succession is three episodes into its final season, and as a member of a generation that has consumed television content primarily through streaming I’ve gotta say- waiting a week makes this so much better
I was born in 2002, which is important to this piece because it means I missed a golden age of television as I was just too young. I consumed the Sopranos and The Wire on streaming platforms. I watched all of Breaking Bad over six weeks, and I gotta say I don’t think it was meant to be watched like that. Not that I had a bad experience with the show- it was great- but I feel like having to wait a week to see what happens after the iconic “Ozymandias” episode would have made the final moments sweeter.
I got an opportunity to do that with Succession’s final season- most of my favorite shows have been off the air for a decade- this is my first opportunity to watch how a show I love ends in real time, and it has not disappointed me.
I started Succession immediately after finishing The Wire- needless to say it was a pretty big change of pace. For one thing, this show didn’t have any characters I liked. I could look around at The Wire and say “ok I think I want good things for Bodie or Namond or Duquan.” That’s not the case with Succession. Every character is the most obnoxious rich kid you know. Everybody uses this bizarre sanitized corporate speak to say the most evil things to eachother. Hell, one of the the main conflict’s of the show is “which unqualified sibling will daddy choose to run the company when he’s done?” I don’t think I’ve seen a more perfect encapsulation of the type of person I despise than the average character on Succession. The Roy children are the definition of being born on third base and thinking you hit a triple.
It’s great.
THE REST OF THIS CONTAINS HEAVY SPOILERS FOR ALL OF SUCCESSION
How do you make the audience relate to, and even empathize with these people? They are larger than life figures- basically nobody on the planet can understand their problems, let alone relate to them. Yet somehow, Succession finds a way to make every character relatable. Kendall Roy might be kind of a jackass but I can understand his strategy of crawling into a ball in a poorly coordinated effort to self-soothe when everything is going wrong- I do that! Roman’s a creep, but I think everybody can relate to his ability to use denial, something he demonstrates so frequently in this series it becomes one of his behavioral trademarks. Shiv might not be able to express emotion in a healthy way, but we can all relate to the fact that she’s constantly caught between what feels like the right thing and what the right thing actually is.
One of my favorite things about Succession is how you can see in every character interaction exactly what the impact of their upbringing was. These people are all severely emotionally stunted. Nobody has a healthy relationship with their parents or their children, or even the idea of attachment and love itself as shown in their interactions with friends and partners.
My favorite example of this is the Roy’s relationship with happiness, which is to say it doesn’t exist! I don’t think I have seen a genuine moment of happiness from any of the Roy kids. When Kendall isn’t mid-spiral he’s desperately seeking approval from everybody around him- his father, his ex wife, his children- anybody that he feels he has disappointed. Even Kendall’s “victories” are hollow. When he finally exposes the Royco cruises scandal he does it as a castoff- nobody in his corner except cousin Greg (kind of) and the people he’s paying to be there.
Shiv Roy and Tom Wambsgans were always a match made in Hell. Tom Wambsgans is too focused on being a people pleaser to the detriment of both himself and his marriage, and Shiv is too focused on “winning” their marriage to care about having a healthy relationship with Tom. It’s no wonder their relationship functions exactly how you imagine it would.
Through the first three seasons we got bits and pieces of the Roy’s (in)ability to deal with emotion, but they’re always isolated to one or maybe two of the siblings. That, to me, is what’s so special about “Connor’s Wedding.” All of the Roy siblings have to deal with Feelings- a thing that makes them all feel icky in differing ways- at the same time.
Roman is first. The first scene of the episode is Roman having what would end up being his last conversation with his father- Logan invites Roman to meet with Mattson, Roman reminds him that it’s Connor’s wedding day, and Logan brushes the notion of attending his eldest son’s wedding off like it’s a meeting he can stand to miss.
Now, if you jump forward a few scenes the siblings are all on a ship for Connor’s wedding. Shiv ignores a couple of calls from Tom, and the younger trio meet up with Connor. After the meeting Shiv gets voted to tell Connor Logan won’t be attending his wedding, as Kendall and Roman think hearing it from Shiv will soften the blow. Almost immediately after she exits the frame, Roman receives a call.
