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Editor’s Note: The below contains major spoilers for the series finale of Succession.The end of Succession is the end of an era. Over the course of its four-season run, which concluded tonight in spectacular fashion with the final episode titled “With Open Eyes,” it threaded the needle between being sharply humorous and enduringly horrifying. A portrait of modern American decline where a cutthroat family of insufferable billionaires known as the Roys fought each other over their media empire, it only grew more and more grim as we watched them carve up the world in search of more power with little a care about the sinister repercussions that could have on society writ large. Its ending brought this all home.
The question that was always posed, even by the show’s very title, and had grown more pressing was about who would be the one to become the head of this callousness by carrying on the sordid legacy their now departed father had built. However, as we came to realize and as this episode laid bare one final time, it mattered little about who would “win” when the reality had always been that the rest of us would lose no matter the outcome. As we witnessed Kendall (Jeremy Strong), Shiv (Sarah Snook), Roman (Kieran Culkin), Tom (Matthew Macfadyen), and even Greg (Nicholas Braun) jostle for power one last time, the emptiness of it all, while entertaining, was what made it all the more sickening. We got our answer of who came out on top, with little going as expected despite all the predictions, yet the certainty remained that the evil at the core of the operation would now continue.
‘Succession’s Finale Was One Final Familial Train Wreck
This began with Kendall desperately attempting to maintain a hold on his father’s company. With news broadcasts echoing in the background and an advisor informing him that they might not have the votes to hold off a takeover, he seems to be on the ropes. Meanwhile, Shiv discusses with Lukas Matsson (Alexander Skarsgård) how they are right on the edge of success. She seems downright giddy about the whole way it has played out despite the fact that her brother Roman is seemingly nowhere to be found after having a breakdown at their father’s funeral. When the conversation turns to Tom, Shiv seems to half advocate for her husband to Matsson while also saying that he is the type of person who “will honestly suck the biggest dick in the room.” As has been the case over the course of this season and the series writ large, the two characters are meant for each other despite all the pain they have put each other through. They both are drawn to money above all else. To put it simply, they’re made for each other. Alas, that is precisely what drove them apart over and over. When Shiv gets a call from Caroline (Harriet Walter), she is then informed that Roman has gone there to stay with their mother. She decides to go visit him in an attempt to get him on their side. Before she takes off, Shiv calls Tom. She candidly discusses their relationship or, as she calls it, “the nightmare they’ve shared.” While Shiv seems like she wants to be in a real relationship, Tom says he doesn’t know, and their strained call ends.
Elsewhere, Kendall is trying to make calls to somehow claw back a chance at control. When he too is tipped off about where Roman is, he immediately calls his mother. He tells her that he urgently needs to speak to him, but she demurs even telling him whether he is there. It then becomes a race to get to Roman first. Neither Shiv nor Kendall cares about him as a brother. Instead, he represents an important vote that they need. Their selfishness again drives their decisions. When Shiv gets there first, she encounters an uncharacteristically quiet Roman who is also injured. He says that he got into an argument and that this is the result, though it isn’t addressed much more beyond that as all of them enter the house.
When Kendall subsequently arrives, shouting “Romey” around the luxurious grounds as if he is playing hide-and-seek, the table is set for a family vacation to end all vacations. The trio bicker among each other while their mother futilely pleads for “civility.” As Kendall continues to push his brother to get his vote and commit to what they agreed upon, Roman sounds on the edge of tears. As he pleads for his brother to let it go, who ignores this and just keeps pushing, he flees from the table. Elsewhere, the Disgusting Brothers Tom and Greg are trying to prepare for a potential change of management. In addition to learning that Greg is paid 200,000 dollars, an absurd amount of money for how little he actually does, we see Tom fearful that they both could soon be fired. He is worried that he is out of moves to make and that he won’t be around for the new era of the company. Back at their mother’s house as the waves crash behind them, Shiv tries to strike a compromise by saying she would support them in their previous failed media venture and asks that they support her in exchange. Kendall rejects this, saying she is gloating, and subsequently calls her a cunt to her face. It is a new low point for him as he had usually been the one to speak up for her. Throughout this, a battered Roman says little other than to sarcastically remark on how it is a lovely evening.
