Note: This story contains spoilers from “Succession” Season 4 Episode 3
TV shows are accused of jumping the shark—that is, writing in over-the-top stunts or plot twists—when they run out of organic ideas.
The third episode of the fourth and final season of “Succession” jumps off the Statue of Liberty with a surprise Death Waystar’s mentor Logan Roy (Brian Cox). But with trademark aplomb, HBO’s best-written, acted, and directed series uses the most melodramatic phenomena imaginable to uncover a wealth of new facets to the major characters’ personalities, and to bring these selfish, evil To bring out whatever sympathy people might have.
The Roy family and their retinue may not be as much fun to watch on Sundays as they used to be, but they’ve never been more mesmerizing. Showrunner Jesse Armstrong and his team took a huge leap with this one. In retrospect, we should have had the confidence to know that they would make it pay off like some other writers’ room might.
Who – or what – do you love?
The episode titled “Connor’s Wedding” is a miracle of misdirection before the big switcheroo arrives. The first two entries of the season led us to expect cringe-o-rams of rich folk idiocy as Alan Ruck’s eldest brother Roy drags former escort Willa (Justin Lupe) into a media carnival for his pathetic presidential campaign. changed his marriage.
The hour begins with naïve Connor dashing any hope his father Logan had of attending the ceremony. Logan gathers most of his Vestar Royco executives for a chartered plane trip to Sweden, where he intends to hammer out the final details of the group’s sale to tech billionaire Lucas Mattsson (Alexander Skarsgård). Logan wants Roman (Kieran Culkin) — who at the end of the last episode began running away from Logan’s trio of kids, who were fighting his every move — to join him, as Roman and Mattson share a common bond. Went back.
Roman reminds his father that it is half-brother Connor’s wedding day, and he plans to attend; This most creepy Roy shows the child’s capacity for sensitivity toward others that emerges throughout the hour. Logan asks Roman to fire Gerry (J. SMITH-CAMERON) – the Vestar General Counsel who was notably not invited on the trip to Scandinavia. Aware that his son sends D-K pictures to the friendly old lady, it’s yet another test of loyalty that Logan’s dumping on the people he plans to retain on his ATN network, When Mattson acquired its remaining ViaStar assets; See also Episode 2’s Tom-to-Greg assignment to break the bad news to Kerry (Zoe Winters) about her anchor audition.
To describe the initiative, Logan says, “Clean out the stalls.”
The wedding pregame is underway in New York Harbor, and the dock is indeed full of bunting, while a brass band is blowing by. Shiva (Sarah Snook), Kendall (Jeremy Strong) and their brother Roman. So is cousin Greg (Nicholas Braun), who is being told from the Teterboro airport by his boss/victim/best “friend” Tom (Matthew Macfadyen) that Logan doesn’t want him to go to Sweden.
“He’s hurting you visually right now,” Tom said, referring to his favorite punching bag.
“He’s so petty,” Greg sniffs, perhaps not realizing that Logan’s assistant-for-profits Kerry (Zoe Winters), who threatened to rip Greg apart like string cheese the last time they met, Met, are on the plane.
Geri is also married. When Roman tries to arrange a meeting after the ceremony, she immediately understands what’s going on and puts on a typically, brutally confident bad boy apologetic spot, whereupon Kerry confronts Greg. had left
Meanwhile, Connor is getting fitted on the wedding cake. Is he just being his usual silly self? We soon learn that it is made from Victorian Sponge, which as a child she ate for a week after her mother was committed by Logan.
Despite that sad memory jog, Connor still yearns and hopes for his father to show up. To avoid confrontation upon arrival, the groom asks his younger siblings to wait in the upper cabin of the triple-decker party boat. Greg, still under the illusion that he is “like a kid” in the eyes of the family, is rejected when he tries to move in.
the real show begins
Tom calls Kendall from the plane. Logan is sick, unresponsive. A flight attendant is doing CPR.
“How bad is it?” Too many times asked and answered unsatisfactory. Ken orders a phone to be brought to the ear of his father, who is lying semi-ambiguous on the floor in an isolated part of the cabin. Kane delivers a final message – strange, angry but heartfelt and strangely loving in the way that only he can – to the unconscious Logan. Kane then leaves the room to find Shiva, who is networking in a crowded part of the boat. As he searches for his sister, finds her, and walks back to the private cabin with startled disbelief, the excellent Steadicam work heightens the disorientation and urgency.
If you thought Sarah Snook’s performance at the end of this season’s first episode was disastrous, it was. But the old saying “you ain’t seen nothing yet” could have been coined for the gamut of emotions running across Shiva’s face and tone of voice as she reacts to the news she hears. As always, Shiva is the child who, in distress, reveals the most affection for Logan – now with a subtle hint of guilt when they last met and talked about it afterwards.
