Spoiler alert: this recap is for individuals watching Succession season three, which airs on HBO within the US and Sky Atlantic within the UK. Don’t learn on until you’ve got watched episode eight.
Marriage ceremony bells had been ringing. So had been alarm bells in Waystar Royco’s HR division. However is a funeral toll about to ring out, too? Listed below are your tasting notes for the penultimate episode, titled Chiantishire …
‘Is he gonna watch?’
Earlier than the Tuscan turmoil started, we had been served the amuse-bouche of a board assembly. Logan Roy (Brian Cox) “ambushed” main stakeholders Stewy (Arian Moayed) and Sandi Jr (Hope Davis) beforehand to tell them that Waystar was in talks to purchase GoJo. The 2 Ss had been sad about being lower out of the deal-making course of, however agreed it made sense.
Across the boardroom desk, issues obtained much more awkward. Shiv (Sarah Snook), nonetheless livid at being sidelined, dialled in as a result of she was at residence in mattress feeling depressed. Sorry, “engaged on technique”. Then there was the small matter of Logan being legally recused from the opening portion of the assembly, as a result of ongoing DoJ investigation. He stood exterior the boardroom, gazing via the glass like a stroppy silverback. Not off-putting in any respect.
Slime pet v slime badger
We’ve had the president-picking episode and the excruciating celebration episode. Now it was time for the flawed minibreak episode, as Workforce Roy boarded their PJs to a household wedding ceremony in Italy.
After some in-flight bickering, Roman (Kieran Culkin) aired his suspicions about their stepdad-to-be. Peter Munion (Pip Torrens) had had three bankruptcies, two divorces and 4 youngsters (bankruptcies apart, this was the identical as Logan). Munion was now a nursing residence magnate, working “silvery gulags”. After a whirlwind romance, was it smart for Woman Caroline Collingwood (Harriet Walter) to stroll down the aisle? God forbid anybody name the Roys cynical, however Roman reckoned Munion was on the make.
He’d additionally been bombarding Gerri Kellman (J Smith-Cameron) with unsolicited dick pics, which she tactfully termed “the gadgets”. When Gerri tried to attract a line, he dismissed it as her being “minxy”. After final week’s celebration antics, Romulus was changing into irredeemably terrible. He wanted taking down a peg or two. About that …
Ken-doll was stripping again
Kendall (Jeremy Robust) was first to reach on the Palazzo del Dysfunction. Wanting gaunt and sporting a penance buzzcut, he’d gone full sackcloth and ashes. As his mom remarked, he regarded like he was “simply again from the entrance”. Harriet Walter, AKA “Scary Poppins”, was deliciously bitchy – even outdoing her scene-stealing latest TV turns in Killing Eve, Physician Who and Ted Lasso.
She’d divided up the itinerary to maintain Kendall and his father aside. We lastly met Munion (Pip Torrens), an unctuous toff in panama hat and lime-green chinos. Type-wise, this was per week for cream linen and tasteful cruise-wear. The Roys had been in Membership Med mode.
Connor’s indecent proposal
Connor (Alan Ruck) admitted to girlfriend Willa (Justine Lupe) {that a} reporter from Politico was digging into her previous. As a former intercourse employee, this might show awkward for the presidential pipe-dreamer. Con got here up with an answer. It regarded for the world like he was going to interrupt up with Willa. As an alternative, he went down on one knee in one of many least romantic gestures you’ll ever see. They faked rictus grins for bystanders, however the subsequent morning, Willa was nonetheless procrastinating. “This a lot considering may get unromantic,” stated Connor. You don’t say.
Munion met the in-laws
When Roman requested mother if she’d signed a pre-nup, she hardly put his thoughts at relaxation, variously describing Munion as “Bridezilla”, “a tart for VIPs” and “a greedy little scholarship boy”. She later let slip that he’d misplaced his London flat in a salmon deal gone dangerous. Fishy.
When Logan arrived with each spouse Marcia (Hiam Abbass) and PA-cum-lover Kerry (Zoë Winters) in tow – “the skunk, the porcupine and the concubine”, as Woman C dubbed the trio – Munion pressed his predecessor’s flesh. He requested Logan to speak to his UK authorities contacts about “giving one thing again, an opportunity to serve”. Translation? “Get the dipshits in Downing Road to make him Lord Seatsniffer of Pantyhose.”
Additionally current and proper was PR rep Comfry (Dasha Nekrasova), who instructed Kendall a podcast was working a “Curse of the Roys” investigation. It included the mysterious drowning of a waiter at Shiv’s wedding ceremony – by accident killed by Kendall, in fact, in a Chappaquiddick-echoing automobile crash. Uh-oh.
