Summary: Greg stumbles through his testimony. An important shareholder suggests to Logan that he takes the fall for cruises. The Roys go on a holiday on their yacht. Willa's play is reviewed terribly and she is upset. Connor looks for financial support from Logan, but Logan only wants to help if he withdraws from the election. Kendall brings Naomi on the yacht but Logan tells him to send her away and he does. Shiv is planning a threesome for Tom, but Tom is uncomfortable with it. Roman, Laird, and Karl return. Laird praises his performance in securing the deal, but Roman admits that the deal is likely a sham. The next day, everyone discusses who should take the fall for cruises, which ultimately becomes heated. Tom's name is brought up and he's upset. Later, he opens up to Shiv about how unhappy he is, and Shiv speaks with Logan, insisting that he doesn't pick Tom. Kendall and Logan visit Stewy to make a deal but Stewy doesn't agree to it. Logan meets with Kendall and asks him to be the sacrifice. Kendall asks if he was ever going to get the CEO job and if he deserves what happens to him; Logan tells him he's not a killer and that the Andrew situation was NRPI. Kendall and Greg fly back to New York the next day. Kendall appears on TV but decides to blame Logan for everything, using Greg's documents as evidence of his involvement.
The Good: I enjoyed this a ton. It was a perfect choice to have this season finale be personally focused on the Roys as they enjoy a vacation together. There could have been more action and higher stakes here since it's a finale, but Jesse Armstrong exercised restraint and allowed the strength of the characters and their relationships to dictate this finale, and it was stronger as a result. I loved the yacht setting as it gave the dynamics of this episode an isolated feel. The conflicts involved felt less like a high-stakes and intense ordeal, but more of an intimate family ordeal which is easier to emotionally invest in. The problem of needing to select a blood sacrifice was enthralling and it led to so much meaningful conflict throughout the episode. The character dynamics were outstanding throughout. The best scene to showcase this was the breakfast where everyone got to discuss their thoughts on the blood sacrifice. So much was at play under the surface and I was vastly impressed at how deep this was while still being thoroughly entertaining. On the surface, the scene is a fantastic piece of comedy/drama as the characters politely threw each other under the bus in increasingly escalating circumstances. It's a joy to watch and well performed by everybody. But underneath this, there are so many beautiful story beats. Kendall is never once brought up, emphasizing how he was thought to be untouchable but clearly Logan doesn't think so. Logan starts the conversation by offering himself to be the sacrifice, which is what should happen. But this is clearly Logan finding an excuse to hide behind because if he genuinely did want to sacrifice himself, there is nobody in the room who would be able to stop him (just look at how he enforced their attempt to acquire Pierce). This brilliantly reveals the extent of Logan's manipulations as he looks for who to sacrifice. Tom and Shiv have a fantastic story in this episode (more on this later), and this breakfast scene is a perfect scenario for Tom's emotions to explode. He can't stand that Shiv is not standing by him at all, but we later find out that Shiv was trying to erase suspicion since she and Logan were already planning to sacrifice Kendall. Tom has every right to be furious about this, while Shiv's thought-process behind not backing Tom is understandable. The character consistency in this show can be remarkable at times like this. Even Connor gets a good involvement in this sequence as he offers to sacrifice himself for some money, which is hilariously implausible. Add on some other fun moments like Roman stepping up to prevent Gerri from being sacrificed, and Greg's strange fixation on being viewed as "Greg sprinkles", and this scene is wildly entertaining with so much impactful character development. The crux of this episode rests on Kendall and Logan's relationship. Kendall's been meek and subdued all season, and finally it's now his time to shine as he regains his agency and culminates a high satisfying character arc. The scenes with Logan and Kendall are terrific and say so much about their relationship. I fully believe that Kendall would have willingly taken the fall for cruises if Logan hadn't said two key things that made his manipulation starkly apparent to Kendall. The first is of course the "you're not a killer" line. Logan tries to play it off like it's no big deal, but Kendall understands that this is the reason that Logan has undervalued him at every turn. This is the reason that Logan wants to keep Kendall as his right hand, because he never believed that Kendall had the strength to be anything more. So to prove Logan wrong about this, Kendall decides to fire a killer blow at the press conference by destroying Logan's reputation. The press conference itself is a fantastic scene, and Kendall saying "but" and launching into a tirade against Logan is immensely satisfying. Even Logan can appreciate and respect Kendall's fight in this scene, and that final shot of his semi-smile is a phenomenal piece of acting by Brian Cox. Furthermore, this scene is made even more satisfying as it finally pays off Greg's forged documents, which have been a Chekhov's gun all season. Learning that they contained Logan's signatures to directly implicate him in cruises was a huge reveal and highly cathartic. This ties into the second thing Logan said to Kendall that made him turn on him: Logan tells Kendall "NRPI", which is the exact term that Mo had used to justify what he did. This moment is an enormous