“Your dad is very sick,” this is my favorite line delivery from Matthew Macfadyan’s whole run on Succession. Tom’s apologetic tone and scared intonation make it hit extra hard and immediately throws an already high-strung Roman into a panic, with Kendall and the audience close behind.
This is where the episode turns from “really good” to “maybe the best single episode of television I’ve ever seen.” Roman and Kendall start frantically asking questions. Tom can only answer with varying levels of “it’s really bad guys” while trying to avoid saying “yeah he’s probably dead” outright.
In the flurry Tom refers to Logan as “nonresponsive” prompting Kendall to respond with “he’s non responsive?,” followed immediately by the question “can he talk?”
For me this line really sets the tone for the rest of the episode. The Roy’s are in disbelief. They’re asking nonsensical questions because a nonsensical thing is happening. This person has been a towering, terrifying figure over your entire life and suddenly he’s nonresponsive?
Karl comes into the room and the boys ask him about the medical attention Logan is receiving. In the middle of this line of questioning Frank enters.
“They should talk to him.”
I feel like this was the moment where most of the audience went from “ok whats going on here” to “they killed God??” I’ve never watched a moment like that live, but after Frank said that, the strings fastening my jaw shut severed and my mouth fell open for the rest of the episode. What I love about the way this episode is written is the absolute certainty of the situation combined with the denial being utilized by all parties that’s slowly being chipped away.
Tom knows the totality of the situation but the environment he’s in combined with his people-pleaser personality forces him to suppress it.
When the boys begin panicking as to why they should say something to their dad, Tom says “I think in case it’s the last chance.” Not “in case it’s the last chance” or even “I think it might be your last chance”- those would be far too final- Tom needs to pepper in several phrases that soften the blow of the sentence, and he continues using this style of dialogue for most of the episode.
The scene moves quickly to Roman and Kendall talking to Logan.
Roman goes first and immediately goes into “everything is gonna be ok” mode, more for himself than anybody else. This is the way Roman self-soothes throughout the series and seeing it on display in a situation where things are worse than they’ve ever been for him works really well. It’s the emotional version of bringing a knife to a gunfight.
I think Kieran Culkin turned in his best performance of the series in this episode. His words to Logan are a man desperately trying to convince himself his father is ok. He’s using the mythology of Logan Roy, building him up as this “monster” to keep reality from setting in for himself. During Roman’s piece we get a shot of Catatonic Kendall, something we’ve seen before in the series. Most of the time when CK makes an appearance something has gone wrong as a direct result of him, but this time not only does he not have control over any part of the situation besides his own reaction, he’s also facing an event that feels impossible.
Roman finishes up before frantically saying “I don’t know how to do that” and handing the phone to Kendall.
Kendall takes a less frantic approach, I think mostly due to the fact that his panic manifests in a different way than Roman’s does. He tells his dad he loves him while also telling him he can’t forgive him, being far more honest than Roman was able to be.
They then both remember Shiv is out looking for Connor, and Kendall runs off to find her. He pulls her away from the conversation she’s having and Shiv immediately knows that there’s an issue, assuming it’s with their mother. Kendall explains the situation while trying to maintain an aura of calm so as not to alert party guests that there’s a problem.
I said earlier that I believe Kieran Culkin turned in his best performance of the series with this episode, and I would say the same about Sarah Snook. A lot of her performance throughout the series as Shiv is subtle and measured, but the emotion that cascades off of her in this episode stuck with me. Shiv doesn’t lose her cool in the same way Kendall or Roman do throughout the series, but this time the emotions are too much for her to subdue.
“They think dad died,” from Roman followed by the soft “what” from Shiv is my favorite interaction of the episode. Over the last minute Shiv has gone from socializing normally, to panic, to fear, and now she’s arrived at devastation. The line delivery from Sarah Snook is absolutely pitch perfect and feels like the exact encapsulation of your brain’s first response when you get terrible news.
