#succession analysis

[moonagedaydreamsofrhiannon]

parallels…

[thegreatmelodrama]

Upon rewatching Succession again, it becomes clearer to me that show is one which only gets better the more times you rewatch. Not just because of the reminder of how good the story is or the acting, but because the rewatch (and indeed the first time binge watch) provides a completely different viewing experience that provides you with a richer understanding of the characters and their fates. The first watch, I find, puts you into the perspective of each of the kids as you experience the show in the moment with no knowledge of what comes next (even if in the back of your mind you know the outcome will be one that amounts to tragedy). You watch and think the kids (or one kid in particular) really does have a fighting chance to be the victor. Just like each of the Roy children, you are persuaded by shiny, meaningless promises and small victories that give you illusions of hope. The genius of the show is that it does make you care and root for people who you shouldn’t root for much to your own chagrin. You get so caught up in their stories and focusing so much on the successor, that you don’t fully take the time to comprehend in the moment that you are watching them being tested again and again and coming up short every time.

When you rewatch the show in its totality, you recognize perhaps what you didn’t before: that hopes and promises are fragile things destined to break and that the small victories are outliers in a war that was never really meant to be won. You pick up on the subtleties sprinkled throughout the writing that reveal the greater depths and truths about the characters, character dynamics, and where they end up.

It is upon rewatching that you can fully comprehend that from the beginning Logan never really intended on naming any of his children as successor to Waystar Royco, even if that’s what he so desperately wanted. The company served as a carrot-and-stick with which to exercise control, and nowhere was that more obvious than with his children. If you go back to the scene where the “old guard” and the kids discuss the sheet of paper Logan left behind and the conversation between Frank and Kendall, it really cements this fact. There exists a sheet of paper which was edited at some unknown point that has a list of names with Kendall’s underlined (or crossed out depending on which side you are on—however even that argument is pointless). However, as viewers we are aware of what happens in reality, outside of that sheet of paper: Logan was constantly testing his children, and the second they failed he would turn to another and repeat the cycle both to maintain his own control in real time and preserve his legacy afterwards. At some point he accepted the conclusion that they weren’t “serious people”. It still doesn’t stop him from bringing them back into his orbit, however, even once he decides to sell to GoJo and Mattson, with the promise of responsibility and meaningless titles.

Watching the finale for the first time, you don’t fully contend with the fact that the company doesn’t go to the kids. It seemed both obvious and yet shocking and surprising at the same time. Even more pointedly, you don’t fully accept that it was never and probably could never be them until Shiv herself reaches that same conclusion in the conference room during the vote and once more when Roman dejectedly says “we are bullshit…it’s all fucking nothing man”. It’s like reading a Shakespearean tragedy for the first time: you know it will end poorly, but you aren’t convinced until the final, tragic blow has landed and you are left on the final page.

However it is only upon rewatching that you can truly comprehend that from the beginning and trace every character’s trajectory with a deeper understanding of who they are and how they got there.It was always going to end like King Lear or Hamlet: it was never going to be the kids who became successor; it would always amount to nothingness and loss with a foreign power taking control with a family ripped apart by ambition and competition. But by god does the show do a fantastic job of making you think otherwise throughout its epic run.

[cultofroslin]

Did anyone else notice the sudden—but not entirely surprising—regression in Gerri Kellman’s wardrobe choice in the finale of Succession? (Pardon the low-res image; I couldn’t get a proper screenshot.)

After seasons of sharp, C-suite-worthy suits and intentional jewelry, her return to the now GoJo-acquired Waystar looks… muted. She’s back in something closer to her old uniform: “invisible, like wallpaper, boring old sort of nothing, like a competent clever filing cabinet that everyone seems content to have around.” The cut is almost military-utilitarian. The overall effect is designed not to offend anyone—even though, yes, it’s still Emporio Armani.

And with Succession, we already know this isn’t accidental. Everything we see on screen has been thought through. Even the costumes are extensions of a character’s interior state, their strategy, and their place in the packing order. So Gerri’s outfit in the finale reads more like a deliberate choice: the re-donning of her chameleon skin.

She’s treading lightly. Navigating the possibility of reclaiming her old role while sizing up her new “soft” and “sick on vacation mania” colleagues. This is Gerri making herself nonthreatening again.

But what happens when she does get her role back?

It’s clear that nothing about Waystar Royco will ever be the same under Matsson's control. The vikings are steering the ship now. Which made me wonder: how does Gerri Kellman adapt in a GoJo-acquired Waystar Royco? This is my attempt to visualize some parts of her in that universe.

We already saw hints of her experimenting with Scandinavian fashion back in S4E5—mostly dictated by Norway’s weather. But New York is a different battlefield. More than the climate, it’s about culture. The nature of the business has shifted, and the kind of talent being onboarded has changed. Suddenly you have Norwegian sensibilities crossing the Atlantic, landing squarely on the East Coast.

So Gerri does what Gerri always does. She adapts. Ever the chameleon, she recalibrates her look to match the new power: a crossover of tech-world casualness and Scandinavian precision, but still grounded in her signature polish. She drops the severity and ruthlessness of corporate New York. She looks relaxed and approachable—yet still not careless or weak.

As for her new office—and everyone else’s—the Nords bring their utilitarian-minimalist design ethos with them. All executives' offices look the same. It’s a shock to the retained employees who were raised on the old Waystar culture, but a clear perk for the younger hires the new regime is courting.

No personal items on desks. No territorial markers. You can sit anywhere, take over any table as needed. Power no longer announces itself through awards or framed certificates on the wall. If you’re a leader, your presence has to do the talking. And that, of course, suits Gerri just fine. She has never needed any props, anyway.

