Final review of ‘Succession’ (T3): maximum boiling point

And when it seemed that ‘Succession’ was going to consolidate as a series of (sublime) variations on the same theme, that of wealth as disease, the end of its third season surprises us by opening shreds of dignity and decency in characters that we believed doomed to amoral fickleness. In perspective, actually, maybe everything was leading us to this point: Kendall (Jeremy Strong), in particular, has been prepared for it “since he was four years old,” he says. But even being aware of all the clues or the slow and relentless growth of a common wound in the Roy brothers, it is impossible to face the last minutes of this final episode from parsimony: it is the drama of ‘Succession’ at its peak of boiling to date, a catharsis and a turning point.

The season had begun in the rubble of another battle: Kendall’s betrayal of the almighty Patriarch Logan (Brian Cox) at the press conference in which, in principle, he had to blame himself for the horrors that occurred in the Waystar Royco cruise division and its subsequent concealment. From a yacht in Croatia, Logan watched the movement and almost seemed to smile.

That smile quickly turned into a grin and a war started. On one side, Kendall and his little planned attempt to revolutionize Waystar, in which he is accompanied, in principle, by the (as almost always) confused cousin Greg (Nicholas Braun). On the other side, a Logan not too lucid, nor too good of the urinary tract, who appointed a new CEO, Gerri (J. Smith Cameron), while still pulling all the strings from the shadows.

For a long time, the Roy brothers have been unable to organize and recognize the common enemy: Logan. His summit in a room in the second episode of the season did not result in any agreement. We’ve seen them publicly ridiculed and humiliated through ghoulish jokes (like Kendall tapping on ‘Rape me’ from Nirvana during Shiv’s first great corporate speech) or open letters written in cruel handwriting. Battles could be fought in intimate spaces, but Armstrong and his team still prefer the big social event as an episodic unit (or almost): it can be a decisive annual meeting of shareholders; It might be Kendall’s 40th birthday party, a real moral party pittance.

The tragedy of a ridiculous man

Thus, paraphrasing Bertolucci, this third season of ‘Succession’ could have been subtitled. Although it is a choral series and each viewer has their favorite character, all eyes have been on Kendall, that ridiculous but emotional man due to his (unrecognized) fragility. The aforementioned birthday episode, a masterpiece directed by Lorene Scafaria (‘Wall Street Scammers’), was not really an extended version of the classic rap moment ‘L to the OG’: despite its great jokes and delusions (to the party, or to the world, Kendall was accessed by a tunnel shaped like a vagina), stood above all as a sign of total decadence among Ken, Shiv (Sarah Snook), Roman (Kieran Culkin) and surroundings.

In the center of memory, that overwhelming scene in which Kendall moved Rome (not Roman or Rome) with Santiago to find the handmade gift prepared by her children: metaphor for another lost connection? Jeremy Strong showed, once again, how seriously he takes his character. “As seriously” as his own life, as he explained in a controversial profile of ‘The New Yorker’ focused on his extreme commitment to the actor’s craft.

Something like true emotion

But is anyone on ‘Succession’ worthy of true compassion? Until recently, we could almost say no, not really. Not even Shiv, although a few episodes ago he posed far from the authoritarian presidential candidate Jeryd Mencken (Justin Kirk) and went from smiling in a certain group photo. And yet it is easy to feel that compassion, because deep down we know that the first person responsible for all these acts of cruelty is an unscrupulous father; black hole around which adults who have never stopped being hurt children orbit.

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In this season finale, the plots around corporate mergers, as well as the ideas around the death or transformation of traditional media, have been confirmed almost as garnishes against the drama about family ties or their lack. “Souls are boring,” Greg says in a great moment, but the victory our antiheroes aspire to (or perhaps it would be better to say they aspired to) seems less financial than spiritual. The coup struck deep.