Official Succession Thread 🟠 Season 4 Currently Airing

[re'up]

also, the beauty of the show is in it's nuance. And it's refusal kind of in a post anti hero TV era, to play that game, of making loveable characters like Tony Soprano, Walter White, and have them do horrible things, they aren't that like able, and often do horrible things, in the show's world.

The Roys are closer to most people than many want to admit, self interested, and unapologetic about it, but they are still human, they all have that element from time to time, even Logan, but they are too self absorbed, caught up in their ego to change course.

 

[Bless't]

To the Disgusting Brothers...

 

[Bugzbunny129]

People saying kendall couldnt do it, but tom could? The same tom whos job greg basically does by himself while he does coke and orders lattes.

 

[Gus Money]

As he's played though, Kendall's flaw is that he's not able to really read people and move in a room, take the temperature, forge a connection with people. He knows all the corporate nonsense talk, he knows the business school bullshyt, he knows the business fundamentals, but he frequently fumbles on standard stuff, stuff that I can do, easily. Like meeting someone on a human level, without the pretenses of business or formalities.

Note: This is highlighted over and over again, as he constantly think the shareholder votes are a LOCK for him lol---it's a feature of people who don't know themselves, that they find it hard to read others accurately.

What Logan does, all his old school bluster and bullshyt, is forge a connection with people. That straight talk express, John McCain shyt, people feel like he's genuine. With Kendall, he's not comfortable in his own skin, he doesn't have confidence, he doesn't have a sense of self. And people see that. Imagine his tone deafness with the whole Season 3 ordeal, played out as he's CEO.

I like Kendall too. and I meet guys like him, who have the pedigree, have the money, but they are just kinda like shaky. Off. They don't have real confidence. My boy reminds me of him, my homie was like a CEO type, but an addict. He also got sober but like didn't do the work, or keep up with it. And he ended up dying.

fukk I am watching the end of Season 3, where Kendall is breaking down. and I used to see my boy like this too. Ashamed. But the next day he'd be on another ego trip. Also, Kendall has way more heart and conscious than his family, under all the posturing and rich guy antics.'

edit: damn, last night, I was posting, kind of stream of conscious, and then Kendall, after having a breakthrough, of sorts, just like my homie used to, went right back to the ego based "take over the company", because that's truly the only place he can feel any sense of meaning or purpose, seeking his Dad's approval. Wow.

Good post. Just to add, Kendall is ironically the only sibling who can maintain a relatively solid personal relationship outside of the business world (with Stewy). Shiv and Roman aren’t shown having any genuine friendships from what I remember.

Ken is also the most comfortable sibling when it comes to interacting with regular people in real world social situations (hanging with the meth addicts, ordering drinks like a normal person at the dive bar, etc). It was like once business (or his ego) got involved then he lost all social skills and awareness like you said.

 

[re'up]

Tom's a company man/steer the ship CEO. Plenty of guys like that in the business world. He's not a dynamic, new school, Musk type, nor is he the old school Rupert Murdoch/Logan Roy type, he's the kind of reliable, steady hand, toe the line type of guy. Criticism will be that he's weak, the kind of Mitt Romeny business acumen, but Romney made a lot of money for everyone, and there's no room for two rockstars. Mattson being the other.

Read a lot of profiles on these guys, and most CEO's aren't Musk, aren't "rockstar CEO's", Brandson, or Trump for that matter, they are business school graduates, who spent their whole life in the corporate structure, and are disciplined, organized, and competent. They show up and do the work. They are like military officers, they take their orders from the board.

 

[re'up]

Good post. Just to add, Kendall is ironically the only sibling who can maintain a relatively solid personal relationship outside of the business world (with Stewy). Shiv and Roman aren’t shown having any genuine friendships from what I remember.

Ken is also the most comfortable sibling when it comes to interacting with regular people in real world social situations (hanging with the meth addicts, ordering drinks like a normal person at the dive bar, etc). It was like once business (or his ego) got involved then he lost all social skills and awareness like you said.

The Stewie thing would be highly debatable. Stewie is someone who almost always projects 100% confidence in himself.

