Succession Power Rankings: “I Don’t Think of Things Such as That”

Ranking the Roys after season 4 episode 8, “America Decides”

Oh lord. Photo: Screenshot.

Will the series finale of Succession be Shiv Roy pressing “post” on her viral essay about the night of the presidential election, titled “What Happened.” (It will be the Hundred’s inaugural post, of course.) It’s election night on Succession, and somehow this election seems … not as bad and yet somehow worse … than the real 2016 election. Everyone is kinda on the bottom this week, except for Cyd Peach who is somewhere wearing comfortable shoes, watching Tom get flambéed on CNN, and living her best life. Here’s where we stand after season four episode eight, “America Decides.”

Roman Roy
Kendall is — sorry — weak and indecisive, Shiv is playing both sides, Connor is due for a disastrously irresponsible CNN interview soon. Someone has to play a hand here, and Roman can always be counted on to act. Sometimes it’s stupidly impulsively (firing Gerri), sometimes it’s a bit more cunning. Tonight, he understands the assignment: Power at all costs, making a deal by any means necessary. He will ruin democracy if it means saving his family business, and no one else has the stomach to make a deal with Mencken to make that happen. A direct line to the president elect (-ish) makes him the leading CEBro.

Jeryd Mencken
J-E-R-Y-D … how does even the spelling of this man’s name look Republican. When Mencken, the conservative presidential candidate (or should I say conservative president-elect?), gives his speech at the episode’s end, everyone seems squeamish about what he’s saying. (Except for Roman, who thinks he’s just secured himself the sole CEO job.) “Democracy has this tendency that we have to beware to become mere transactional,” Mencken says, among his many crackpot ideas. He just engaged in a transaction to become president, of course, so I wonder how long he’ll hold his side of that deal. I get the sense that he’s only beholden to who serves him the most right now.

Connor Roy
Just because Connor didn’t win the election doesn’t mean Con-heads won’t unravel American democracy thread by thread. (Connor’s campaign slogan: “Enough Already!” Amazing.) “I happen to be a billionaire,’ Connor says in his concession speech. “Sorry.” I know these rankings are unserious but let me be very, maybe too unserious: this is a bar. This is “50K for a verse, no album out.” If not the White House then Coachella.

Darwin Perry
When the Republicans need the Roys to plug some numbers into their calculator, it’s Darwin who knows how to make the graphing calculator y equal mx plus he (cannot stress enough how bad I was at Algebra II). Con: he gets wasabi, and then lemon-ish Lacroix in his eye. Pro: he did suddenly become on air talent, kinda. (Him changing his mind when Roman dangles this opportunity … oh, the vanity … bellissima.) I’d say a fine night for Darwin, all in all.

Tom Wambsgans
Tom is living the life of an Usher ballad — a surprise pregnancy! A broken relationship! But kinda a thriving career! —  and it went mostly wishy washy for him tonight. The other executives at ATN obviously resent him, but when it matters tonight, the CEBros are on his side. So what that he’s being called the grim reaper at democracy’s door? At the top of the episode, Tom said he needed to get the best election numbers ever and guess what the fuck he did…

I’m inclined to think Tom just breaks even this episode. He was a dead man walking until Roman and Kendall learned about Shiv’s secret alliance; now he’s the most hated man to, I don’t know, Josh Gad and whatever other celebrities tweet inane #resistance rallying cries tomorrow morning after Mencken’s election. He needs the Matsson deal to go away, because if Matsson takes ATN centrist, he’s out. If nothing else, he’s proven to a demagogue (Mencken) that he’s a willing servant, so he has a lot of options at the end of this episode, no?

Kendall Roy
An entire episode of Kendall’s mouth writing checks his ass can’t cash. Kendall is deeply torn about the election, ATN, the country, all of it. On the one hand: his daughter’s safety, the future of the republic, respect from the people he actually wants to vape next to in a booth at Zero Bond. On the other hand: scarily intense — like damn near unblinking-intense — conservatives who will let him run his family business. For all the ways this show (and Ken himself) mine how unlike Logan Kendall is, he’s still a Roy. When it comes down to it, Sophie can pay for therapy with the billion dollars she inherits from her family destabilizing the United States government. (Her problems won’t ever be solved, though, as the planet will become uninhabitable between her seventh and ninth breakthrough, and we have Mencken’s climate policy to thank for that!)

