Unbetitelt

Oh wow, parallels defining a character’s attitude towards other people and the relationship between characters! Isn’t media literacy fun?

For real though, the main argument of “Greg will be CEO”-folks was that since the show began with Greg vomiting all over a mascot at a theme park and he then experienced success when he joined the company, the natural progression of the plot must see him on top of things. And I’m going to put this bluntly: their mistake was believing in the American dream. Just like the Shiv=girlboss people, they thought that, yes, capitalism is a dirty game, but it’s one where everyone lands right where they belong. And I’m not saying Greg deserved to be CEO, but that interpretation of him speaks to a fatal flaw in the way some people have followed this entire show. There is no just cause, no king emerging from the shit, it’s a mudfight ad-eternity.

Greg was never the little guy climbing the corporate ladder and securing his place, he was always a toy convincing himself he could be one of the real boys. Nobody in the family cared about him, Tom was the only one who even noticed him, but not because he was interested in building him up-are you crazy? Tom didn’t have much power in the family so he took the guy they gave him and made him his amusement. He had fun in watching Greg stumble around in a world that he clearly didn’t belong him. But Greg thought he had a chance, and the more power and respect he got, the more of a corporate asshole he became, hiring “mini-gregs”, playing power games, SUING HIS FUCKING GRANDPA. I think that’s part of Ewan’s initial concern for him, he saw Logan in him in a way, he knew you can’t get up the ladder without becoming a horrible human being. He knew Greg would either be eaten by the sharks or become a shark, and once he saw the shark in him he immediately lost all hope in him and cut him off. But Greg was in too deep. LOOK AT THE LITTLE SMUG ASSHOLE SMILE as Kendall phones the Democrat party office during the election episode. He really thought he could finally get his way and establish his place.

And that’s because he thought he was part of the company. But here’s the truth: Greg was never a part of the company, he was always the company’s property. No matter how much shallow respect he got or how many subordinates he could count, he was Waystar’s, and especially Tom’s property, a relation perfectly capsulated in his FINAL SCENE. What the “Greg=CEO” people and everyone who watched this show rooting for their favourite flavour of venture capitalist to win, did wrong, was assuming that Greg’s story was a tale about working yourself up from dishwasher to millionaire, from weird mascot costume guy to CEO.

My brother in christ,

I’ve seen a lot of people talking about the whole “a child weaned on poison and so on” thing with Succession, and while I agree, this is a valid take, I want to add my two cents specifically in regard to the protest scene in the latest episode.

To first explain my framework for this, I think out of all the Characters on Succession, Roman is the one with the least personality. And I don’t mean that as an insult to the character or the writers or Kieran Culkin. I think, ironically this is his biggest and most defining character trait. Roman Roy is a man who seemingly cares about nothing. When a rocket blows up under his oversight, he washes his hands and gets out of the bathroom. And still, from the very first scene, this man is explosive. He doesn’t stand up from chairs, he practically throws himself off them. Anytime the room is silent for a second, he bursts out with a sex joke, every second word out of his mouth is “fuck”. Because that’s what happens when each of your actions are calculated. Not in a rational way, he doesn’t act logically. But to perform the simplest tasks he first needs to convince himself to continue existing. Roman Roy is a wooden boy. There is no person inside him, he is a carefully crafted amalgamation of collected habits, motions, phrases, ideas, quite possibly even political ideologies(I wouldn’t be surprised if he believes in nothing he is saying). He is mot the firstborn, not even the secondborn, he has no family of his own and nothing to fight for. Roman Roy is a nothing craving to be SOMETHING.

That’s where Logan becomes important, because he, for all his faults, is undeniably SOMETHING. He is a monument, en emperor, Citizen Kane on steroids, the king of the world, but most importantly, he was THERE. Logan Roy was undeniable. When he looked at you, you were marked for life, he walked into a room and everyone went silent. “He made me breath funny.”

Meanwhile Roman was a child. I’ve seen people analysing the way Roman basically becomes a 5 year old when he’s under pressure, and I think all those interpretations are great, but I’d like to take it one step further. Roman isn’t a hard shell harboring a soft core, he is a child who just learned the f-word and is now shouting it at full volume to impress the adults at the table. Because he thinks there’s nothing else he can contribute. He himself is nothing.

Logan, for better or worse, was complete. He was a fully grown man with beliefs, ideas, means and a strong right hook. He was a presence in Romans life, as much as Roman bent over backwards to please others or benefit himself, he would always know that there’s something that never changed. As long as Logan lived, there was SOMETHING in Romans life. That might he the source of Rome’s respect for him in the election episode.

So taking all that into account, I never really saw the protest scene as Rome craving violence. For me, it’s him looking for SOMETHING. This man, this child actually, just lost the only thing in his life that was defining. For years, there was something that made him hold his breath when he saw it. Something that was, in one way or another complete. Logan Roy was a monument, he wasn’t a poison that quietly slipped into Roman’s veins, he was the sound of a thousand screeching nails for 30 years or more in his ears. When Logan Roy was in a room with a thousand people, it was his room. When Roman Roy is in a room by himself, that room is empty. There’s no one around to hear the tree make sex jokes as it falls. If the two of them were together, at least there was SOMETHING there. So for years, decades SOMETHING was there, and then, out of the blue, it was just gone. What do you think it meant for Roman to be in Logan’s presence? It meant stability. Despite all Roman went through, however he slipped and slivered and bent to be accepted and make his way, his no good, piece of shit father was always there, always the same.

So when he walks out of the funeral and stumbles into the street, he doesn’t care about anything. Police? Protesters? Who cares, not this “guy”. It’s only when he sees masses of people go by that he “joins” them. Because maybe, just maybe, a thousand angry people stomping all over you, is kinda similar to being in a room with your dad. The people who walk past and over him, just for the moment are SOMETHING, an undeniable presence. They’re the placebo to the monument Roman needs to justify his existence.

Roman Roy doesn’t like pain. He doesn’t like heartbreak. If he could seal himself in Carbonite, he would. Because the relief he feels upon feeling a hand striking his cheek or a boot on his chest isn’t derived from the pain it causes. Roman loves them because they’re definite proof that there’s something besides him and his charade, that some things are real and true and just like they are, that there’s forces in the outside world, that there’s SOMETHING outside of him,