This is where my thoughts on Gerri Kellman begin after GoJo. If you have a different take on who she becomes in this new order, I’d genuinely love to hear it! Perhaps I can even work on visualizing it.

More Succession analyses → [x]

[rmoonys]

The reason that each of the Roys are so easily manipulated by Logan begins and ends with the fact that he will always know each of them more than they’re known by anyone else—because they don’t know how to let themselves be known or understood by anyone else, not even each other, not even their partners or lifelong friends, (he’s made sure of that.) and THAT is why he’s always able to say the cruelest possible thing, cut them where it’ll hurt the most, or manipulate them most effectively. Because in order to betray someone fully, in order to hate them properly, you have to really know them. And even when he’s hurting them, all they can see is love. All they can feel is known, understood, and they’ll spend the rest of their lives chasing that feeling that only their father can provide, begging for scraps and doing whatever it takes to get them.

[applciuux]

“We’re kids”

roman reverting back to childhood with a t-shirt—youthful and colourful, which we haven’t seen in roman’s attire before. he’s showing that his business showmanship was always a facade and a way to try to mimic his father, a way to cope with the insecurities that came from logan and childhood. he is regressing as a defence, like he has on numerous occasions, because he copes by turning the painful into the pleasureful. I’m not saying that he is feeling pleasure in any sense atm, but instead the abuse is comfortably painful for him, so now that his father is gone, he is wanting to go back to a safe space that isn’t actually safe: his childhood. similar to Kendall in s3, where Kendall although didn’t lose his dad physically, their relationship was spiritually died. The siblings are children, and they cope the only ways they know how: abusing others and being victims of abuse.

[peachypaddys]

MY addition to the tomgreg betrayal discussion is that it's not gonna happen bc it simply isn't set up. ppl just expect a betrayal bc "it's succession" but the betrayals didn't happen out of nowhere.

kendall's s2 betrayal wasn't a shock since he literally tried going against his father two times before in s1 and ended s1 firmly under logan's thumb where he was walked all over and treated like a puppet. so that + the latent desire to overthrow his dad = s2 betrayal.

tom's s3 betrayal might have been a shock in the moment because of him seeming so spineless but he too ends s2 in a markedly unhappy place with shiv where he wonders if he'd be happier without her AND his betrayal was foreshadowed back in s1 by logan.

contrasting that with how tom and greg end s3 shows the difference. they're gladly joining alliances and giggling nefariously about whatever they're gonna do. they spent the whole of s3 growing closer until their relationship rn is so much more friendlier than at the end of s2. the prev two relationships were very clearly going on a downward trajectory while tom and greg's were upwards.

so i don't think a betrayal is on the cards but other lines that could be possible foreshadowings for what's in store for them include:

"greg's expendable"

"you think tom can handle the competition?"

the rest of the nero sporus story (and he gave him a ring, and he made him dress up like his dead wife)

"i'll remember"

"is it possible you might... with me?"

"greg, buddy, never trust anyone. ever."

[cloud-based-and-rainpilled]

Another tragic layer of Tom’s relationship with Shiv and his relationship with Greg is the choices you have to make with being bisexual.

As a shipper of both tomgreg and tomshiv and being bisexual myself, it really hits home the nagging truth of needing to “choose.”

Unless you’re poly, if you’re bi, you pick a partner. You are either in a heterosexual or homosexual relationship and everyone’s perception of you hinges on that.

Succession is all about choices. Who do you chose to ally with, to trust, to love? Even without a sexual element with Greg, Tom is still torn between him and Shiv. By the writers’ and actors’ admission, he loves both of them equally.

The dynamics of being in a heterosexual relationship versus a homosexual relationship are very different. There’s the expectation of parenthood or harassment depending on what you choose.

Not to mention the identity mindfuck of once you pick your person— will I always long for something I can’t have? Did I make the right choice? Was it ever even real?

In some twisted endless cycle ending to Succession, Tom and Shiv love and hate each other forever, while Tom continually cheats and goes back and back and back to Greg forever. Everyone is miserable.

If Tom chooses Greg, he loses the love of his life, the mother of his child, the only woman who fulfills him and frightens him and blows his mind and offers him comfort.

If Tom chooses Shiv, he loses the love of his life, his best friend, the only man who’s ever cared for him and protected him and given him comfort and been by his side.

Tom’s trapped in the bisexual’s dilemma— and trust me, there is no solution.

[esotericfloozy]

it’s funny how badly the roys (and mattson) fumbled schmoozing with mencken at the funeral reception. in mencken’s speech in 4.08, he clearly says he doesn’t want to deal with roy style bargaining. he says “the model that i follow isn’t from the scorched marketplace, where cunning men haggle for the best price.” while this is a dog whistle for anti semitism, it’s also a rejection of the capitalist status quo where the bottom line drives business. yet, SOMEHOW, kendall assumes this is a guy he can “make a deal with”. and then kendall starts asking for favors at his father’s funeral, connor is angling for an ambassadorship, shiv and mattson are trying to work him for CEO, and even greg is trying to schmooze on tom’s behalf. it’s like they didn’t hear him at all. he IS a demagogue and he wants to call the shots. he doesn’t want to give out handouts, even to the people who crowned him as president. and that’s why he’s going to fuck them over. and see, that’s how fascism works. it’s not the business class that calls the shots in a fascist state, it’s the state that makes the decisions about what the business class should do. for mencken, atn was never going to be anything other than a propaganda machine. he doesn’t need the roys for that. technically, he doesn’t need anyone’s permission now.