But Kendall’s gaze has been so fixed on his own future that he forgot to keep an eye on his sneaky siblings. Roman has leapfrogged ahead of him in the CEBro arms race now that ATN is all-in on Mencken. Shiv is with Matsson now, which is bad for Matsson but good for Shiv. (Shiv has only done one meaningful thing for Waystar and that is silence that one woman.) 

Lukas Matsson
Even the devil is like “please remove Mencken from the group chat,” and Mencken promised the brothers that he’d kill the Gojo sale. But one thing about Republicans: they lie! A lot! It’s kind of their whole thing. Mencken promised loyalty to the brothers today, but yesterday’s price is not today’s price goes, like, quadruple if you actually get to be president. I’m skeptical of Mencken’s promises as I am of him, especially when Matsson has a lot to offer and is a better business partner. The Swede only wants to push ATN more toward the center because he thinks that’s the biggest payday. I wonder if Mencken’s election, legitimate or illegitimate, could convince him otherwise. There could be an angle here for him. He has the stomach for an unsavory business partner.

Anyway, girl: worrying about these kids when he needs to get his own house in order. both Beyoncé and Miss Tina shaded the Renaissance World Tour’s Swedish crowds this week.  

Jess Jordan
For a few moments the fate of democracy was in the hands of Greg Hirsch, meaning it was the hands of whoever Greg Hirsch was talking to at that very instant. That happened to be Jess Jordan, Kendall’s long-suffering assistant. As she tried to make Greg feel the magnitude of the moment, she was also … stalling him. That shot of her typing on her phone lasted a few moments too long to make it seem insignificant to me: a moment later, Tom is damn near on a wanted poster for slitting the throat of democracy? Inch resting!

Greg Hirsch
With Logan gone and the center of power always in flux, Greg has been hedging his bets this season, guessing at who’s better to be close to. Last week he got close to Matsson for Kendall, and ended up uncovering a bit of dirt on Shiv (that she’s paired herself with the Swede against the bros). Even as Greg is trying to distance himself from Tom, it’s Tom who gives him the best advice: information is currency, and don’t spend it all in one place. 

Unfortunately Greg has to spend the whole election night trying to herd fat cats off the ATN newsroom floor, but there’s something to the moment alone he has with Shiv. When Greg tries to float a bribe for his silence, she responds with a threat. Shiv, as always, probably thinks she’s doing something, but this gr-egg isn’t really fried. Tom is the one in with the brothers at the episode’s end, and that, plus his direct line to Matsson, puts Greg in a good spot.

 Rava Roy
Rava’s bed was made when she decided to have kids with that sentient StockX tag. But imagine that your husband would rather destroy the country than have a relationship with his daughter. There has to be a 90s R&B playlist about this.

Democracy
Dare I say it … America … America has a problem …! 

You just know Aaron Sorkin is watching this election and opening Final Draft to write another self-aggrandizing Newsroom monologue about ATN’s threat to the repbulic. And that’s the real loss.

Siobhan Roy
In the words of a wiser woman: Let me just go in the bush and weep. I just need to go in the bush and weep. I know Shiv Roy and that fuckass bob will never not be the internet’s favorite girlboss, but what is she girlbossing exactly if not her own demise? Matsson keeps her close, but he also has eyes and ears via Greg now. Kendall and Roman have shoved her out of the sibs inner circle because they can’t trust her. Tom replaced her in Logan’s inner circle and now he’s replaced her in the brothers’ inner circle.

In her personal life, Shiv has finally told Tom she’s pregnant, but to what end. She’s so craven and broken that he interprets it as another play — and it kind of was! Nothing is off limits to either of their own greed, but at least Tom recognizes this. Shiv, subconsciously if not consciously, was trying for his sympathy.

As she storms out of the building, she’s on the phone with Matsson promising that she can help him out of the India subscriber inflation. But she doesn’t have any real options now: Matsson won’t really commit to her, and the brothers have iced her out.

Yes Shiv gets ranked lower than democracy. The country can recover but this bob might not.