Tom Grovels Like He’s Never Groveled Before
The man who has backstabbed anyone he needed to, Tom, then finds himself without any allies. At a dinner with Matsson, he agrees to “sing for my supper” and desperately tries to suck up. However, the conversation takes a turn. Matsson begins criticizing Shiv to Tom and asking for his advice about what to do with her. Rather than being about his role in the company, it seems as though the two of them might be discussing forcing her out. Matsson says that he wants to have sex with her and that he couldn’t deal with the mess of that. As he says, he wants to “get the guy who put the baby inside her instead of the baby lady.” Tom, the sniveling man that he is, agrees to do whatever is asked of him, including being a “pain sponge” for Matsson. It is a conversation that concludes with Tom informing Greg that they are going to be okay before departing, fully ready to throw Shiv under the bus. However, Greg manages to use a translation app to find out about the plan Matsson has to force her out and immediately calls Kendall to inform him of this, but says that he wants something in return.
After working to confirm this information, Kendall pulls Shiv and Roman aside to speak about what he has just learned about how Matsson is interviewing for the CEO position he promised her. While she is initially skeptical of this claim, believing it to be a desperate ploy, she begins making calls and realizes that he is actually telling the truth. Not only is she not able to get a hold of her allies, a telling sign, but her name has also been removed from the takeover announcement draft. Suddenly, the Roys find themselves in alignment once again and begin strategizing together. Shiv is worried that, even united, they won’t be able to turn the tables and that it may be too late. Making matters worse, they get informed that they have burned through a lot of their credibility of late and that they would need to present a vision to win the board over. Kendall initially says that this has to be with him at the head of the company while Roman says that their father had said that it should be him. Of course, all of them share their own stories of similar promises. Each is trying to assert their claim to the company and argue for their superiority. Kendall goes low by saying that Roman showed he is not capable of taking the role after he cried at the funeral, whereas he is a “business psycho” who could better handle it.
It is a despicable moment that shows he has truly become his father’s son, willing to insult and diminish his loved ones in order to gain an edge over them. While Kendall goes out for a swim, Shiv and Roman have a conversation alone about what to do next. He says that she was played like a “pregnant cello” before apologizing for the insult, a rarity for him, and the two begin making fun of what would happen if they literally tried to kill Kendall though ultimately failed. With all three in the water, they agree to Kendall’s proposal that he be the one to lead the company. The three then attempt to share a late meal in their mother’s kitchen who emerges when they make too much noise. There is something sad about them celebrating like kids about the takeover of a company when they were willing to betray each other only hours earlier. When their mother remarks on how it is nice that they are getting along, it is a hollow observation when considering how this only occurred because they were on the same side of a power struggle. They are not siblings at this moment. Instead, they are all simply callous co-conspirators drunk on the prospect of somehow getting more power.
‘Succession’s Final Pieces Fall Perfectly Into Place
When they all take a private plane back the next day, ready to take on Matsson, all three of them are riding high. Before they do so, they make a stop to talk with Connor (Alan Ruck) who is currently giving away all of their father’s things. We learn that he and Willa (Justine Lupe) are going to be living separately to pursue their own careers. However, complicating this is the potential that Jeryd Mencken (Justin Kirk) might not actually be successful in the election. In an adjacent room, they all watch a video of their now late father at a dinner where they were not present. He is joking around, and the three siblings begin to get emotional at this small glimpse of him being happy. For all the jokes that were made about Logan (Brian Cox) being resurrected for the episode, this was the closest the series got. The only place he is still alive is in their memories and videos. Shortly after this, Tom and Shiv have a conversation together where he admits that he was going to be the CEO in her place. When she learns about this, she confronts him before going to tell her brothers. Tom then gets in a pathetic fight with Greg in the bathroom, angry his fellow Disgusting Brother betrayed him and threatened his shot at power. As Kendall, Shiv, and Roman then head out, Matsson wakes up in a rage when informed by Tom about how they are coming to try to take over. The three siblings walk in with smiles plastered on their faces, reveling in the supposed quiet before the storm that will leave them scattered to the winds with no parachute to cling to for the first time in their miserable lives.
