Succession chickens out, but still gives us a solid finale

Succession chickened out. Last week ended with Kendall at the end of his rope about to drown himself in a pool. Killing Kendall would have been a sea change for the show, a huge pivot that upped the stakes and forced the morally bankrupt characters to confront their emptiness. Instead the season 3 finale opens with the reveal that Kendall is fine; still sad and coming apart, but fine.

The episode gets a nice build going as it revs up to a confrontation between Logan and his three youngest children, but it’s hard not to see this as an opportunity lost, of Succession trading out a potential game-changer for another turn of the wheel. Kendall, Shiv and Roman end the episode on the bottom, but things will roll back their way eventually, even if we have to wait until season 4 (and maybe 5?) to see it.

That said, the episode is still good; this is Succession we’re talking about. The dialogue was especially sparkly, particularly the ever-entertaining back and forth between Roman and Shiv. (“We need a plan to kill this baby.” “Yeah, finally you found a worthy adversary.”) There were also lots of affecting character scenes, including a moment of dignity for Connor where he reminds everyone that he is in fact Logan’s eldest son, however often he’s dismissed by his siblings (and the audience).

“Souls are boring. Boo souls!”

And there are stakes, even though they’re not as high as they could have been. Lukas Mattson has held out long enough for Gojo’s share price to actually eclipse Waystar’s. His plans come to fruition, he finally reveals his true intensions: he wants to buy Waystar, not the other way around.

And Logan agrees, albeit only after he sends Roman away from the meeting; Shiv, Roman and Kendall find out through backchannels that Logan is selling the company, which means that they will never ascend to power. With Shiv leading the way, the three of them come together and concoct a plan to stop their father from selling, since without their board votes he won’t have the supermajority he needs to affect a change in management. They march into the building where he and his team are ironing out the details, reveal their plan…only to learn that their other abusive parent has colluded with Logan to dilute their voting ability, meaning they’re now left twisting in the wind.

And Tom, of all people, tips off Logan that the kids were up to something. This comes on the heels of Shiv admitting to him last week that she didn’t love him, so I guess he wasn’t feeling particularly loyal to his wife. Greg, meanwhile, sells his soul for a chance to be “at the bottom of the top,” as Tom puts it. “What am I going to do with a soul, anyway?” Greg asks. “Souls are boring. Boo souls!”

That could be a tagline for the show, although the writers regularly turn out such bangers that you could plausibly say that about every other line. (I also liked this innocent query from Shiv to her siblings: “So how do we feel about killing dad? Mixed feelings?”) But again, we’re back on the merry-go-round of soulless people trying to fill the holes in their hearts with power. No one tries to break out of the cycle here, which is what I was really hoping for a finale.

“All the Bells Say” is good, just not as good as Succession deserved

Still, it’s good; there’s no way I can plausibly say this episode of Succession wasn’t really good just because it didn’t go the way I wanted it to. Jeremy Strong gets more fodder for his Emmy reel in an excellent, extended scene where he confesses to Roman and Shiv his involvement in the waiter’s death from the season 1 finale. It’s a powerful moment, because this has been eating away at Kendall for the past two seasons, and also darkly hilarious, because Shiv and Roman have absolutely no clue how to comfort their brother. The best Roman can do is joke about how the waiter’s death explains the bad service at Shiv’s wedding.

They basically play down Kendall’s crime like it’s no big deal, which is a reminder that these three are terrible people, even though we root for them to take down Logan, who’s even worse. The way Logan mocks Shiv before revealing the double-cross with their mother…Kendall, Shiv and Roman are the products of abuse, and they’re caught in self-destructive cycles; Kendall’s is just the most obvious.

I can see Roman falling down a hole next. He’s been working more closely with Logan lately and is feeling closer than ever to his father…but remember, this is the same father who slapped him when he was feeling angry; Logan doesn’t actually care about Roman, and it was heartbreaking to watch Roman realize that in real time. Jeremy Strong usually takes home the awards hardware for this show, but Kieran Culkin is creeping up on him.

So was “All the Bells Say” everything I was hoping for out a Succession season finale? Not quite, but it was still great TV, and I’m still looking forward to more.

Episode Grade: B

Roy Family Bullet Points

• “The service here is weird, and slow, and fucking my dad.”
• Obviously the Roy kids are terrible at Monopoly. “I’m only stealing so I can win.” “Cheating is part of the game.”
• “Hans Christian Anderfuck”
• I wonder if Mark Zuckerberg will have anything to say about fellow soulless tech billionaire Lukas Mattson invoking his name.
• “My mom is marrying a bowl of porridge.”
• I enjoyed Kendall’s bewildered reaction to his siblings attempting to show him affection: “We just wanted to get together to let you know that we love you.” “What?”
• Willa’s version of accepting Connor’s marriage proposal: “Fuck it. C’mon, how bad can it be?”
• For some reason I thought Caroline Collingwood downplaying how thoroughly she’d screwed her children was pretty funny: “I think everything will be fine.” That woman cannot be bothered.
• “We just walked in on mom and dad fucking us.”

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