This week’s follow-up begins with a laudatory speech. No, it doesn’t apply to Logan Roy (Brian Cox), whose funeral takes up most of this episode. The speech will be given by Roman (Kieran Culkin) and is actually for Roman. Roman praises himself twice in this episode, a tribute to the times when he held power in the company. This is Roman’s farewell. Roman is still alive, but he died for Waystar Royco after a horrific attempt to salute his late father.
At the start of Church and State—one of the best Succession episode titles of all time—Roman rattles off his speech over a bunch of pink (pink!) note cards, alone in his apartment. “My father was a legend,” says Roman, “and shit, shit.” Or something like that. This scene plays out exactly how I rehearsed it for a seventh grade science presentation: half-assed. But he doesn’t even have a PowerPoint presentation to back it up! Roman fails to get a single coherent train of thought across his practice session, so God only knows what a mess he’ll make at the real funeral, in front of everyone around the world – his Matsson (Alexander Skarsgård) siblings. ), even POTUS.
Only Logan Roy’s funeral would take place the day after the election. Crowds of left-wing protesters take to the streets of Manhattan to protest the victory of fascist Jeryd Mencken (Justin Kirk). Did he even win? After Milwaukee’s ballots are set on fire by another group of protesters (presumably right-wing, despite Roman’s claims to the contrary) in the final episode, the election is contested. The only news station to call out the choice for Mencken was ATN, which is now under fire for an early and potentially wrong decision.
Tom (Matthew Macfadyen) is so disturbed by a New York Times centerfold article exposing events at ATN on election night that he tells Greg (Nicholas Braun) to call the paper with a correction. Tom wants to be named as the one who called the election. Yes, it might weigh on him — but what’s the point of getting in trouble when you’re just a little bubble of blame in the New York Times? He wants his face to appear as big as possible in the newspaper. Tom is so upset about this and all the election madness that he skips Logan’s funeral altogether.
Harriet Walter, Kieran Culkin, Sarah Snook and Jeremy Strong.
Macall Polay/HBO
Also absent are the children of Rava (Natalie Gold) and Kendall (Jeremy Strong), who are brought to the state by their mother after violent protests erupted across New York. Kendall is angry. He threatens to stop traffic. He threatens to call New York State to put Rava under surveillance. All this anger – and yet he couldn’t bother protecting his own children by not calling the election early. Succession fans cheered for Kendall (and a little, too). Aren’t we all against him at this point?
That keeps all the attention on Shiv (Sarah Snook), who is using her father’s funeral to influence the company. Shiv is no longer upset about the election – I swear that woman has a steel wall protecting her heart – but has his sights set on Mencken. She strikes a deal with Matsson that will promote her to CEO if Matsson is allowed to buy out the Waystar stock. The pair just have to convince Mencken that he should dodge Roman’s requests to block the deal so they can move on.
Luckily, that’s not too difficult as Roman completely squanders his chance to be considered a strong head of the family. After Logan’s brother Ewan (James Cromwell) takes the stage at the funeral – Greg was supposed to restrain his grandfather and prevent him from making a scene – to deliver a fantastic eulogy, it’s Roman’s turn next. He’s making a complete fool of himself. After spending the last few episodes stumping around firing everyone and trying (and mostly succeeding) to take as much control as possible, Roman loses everything when he collapses onstage.
It’s unclear if Roman is sobbing with sadness or embarrassment. It’s probably a mix of the two, although the ladder makes more sense given how emotionally untouched he seemed after her father’s death. (On the drive to the funeral, Roman joked about how sexy he might find Shiv during her pregnancy. How sad can he be?)
Roman disappears for a while before regaining his dignity at the wake, where Logan’s attention was drawn to Mencken. Again, Roman can’t grieve because he wastes absolutely no time sauntering over to the President-elect and asking when he’s going to block the GoJo deal. But Mencken has been playing the idiot brothers the whole time – he tells Roman he’s “still thinking about it” before Greg approaches them to interrupt their conversation. Then suddenly everyone tries to chat with Mencken. It’s Shiv who has the last word and takes Mencken to chat with Matsson – later they get the ‘yes’. Matsson and Shiv will take over Waystar.
However, the biggest power play at this funeral wasn’t about the company at all. Rather, it was about all of Logan Roy’s ex-lovers (unless there’s more hiding under the woodwork). Caroline (Harriet Walter), the mother of Shiv, Kendall and Roman, carries her new husband with her to the funeral. She makes a grand gesture when she hugs Kerry (Zoe Winters), Logan’s assistant and youngest wife of the hour, in her loving arms and supports her through tears. Caroline leads Kerry through the crowd to Sally Ann, another woman, who she pulls beside her. The three of them approach Marcia (Hiam Abbass), Logan’s widow, like a line of ducklings.
“Sally Ann was sort of my Kerry,” Caroline says to the group of women. “But now all the water is under the bridge.”
The women sit together in the very first row of pews. As the event begins, Marcia takes Kerry’s hand. Not only is this a mildly humorous, gasping moment — I couldn’t keep my jaw down watching Kerry and Marcia squeezed together and staring at their mutual lover’s coffin — but it also has quite a bit of power . These four women have been the biggest supporters of one of the world’s greatest threats. You’ve seen everything. You’ve seen Logan cycle through other women (Where’s Rhea Jarrell?), devastate his kids, build an empire — and now they only have each other.
Justine Lupe, Alan Ruck, Kieran Culkin, Jeremy Strong and Sarah Snook.
Macall Polay/HBO
Keeping up with the Roys
While they may not be part of the main plot, we still want to highlight Succession’s most flaming burns and spiciest moments. Here they are from this episode:
-Kendall’s, Roman’s and Shiv’s mother has invited everyone to a relaxing family vacation in the Caribbean where everyone will reflect on the past week. “Mom suddenly wants to be a mom,” says Shiv. Ouch. And even though Kendall cried for his kids all morning, he has no regrets about his mom: “I’m a hard ‘no’.”
-Karl (David Rasche), Frank (Peter Friedman) and Gerri (J. Smith Cameron) talk about their former boss at his funeral. “He’s actually gone,” says Karl. Gerri snorts: “How many of you are looking forward to it?”
– After Roman messes up his eulogy, Kendall takes the reins. He’s such a supportive brother. But Roman takes a serious ego blow when Kendall grabs his notecards and, on stage, just feet from her father’s lifeless body, begins to rewrite his speech.
-Logan’s grave is a big topic of discussion. It’s so big! There are empty holes in the wall for the children to put their bodies to rest in future – how thoughtful. Connor (Alan Ruck) claims the top bunk. My favorite line, however, comes from Shiv, horrified by his $5 million tomb adorned with red streamers: “Was he in a bidding war with Stalin and Liberace?”