This article includes several spoilers for Sunday’s “Succession” episode on HBO. Betrayal. Lies. Confessions. Other betrayals! Congratulations on your Season 3 finale, “Succession” – it seems you lived up to the expectations.
The following are the five most stunning moments from one of the year’s most anticipated television episodes!
Kendall’s downward spiral continues.
Kendall (Jeremy Strong) would he live or die? The argument ranted on social media all week, given that the penultimate episode’s final scene showed him on a pool float, slowly drowning — he looked like a shell of a human following the horrific conversation he had with his father, Logan (Brian Cox), who essentially guaranteed he would not be bought out of the family business, Waystar Royco, and would continue to make his life miserable.
Additionally, Strong’s interesting (and, as is often the case with celebrities, extremely contentious) recent New Yorker profile and intensive acting method sounded like the kind of story that would run when a character is nearing the end of their life.
Anyway, we learned in the opening minutes that Kendall survived after being discovered in the pool by his crisis PR rep, Comfrey. Kendall seemed barely functioning when he returned to the Italian villa where the family was vacationing for his mother Caroline’s (Harriet Walter) wedding after spending a night in the hospital.
Even though he came dangerously close to drowning, probably on purpose, he didn’t want anybody to make a big deal out of it: “One too many Limoncellos, no big deal,” he whispered.
Kendall seemed to be in such distress that his estranged siblings expressed genuine worry for him: Even Roman’s (Kieran Culkin) sarcastic remark to Comfrey fell flat. (“If you locate him again in the water, there is a C-note inside for you just to let him sink.”)
They even staged an intervention: “You are an addict.” “You’re hooked to alcohol, drugs, relationships, sex, job, and family problems,” Shiv (Sarah Snook) said.
However, it all descended into Roy’s family dysfunctional bullshit. “Do you have any clue what it’s like to be promised something and then have it snatched away?”
Kendall inquired, alluding to his conflict with his father over the company, only for his half-brother, Connor (Alan Ruck), to interrupt the discussion by demanding that everyone remember he was the oldest son and storming out in a fury.
Willa consented to Connor’s marriage.
Willa (Justine Lupe), Connor’s girlfriend, consented to marry him to make him feel better after the blowup. However, she hated him the majority of the time and looked to regret her choice immediately. “How horrible could it be?” she said emphatically.
The unpleasant business trip of Logan and Roman
Since last week, when Roman attempted to email an explicit picture to Waystar Royco general counsel Gerri (J. Smith-Cameron) but inadvertently sent it to… his father, things have been, hmm, unpleasant.
Logan sent Roman along on a last-minute trip to see technology CEO Lukas Matsson (Alexander Skarsgard) figure out a prospective merger between Waystar Royco and Matsson’s firm, GoJo, in the finale, and it appeared as if everything had been forgotten.
So who was expecting Logan to deliver a long-delayed and very twisted sex lecture to Roman? Certainly not Roman, who was surprised but explained to his father that he attempted to email the picture to Gerri simply because he was “being awful” as usual.
Logan was unconvinced. “Get straightened up if you need to,” Logan hissed at him. “I’m not interested in learning.”
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When they came, the situation deteriorated, and Matsson offered that, rather than a merger, he takes over the whole firm.
Logan first rejected emphatically but agreed to consider alternative options and requested Roman leave and return to the wedding – a foreshadowing of what was about to unfold.
Kendall’s declaration
After this moment, the Emmy Awards should save some time and immediately give Strong the trophy for best drama actor.
Shiv brought her brothers into an alley during the wedding celebration to discuss the family business issue — it was evident that something was building behind the scenes with Logan and Matsson, and the children were being kept in the dark — but Kendall was uninterested.
Rather than that, he was distracted by two waiters tossing away garbage, which revealed his worst secret: on the night of Shiv’s wedding in the Season 1 finale, he was involved in a vehicle accident and murdered a waiter.
Kendall buried himself in the earth. “Something is gravely wrong with me,” he said gently. “I am not a decent human being.” And, although he had been feuding with his brothers throughout the season — he had attempted to bring down the family business, after all – he abruptly confessed: “I murdered a child.”
I was euphoric and determined to score. And I was inebriated. However, I drove, and he noticed something and took the wheel, and we ended up in the ocean, where I abandoned him and fled.” Kendall then collapsed altogether. (However, he did not inform them that Logan assisted in covering up the crime.)
Shiv and Roman attempted to console him — each in his peculiar manner. They refused to allow him to refer to himself as a murderer, and Roman made some crude jokes: “Who is the true victim here?”
I waited three-quarters of an hour for a gin and tonic,” he observed dryly, eliciting the tiniest of grins from Kendall, despite his continuous sobbing.
Shiv eventually exited to take a call. She stated that a deal was being negotiated for GoJo to acquire Waystar and Logan to cash out and abandon them all. Suddenly, the three fighting siblings found themselves on the same team.
The concluding scene
The episode concluded in the defining event of the series when the Roy brothers discovered Logan and wanted to know what was going on with the impending sale to Matsson and GoJo.
On the way over, they formally allied to drive Logan out of the firm and discovered that, according to a stipulation their mother negotiated as part of their divorce settlements, the three children had veto power over any change in management at Waystar.
Logan first claimed to be amicable, stating that it was an “ideal time to deal with a big technology business” and handing over authority to Matsson. “This is the optimal time to sell.
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If I am not doing the best deal possible at every point, what is the purpose of anything? If I do not leave, I lose $5 billion.”
Kendall beckoned, “Come on, Dad.” “How are you going to spend the five billion? Put it in the same pile as the rest of your bile?”
“Probably,” Logan said. He had no problem in responding to his children — whom he had ignored and tortured for years, without teaching them any life skills — when they inquired about their future at the firm.
“Construct your pile,” Logan instructed them. “This is a chance for you children to get a real-world education.”
However, after Shiv said that they had veto power, Logan lost it, yelling that they were moron’s and he had them beat. Logan Roy called Caroline because he is always one step ahead of everyone else.
“Your mother and I have been studying the words of the divorce deal, and we’ve agreed that the meetings were slightly out of date,” he said casually, as Kendall, Roman, and Shiv realized (in exclamations peppered with expletives) that their veto power, and likely their positions at the company, had been removed.
“Dad. “Please,” pleaded Roman, the only heir who refrained from rebelling against his father. He reassured his father that his children loved him, but this only served to enrage Logan more since he knew their original objective was to push him out.
As Logan departed to continue harming his children, Shiv pondered, sadly, who alerted him in advance of their impending arrival. Logan pats Shiv’s husband, Tom (Matthew Macfadyen), on the shoulder in a gasp-worthy scene.
Tom seems to have finally gotten his retribution for Shiv’s constant condescending demeanor and essentially revealing in the previous episode that she doesn’t love him and is aware she’s too good for him.
“Wait a minute, Shiv. Are you all right?” Tom inquired innocently, while Shiv was speechless. Finally, when Tom urged Cousin Greg (Nicholas Braun) to join an alliance, his prior chat with Greg made sense.
“Would you want to make a deal with the devil?” Tom had inquired.
In the episode’s defining line, Greg cheerfully agreed: “What am I going to do with a soul anyway?” he said. “Souls are tedious. Souls, boo.”