In the office that used to be their father’s, Kendall hesitates briefly before sitting in the chair. They then begin discussing strategy and he really settles in. He even puts his feet up on the desk, seemingly totally relaxed and eating up the moment. This is disrupted when Gerri (J. Smith-Cameron) arrives and Roman begins to spiral. He grows concerned about the optics and that he will be perceived as having “pussied out.” Kendall seems to initially embrace him to comfort him but begins squeezing him hard until he yells out in pain. The cruelty etched into Kendall’s face is chilling. Roman then wanders away, the cut on his face reopened, broken and defeated. As Kendall stands in the office alone, now on the cusp of getting everything he ever wanted, his almost blank expression is eerie and unsettling.
The culminating meeting with the board is all he needs to step into his father’s shoes. It begins with Kendall saying that they should not go through with the deal, laying out to everyone how they should stick with them. Roman literally tries to nurse his wounds while Shiv seems rattled in the corner. Kendall calls for the vote to kill the deal, sitting back in his chair and ready to bask in victory. As they make their way around the table, everything is going exactly as he would have hoped. Even Roman votes no, but Shiv then walks away from the table. She is the deciding vote and her two brothers subsequently chase after her. Shiv says that she needs to think before saying she has changed her mind. Kendall begins pushing her again, saying that this is the one thing he knows how to do. He throws everything he can at her, literally begging her to back him. Shiv then pushes back saying she doesn’t think he would be good at this. He then begins shouting at her, drawing the attention of everyone else in the building. Kendall says that he might die if she turns on him, and she subsequently brings up the fact that he killed someone.
‘Succession’s Finale Gave The Roys What They Deserved
Kendall begins completely floundering, saying that nothing happened. Roman questions him over and over about it. Shiv says that she cannot stomach him, and he begins shouting that he “is the eldest boy” with an ugliness consuming his face. Kendall then begins grabbing Roman’s face and wrestles him to the ground. Shiv walks out of the room, leaving her two brothers alone. Kendall, fear overwhelming him, tries to find another play for power. Roman, saying the most truthful thing he has over the entire season, correctly points out how all of them are bullshit. All of them have been living empty lives in the shadow of their father and, even with him now gone, are still trying to fight for his company. Kendall, wandering back into the board, tries to adjourn the meeting. It is there that he is informed that Shiv voted to sell the company to Matsson.
Despondent and silent, he walks out through the halls before getting in the elevator for what may be the last time. Looking like has seen a ghost, he descends back down to the ground below while the new leadership comes in. Tom has now come out on top and everyone begins to kiss his ass, an unsettling reversal from where he has been his whole life. This is what he has been fighting for and now at the top rung of the ladder, he begins planning out what he will do next. The only thing that is left is that Roman has to sign the paperwork in a photo op alongside Matsson. Immediately after, he gets away while Shiv watches on before departing herself. Later, Roman has himself a sad drink in silence. Tom gets in a car where Shiv is waiting for him and the two reluctantly clasp hands, not even looking each other in the eye.
The closing scene follows Kendall wandering through a park with only his father’s former bodyguard Colin (Scott Nicholson) for company. As the music swells, and he looks out on the vast emptiness that is his life, he says nothing before sitting on a bench. After all the scheming, conniving, and backstabbing, he came away with nothing. The system he wanted to be a part of so much ate him without a second thought, just as it would anyone. Kendall was ground up into oblivion by the very gears he sought to use to destroy others, a fitting conclusion for a man who so thoroughly believed himself a king that he was willing to cover up a killing. In the end, it was he who was killed by the very forces that he believed himself in control of. If only life itself were so poetically just.
All episodes of Succession are available to stream on Max.
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