In their most brotherly moment yet, Kendall, Shiva and Roman try to reassure each other while second generation Roy Straw figures out what to do.
“Get the best airplane medical specialist in the world!” Ken yells through the phone as he is informed that the plane is turning back to Teterboro.
It is decided that Connor needs to be informed.
“Oh man, she never even liked me,” is his predictably cocky response. He is not able to talk to anyone in the plane.
The Waystar Braintrust — Tom, PR head Karolina (Dagmara Dominczyk), COO Frank (Peter Friedman) and CFO Carl (David Rasche) — call on air to strategize the order of contacting people, how to spin a statement that Will not crash the stock price and other preparations. Kerry comes through the curtain from the part of the plane where Logan is lying, his eyes wild and his mouth a disturbing rictus.
“Fg crazy, isn’t it?” She asks for someone’s approval. She wants to help prepare the announcement, the officers aren’t having it and she’s moved to another part of the plane, perhaps a harbinger of her ultimate fate.
Tom then slips into a bed cabin, calls Greg and tells him to go to ATN and delete the files ASAP. But the boat is leaving the dock.
Another ViaStar public relations person, Hugo (Fisher Stevens), is on board to serve as a liaison between the authorities in the air and the family separated on the Hudson River.
“We’re not that different,” Kendall corrects erratically. But she’s unusually engaging as Gerry joins the kids to help prepare a statement.
“We are highly liable to misinterpretation,” Kane realizes. “So let’s grieve or whatever, but don’t do anything that restricts our future freedom of movement.”
Elsewhere, Connor and Willa come to the conclusion that circumstances dictate that they postpone the wedding. But then he confesses that he is always afraid that she will leave. They share a rare, reassuring laugh.
The other three children meet on an outdoor deck while the towers of Lower Manhattan loom in the background. There is shock and clearly genuine concern for his father’s life, but he is also beginning to prioritize how to deal with Waystar’s board of directors, the markets, and draft a statement that Frank will sign. Logan’s ultimate fate remains unknown.
Back at the cabin with Jerri, Roman tries to get one of his charges out on Jerri. She’s not doing it this time – nor, with any luck, for the rest of the season – and leaves him alone in the cabin.
The three younger Roys then take a water taxi to a waiting helicopter.
we all grieve in our own way
With ominous orchestral strings on the soundtrack, the plane lands at the airport. Police and kids are on the asphalt, shutterbugs crowd the runway perimeter.
A press conference is held inside the terminal. Shiva read the statement: Logan Roy was pronounced dead at Teterboro.
Tom is there and hugs his estranged wife. Shiva leaves. A group of three children hug; They look really devastated.
Shiva then exits the terminal to “see her”. Halfway through the plane, she stops, turns, and calls out to Tom. Ken watches from the terminal as Roman becomes the only Roy child to board the plane.
The body in a bag is carried to a waiting ambulance.
On an island in New York Harbor, Connor and Willa marry.
Best one-liner:
After Kerry is successfully encouraged to leave the Westar executives on the plane alone, Karolina says, “I think Tom, she’s going crazy,” trying to be sympathetic.
“Oh yes?” Shiva’s husband replied, always attuned to the best in humanity. “Judging from his grin, it looks like he caught a foul ball at Yankee Stadium.”
Stray Overview:
The Westar suits on the plane display typically unusual professionalism, much as the Roys on the boat unveil their capacity for admiration and empathy with one another. They seem very real and focused on what needs to be done for the company so that Logan dies, while also being smart enough to acknowledge that one man’s life hangs by a thread. Except Tom of course, but even though he’s as weak as ever, he still steps up to be the best source of information for the people on the other end of the phone. Perhaps they are all relieved that the man they hate and fear will no longer bother them.
Following Logan’s fall, the events on the plane and boat show glimpses of real time, which certainly brings added urgency to the series’ most intense half-hour. The ticking clock element – will the plane land in time for Logan to get the medical help he needs? — adds to the pressure, while Roy’s responses strike a nearly perfect balance of revelation and anchoring familiarity. It’s masterfully directed by Mark Mylod, one of the show’s executive producers. Mylod also recently directed the dark cooking comedy “The Menu”.
So, is Logan really dead? After all, it is the Easter episode, and Logan hints that he thinks he knows more than God. There are visual clues on the plane, most of them not conclusive. But every partial shot of the man unconscious on the floor is in the background of other business going on in another part of the cabin. A “perfect” shot is fired over his prone head; We see more of Logan’s hair than his face. And we never see Roman inside the plane in New Jersey; Being that she is most likely a sibling with dad, how reliable can her reports be?
Playing dead could possibly be Logan’s endgame move. If this happens, it would be the plotting equivalent of jumping off the Empire State Building. But if any show can pull it off, it’s “Succession.”