Shiv is handed the phone and says her piece to her father, and I believe this is the point in the episode where I started saying “go get Connor.” Roman and Kendall have already said their piece. One of them can quickly go and find Conner, but nobody even thinks to do it.
Shiv is the first to really call Tom on the sugarcoating, responding to his performative uncertainty about her father’s condition with “are you just being nice to me?”
Shiv’s monologue is so good. I wish I had more descriptive words to describe it, but it really is just so good. Snook is able to isolate the feeling of a scared child in the form of an emotionally repressed adult whose world is caving in so well with her line delivery.
This point in the episode is where the character reactions get really good- you can really see the wheels turning for each individual sibling. What they’re thinking, what their panic level is, how this news is beginning to set in.
Tom’s resolve finally shatters when Kendall asks one more time if Logan is ok. He breaks the pattern of pacifying and finally admits to the siblings, and seemingly to himself that Logan is not ok. Shiv asks if he’s gone, to which Tom informs her that his heart and breathing have been stopped “for a while”
This is the point in the episode where the difference in how the siblings are handling this becomes even more apparent. Roman delves deeper into his denial and tries to maintain some level of positivity while his siblings seemingly start to begin processing the fact that their father is dead.
After Tom says that Logan’s heart has stopped, Roman says “but that doesn’t mean he’s dead, medically?” Roman can’t handle this fact, so he starts wracking his brain for minute defenses that his father could still be alive, eventually landing on arguing the definition of dead.
Kendall tries to take control, demanding that Tom puts him on with the pilot. He calls Jess, demanding she get a hold of Logan’s doctor, “the best heart doctor in the world” and “the best airplane medicine expert in the world.” While it’s clear Kendall is trying to control the situation, his utter powerlessness and lack of preparation for this scenario is present in his words. He then gets on the phone with Frank demanding to speak to the pilot. When Kendall is told he can’t speak to the pilot he asks why, and Frank calmly reminds him that the pilot is flying the plane.
Back inside, Shiv asks the boys why they didn’t immediately come get her. Eventually they overhear Connor and remember he is, in fact, both a person and their sibling, and he probably would want to know their dad is dead. Shiv and Kendall go to tell Connor and we get a shot of Kendall and Shiv holding each other’s hand like two scared children.
Connor is a plant that grows on rocks and feeds on insects that die inside of him. His father has been a distant figure over his entire life, and now he’s dead.
“Aw man. He never even liked me.” It’s a matter-of-fact line delivery followed by Connor walking it back to “I never got a chance to make him proud of me” without really thinking about the impossible task that would have been.
The siblings go up to a private room where Connor asks for more details about what happened. This scene has overlapping emotions that range from sadness to fear to disbelief to anger. Roman and Kendall explain to Shiv and Connor what they heard at the beginning of the call from Tom.
And then Roman says it. “We don’t know he’s gone.” Kendall and Shiv delicately try to dance around the fact that their father is dead while Roman keeps the wall of denial up. The hug Kendall gives Connor in the background combined with Shiv informing Roman he sounds slightly delusional works really well to separate the people that can process this properly in the moment (Connor, Kendall and Shiv) and those that can’t (Roman). Connor sits to comfort Shiv before the scene cuts back to the plane. I think that scene isolates the Roy sibling dynamic perfectly- the younger three are a trio. More confident and sure of themselves, but when things get really bad nobody actually knows what to do. Connor steps in as the pseudo-father figure offering comfort, as was his role during the childhood of the younger three.
The rest of the episode is just building on the tone the first half of the episode set. The siblings continue to deal with this event in their own ways- ways that don’t appear healthy but are clearly the only ways these people can process emotions.
Succession is a show about the most emotionally stunted people in the world going through life. An event like the death of a parent is a perfect thing to watch them have to deal with, and gives the writers a perfect setting to explore how their backgrounds lead to their real time reactions.
And getting to experience the episode live? Priceless