But, the more interesting thing I think is what you said about interacting with regular people. Noticed that the show wrote a lot of scenes like that, Kendall was certainly less abusive than Roman, and less high handed than Tom, but he only was comfortable because he was so higher on the social scale, and always always nodded to his money and class. He was charming and friendly, and comfortable, because he knew the score. To a degree, some of his interactions were still pretty fukking awkward. The dude who died was one.

When he did the CEO stuff, he was all bluster and tough talk, but it came off forced. "Are we going to fukk or what?" Or he tried to make human connections, but he didn't seem to really know anyone, or care, that much. Kind of like his kids. Him trying to charm Adrian Brody is one example.

 

[humminbird]

Tom's a company man/steer the ship CEO. Plenty of guys like that in the business world. He's not a dynamic, new school, Musk type, nor is he the old school Rupert Murdoch/Logan Roy type, he's the kind of reliable, steady hand, toe the line type of guy. Criticism will be that he's weak, the kind of Mitt Romeny business acumen, but Romney made a lot of money for everyone, and there's no room for two rockstars. Mattson being the other.

Read a lot of profiles on these guys, and most CEO's aren't Musk, aren't "rockstar CEO's", Brandson, or Trump for that matter, they are business school graduates, who spent their whole life in the corporate structure, and are disciplined, organized, and competent. They show up and do the work. They are like military officers, they take their orders from the board.

yep
there are people out there who become CEO hoppers and hop from one company to the next

 

[old pig]

low key I already have this over sopranos in my mind since the last rewatch I did is kinda still fresh on my mind…but I don’t want to fall victim to the moment…I’m gonna let some time pass before I do a rewatch of “the wire” and then “the sopranos”

 

[Gloxina]

yep
there are people out there who become CEO hoppers and hop from one company to the next

That’s one of the main reasons to climb the ladder. You just hop from company to company Tom is definitely Gucci

 

[Stop_It_5]

People saying kendall couldnt do it, but tom could? The same tom whos job greg basically does by himself while he does coke and orders lattes.

Different circumstances since Ken was gonna actually try to run the ship while Tom is accepting the role of empty suit who takes the punches for the real boss - but I do think Ken's incompetence is overstated.

At the start of the show everyone was under the impression he was about to take over until Logan said fukk that plan, and then when he initiated the vote of no confidence to take it by force he had the numbers with the board (including Frank) until Roman choked.

Who knows if it works but there was at least the belief that Ken had put in the time and work to be viewed as a viable candidate before he went off the rails and tried to send Logan to prison.

 

[Erratic415]

What is “grilled cheese with a sucked dikk”?

 

[mastermind]

if you are watching Succession for the plot developments, to me, you are missing about 85% of what makes the show so brilliant.

This is the truth.

 

[mastermind]

That’s one of the main reasons to climb the ladder. You just hop from company to company Tom is definitely Gucci

Yup!

Unless you embarrass yourself and company spectacularly, you can get CEO positions across different orgs and end up in the board room as you accumulate wealth.

 

[RawDogBandit]

 

[Squirrel from Meteor Man]

Tom's a company man/steer the ship CEO. Plenty of guys like that in the business world. He's not a dynamic, new school, Musk type, nor is he the old school Rupert Murdoch/Logan Roy type, he's the kind of reliable, steady hand, toe the line type of guy. Criticism will be that he's weak, the kind of Mitt Romeny business acumen, but Romney made a lot of money for everyone, and there's no room for two rockstars. Mattson being the other.

Read a lot of profiles on these guys, and most CEO's aren't Musk, aren't "rockstar CEO's", Brandson, or Trump for that matter, they are business school graduates, who spent their whole life in the corporate structure, and are disciplined, organized, and competent. They show up and do the work. They are like military officers, they take their orders from the board.

He’s a puppet and a coward. He doesn’t have any business acumen, which is why he was always the lamb to be slaughtered whenever major issues hit the company. His strength is that he doesn’t have a backbone and will do what you tell him. Which is fine. We just shouldn’t frame him as some type of high-level businessman.

He had to do a line of coke during one of the biggest moments in the history of the country just to get through it

He’s working for a man who told him he wants to bang his wife to his face. That was a test from Mattson to see if he had any bite to him. Once Tom didn’t flinch, Mattson knew he had his man.