Succession: episode by episodeSuccessionThe Roy family patriarch reaches new levels of vindictiveness and fury, as he takes his employees on a traumatic corporate retreat
Spoiler alert: this recap is for people watching Succession season two, which airs on HBO in the US and Sky Atlantic in the UK. Do not read on unless you have watched episode three
‘He can do whatever he likes, he’s a human Saudi Arabia’
There are strong echoes of King Lear in Succession and one of the themes of Lear is of humanity recoiling into bestiality. Well, animals of all descriptions are strewn with Shakespearian gusto throughout this typically linguistically rich episode. Snakes, crocodiles, cats and kittens, mice, armadillos, elephants, turkeys and wild boars are all alluded to as Logan seeks fresh fields to conquer and enemies within to smite. He is in mighty form this episode, but with his awful plan to buy out a rival news company, is he about to bite off more than he can chew?
We open with Greg in a meeting with Logan’s would-be biographer. He nervously blurts out that Logan can be “vindictive, paranoid, violent”, without stating that he is speaking off the record. Poor Greg. Fool that he is, you would have thought the family might have sent him to some sort of church.
Logan is having a checkup, but is in grizzly denial that he needs to rest, certainly not to sit out the corporate retreat. His secretary brings him news that Mo has just a week or so to live, but he defers this close reminder of mortality, refusing to schedule an appointment to see him. Instead, he is reinvigorated by news that PGM, his liberal news nemesis owned by the Pierce family, might be up for being bought out. When he tells the board members, however, they struggle to subdue their grave doubts about the move.
To help ease the possible buyout, Logan decides to bring Frank back into the fray. Roman is aghast but sees an opportunity, via Tabitha, to clinch the deal for Dad himself, thereby screwing over Kendall; Tabitha, it turns out, is friends – once more than friends – with Naomi of the Pierce family.
‘Get in line behind Bezos and the Clintons’
Meanwhile, would-be President Connor is “beta-testing” a video for Instagram in which, clutching a beer in his kitchen, he rails against the tax system and threatens to withhold his own payments to the IRS. Logan finds a job for Shiv; to have her squelch this political foray, as it might bring attention to his own tax “arrangements”.
Shiv agrees, but gets wind of the PGM takeover proposal. She has to explain to Tom the consequences for US democracy if Logan carried out the equivalent of Murdoch buying CNN. “If we own the news, I wonder where I’m going to get my fucking news.” She charges Tom with the task of telling Logan the idea is a bad one. Tom demurs; such a move goes against the grain of his kiss-ass ways. Shiv, however, is adamant, reminding him that she will soon be the new sheriff in town.
Shiv visits Connor, but he refuses to accede to his father: “Tell him to get in line behind Bezos and the Clintons.” He tries to flip her, offering a job running his campaign. She decides to work on Connor via his girlfriend, inviting herself to a bar with her to meet her actor friends. There, she meets an actor, Chris, and they go back to her flat and make out. No screens at his apartment, she notes. He says he gets all his political news via comedians. A cultural shift worth taking heed of, perhaps?
To Hungary for the corporate retreat. Tom is plucking up the courage to confront Logan as instructed, but his nerve deserts him; the old man is furious at news that the biography of him is going ahead, and that PGM looks like backing off the deal. He also learns that someone within his organisation has spoken to the biographer; the smell of Greg browning his trousers is palpable from the screen. But Kendall and Roman, it turns out, have also received calls from the biographer.
At the evening meal Logan’s fury brings out a fearsome, almost medieval, autocratic streak as he seeks to cow his family and employees. Learning that Connor has decided to release his Instagram video doesn’t help any. any either. Questioning everyone at the table, he commences an excruciating game called “Boar On The Floor” to try to smoke out doubters about his jeopardised takeover plan and the leaker to the biographer; those who give unsatisfactory answers, including Karl, Tom and Greg are forced to crawl about on all fours, making “oinking” sounds and fighting for sausagesAt next morning’s breakfast, Logan apologises that things got a bit “fruity”. He then learns that Mo has died and that it turns out he was also the one who spoke to the biographer. Meanwhile, word has come through from PGM that the deal might be back on after all.
Shiv greets the returning Tom distractedly. He complains about his trial by ordeal, one he failed miserably, and asks if in future he might have more input on their “team” tactics. She vaguely agrees. She offers to tell Tom about Chris but, mouth still sore from oinking, he isn’t up to it. Finally, Shiv gets a call from Logan. “It’s time to bring you in.”
Who is The Heir Apparent?
On the strength of her call from Logan, Shiv. Although she was dismayed by the slow track her dad had in mind for her last week, she has retained both her composure and her scepticism; it was a good ploy for her to palm off responsibility for confronting Logan about the PGM deal, thereby distancing herself from any suspicion of disloyalty. And, as a passing remark on the private plane betrayed this week, Logan may still not entirely trust Kendall.
Notes and observations
Connor’s preposterous anti-tax rant would, in normal times, see him laughed to the fringes of American political discourse but, post-Trump, American political comedy/drama has had to accept that there is little too absurd to be plausible. Risible as Connor’s campaign is, the programme-makers will surely run with it. In any case, today it’s not Succession modern audiences would be dismissing as utterly unrealistic; it’s The West Wing.
Logan’s torment of his executive underlings brings to mind Stalin and his coercive inebriation of his terrified guests at his dacha; also of Richard Desmond, formerly owner of Express newspapers, instructing Express executives to join him in a chorus of Deutchsland uber Alles at a meeting with Telegraph executives whose potential new owners were German.
Roman has an especially pitiful time this week, asking Gerri how to make good with her Dad, who plainly regards him as a “moron”. But his one redeeming feature is his wit: “You know who drinks milk? Kittens and perverts.”
Much as we spent the opening episode in the fetid confines of Kendall’s head, this time it’s Tom’s turn. Watching him time and again fail to muster the courage to confront Logan would be excruciating if it weren’t so pleasurable.
As for Kendall, he is beginning to acquire the calm, unflappable air of a Michael Corleone; no one’s whipping boy any more, condescended to no longer. He presents himself as the instrument of his father’s will – but has he really abandoned all ambitions of succession?
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