Everything
The latest episode of Succession has hit and BOY did it ever hit. Warning – SPOILERS AHEAD – so if you haven’t had a chance to watch it, do not read on.
You have been warned.
SPOILER ALERT COMING.
And there we have it. Vale Logan Roy. The King is dead. Long live…the King(s). Or Queen.
The death of Logan Roy has been hinted at from the very first episode of Succession – our introduction to the media mogul was a rush to the hospital, which became the catalyst for the behind-the-scenes power struggles that would begin between his children over the next four seasons.
For literalists – it’s also in the title. Succession – there can be no succession unless the current ruler dies. So this scene was for all accounts inevitable.
But even knowing this, it came like a punch when it finally happened. No matter how much we can prepare for it, losing a parent is visceral. Whether that’s because of epiphanies of things that never existed between you (someone pour one out for poor Connor) or because you’ve spent a life chasing after the approval and affections of man who was emotionally crippled at best (note: the rest of the Roy siblings).
But it was the manner in which it delivered it that should earn the writers an slew of awards when their time comes.
At best, Roy has been an absent father throughout the lives of his children Shiv, Roman and Kendall. And his death was no different. On a plane, missing his son’s wedding with no one but Kerry and everyone’s favourite sycophant Tom by his side. Has there ever been a more fitting, and satisfactory end to a character?
Rarely do we get closure in real life and so it is with Logan’s death in Succession.
Watching the Roy clan struggle to accept the truth, rushing to say last words before it was too late or even hoping that by some miracle he would still be alive before the slow burgeoning of the truth begins to dawned on them – they are, finally, the ones in charge – was breathtaking.
Despite their loss, they’re still their father’s children.
Let them games begin.