revelation that was enthralling to puzzle out. Hearing Logan say NRPI means that he almost certainly has been aware of the cruises situation this whole time, and it makes perfect sense. Logan has said that Mo was a close personal friend and was shook up about his death, so of course he must have known what Mo did. That he quotes NRPI without any apprehension tells everything to Kendall. Furthermore, this exposes to Kendall that Logan could have easily brushed off what Kendall did because he has done it to Mo dozens of times, if not more. Yet, Logan did not brush it off as a nothing moment in the season 1 finale. Logan blackmailed Kendall and he has used Kendall's guilt to keep him in check all season. For Kendall to find out that Logan doesn't even believe this to be a big deal is a clear indicator that Logan has manipulated him all this time, and it's now time for Kendall to fight back. There's so much more I can discuss regarding the dynamic between these two, but I can't write forever. Overall, this episode explored their relationship in an incredible way and offered so many fascinating human elements for us to dive into and enjoy. Tom and Shiv continue to have one of the most compelling relationships on the show. It's apparent from the very first scene that this threesome arrangement makes Tom deeply uncomfortable, and I got a lot of laughs out of seeing this manifest as the episode went on. Unfortunately, things took a much more serious turn after the awkward breakfast, and after 11 episodes of trying to look the other way, Tom was finally able to let out his emotions to Shiv. His frustrations with their relationship came pouring out in a wholly realistic way, and his description oh how sad he is in their relationship was genuinely heartbreaking. Sarah Snook continues to be quietly magnificent, and her reaction to Tom's words were fantastic. Shiv uses Tom, belittles Tom, and looks down upon Tom, but she genuinely does seem to love him, and hearing about how sad he is makes Shiv feel pained and guilty. Seeing Shiv beg Logan to not pick Tom is a magnificent scene to follow-up on that. Even more magnificent is Tom's scene with Logan. I don't know what I was expecting Tom to do, but eating Logan's chicken and walking away was absolutely not it. What a fantastic, hilarious moment. I imagine that Tom wanted to make a power move to make it clear to Logan that he isn't just going to take the abuse that's always levelled at him, but true to how Tom does things, his attempt just leaves Logan baffled by what happened. I like what this episode did with Roman. Following his important dealings in Turkey in the previous episode, we spend much of the early parts of this episode examining the fallout. It's great to see Roman take up a more serious role and rise to the occasion. Roman has wanted to show what he's capable of for a long time but has failed repeatedly. Those failures have been funny, but they also made this moment feel that much sweeter. While Laird is happy to fill Logan's head with baloney to collect his paycheck, Roman trusts his gut instincts that the deal was a sham, and is able to give Logan good advice. While Roman likely considers his experience to be a failure, we can clearly see that this is a character victory for him because he has finally showed what he is capable of to Logan, which is what he has been after all along. Tragically, he can't even see that he was successful. Connor has been in the background for much of the show so far, but I always enjoy what he has to offer. He provides some good laughs early on as he becomes a meme, and through his reading of the reviews for Willa's play. Willa chucking the tablet into the water with a comical splash was also fantastic. After this, things take more of a serious turn. Connor is in financial trouble and desperate to keep following his dream, but he's now presented an interesting choice from Logan: give up his dream and get some money to stay afloat, or lose his rich status to follow his dream. This is a fun set-up for Connor in season 3, and I enjoyed the scenes between him and Logan in this episode. The Bad: I feel robbed to have not seen more of Greg at the stand. What little we saw was so funny and I would have loved to see more of how he handled himself up there. The Unknown: What will be the fallout of Kendall's bombshell reveal? How will Logan respond? Will Tom and Shiv's relationship survive? They are on pretty thin ice right now. Is Connor going to give up his campaign? Best Moment: Logan asking Kendall to be the blood sacrifice and their entire conversation afterwards was splendid. You could pick so many scenes to potentially be the best, but this one takes the cake for me. Character of the Episode: Kendall. It's good to have the real Kendall back at last! Conclusion: A terrific season finale to what has been a terrific season. This episode accomplished so much and was an engrossing way to end the season. Season 2 was terrific and took "Succession" to another level. The first season was solid and got better as it went on, but season 2 escalated the quality of the story by diving deep into the characters and their relationships with each other. We learned so much fascinating information, and I looked forward to each episode as an independent character study of the Roys, exploring new facets of them with every episode. Even though I despise these despicable people, I now find them utterly fascinating and I can't wait to see what they do next and what more there is to uncover about them. "Succession" is a damn good character drama, and I hope that it continues to get better from here. Score: 80
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Aaron DhillonJust a university student who loves to watch TV. And analyze it way too much. Archives
March 2024
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