Matsson the Twitter trickster
Smartphones chirruping in unison, the Waystar squad grew involved about GoJo CEO Lukas Matsson (Alexander Skarsgård), who’d tweeted: “Going to Macau, feeling fortunate” with added gifs and aubergine emojis. Kendall thought he was “going nut-nut”. Roman figured it was merely a play, fuelling rumours that GoJo was transferring into sports activities betting to drive up the share value.
Roman was dispatched to salvage the deal at Matsson’s swish Swiss mansion. Matsson admitted he was spiking the share value to maximise his leverage – a transfer as borderline illegal as Roman juicing him for insider intel. Did Matsson nonetheless need the deal? He’d get into mattress, however solely as an equal.
‘What occurs in Intercourse Vegas …’
At Woman Caroline’s “bachelorette celebration”, she and Shiv sniped over cigarettes. In a uncommon second of mutual honesty, each admitted that the opposite one may all the time make them cry. Ms Onion, quickly to grow to be Mrs Munion, added that some girls merely weren’t lower out for motherhood – together with her and Shiv.
Shiv bridled and instantly returned to husband Tom Wambsgans (Matthew Macfadyen), declaring “Let’s have a child.” As she seduced Tom, she insisted on soiled speak, telling her husband he wasn’t adequate for her and that she didn’t love him. It was meant to be scorching roleplay however was a tad too on-the-nose.
Subsequent morning, Shiv backpedalled. The infant plan was adjusted to freezing embryos, probably for 10 years. Tom sought reassurance that the “spicy pillow speak” wasn’t the reality. All just isn’t nicely of their mismatched marriage. With the looming risk of jail out of the best way, Tom was beginning to see it.
Dinner à deux
Logan agreed to a moonlit supper with Kendall, however grew to become suspicious when a personal chef ready separate meals to cater for his dietary necessities. Like a medieval king, he obtained Kendall’s son Iverson to verify his mozzarella wasn’t poisoned.
With neither touching their meals anyway, Kendall stated he’d had sufficient and needed out. For a $2bn dividend and “a chunky asset”, he’d be off the board and disinherited. In spite of everything, that’s what Logan provided in his birthday card. “That was for enjoyable,” smirked Daddy Merciless.
Kendall obtained his dad’s again up by seizing the ethical excessive floor, repeatedly insisting he was a greater man, as if attempting to persuade himself. “You’ve monetised all of the American resentments of sophistication and race,” Kendall ranted sanctimoniously. “You’ve turned black bile into silver {dollars}. Pay up and let me out.”
Logan pointedly introduced up that drowned waiter (him once more): “I cleaned up your shit and I’m a foul particular person? Fuck off, kiddo. Goodnight.”
The autumn of Rome?
Who hasn’t despatched a message to the improper particular person by mistake? However a dick pic to your dad? Much less relatable. At a gathering with their bankers in Milan, Roman defined that Matsson needed a merger of equals. Was “GoJo Royco” a dealbreaker? Not when he outlined the way it was a “development bomb” which may future-proof the legacy media agency. Moreover, equality was simply optics to therapeutic massage Matsson’s ego. The Roy hand would stay on the tiller.
When Logan reluctantly agreed, Gerri texted “nicely carried out” throughout the desk. In reply, Roman despatched her one other “merchandise” – however in an agonising scene, it went to his father as an alternative. Logan was incandescent. Shiv gleefully instructed him about Roman’s kinky fixation with Gerri. Her brother had “points” which had been “a possible drawback”. He bellowed for Roman, instructed him he was a laughing inventory and steered firing Gerri. Even in his darkest hour, Roman balked at that. A advantageous Kieran Culkin efficiency as his cocky bravado fell away to disclose the little boy beneath.
Maybe most nauseating was Shiv’s “uokhun?” follow-up chat with Gerri, feigning sisterly #MeToo concern whereas sharpening the knife. Gerri noticed straight via her and stonewalled. Shiv was making her transfer.
Say it isn’t so, Kendall
We left with Kendall handed out face-down on a pool float, ignoring his youngsters but once more. Shot from beneath, it was each Turin Shroud-like and the third reminder this week of that drowned waiter.
However what was with the dropped beer bottle and bubbles simply earlier than the credit rolled? Count on followers to be rewinding and debating. Kendall appeared to maneuver place to place his face within the water. Was he attempting to drown himself? You’d need to say the indicators have been there. He’s been a lifeless man strolling all sequence. Even his household appear to detest him. The signal above his celebration’s door final week was: “The Infamous KEN. Able to Die.” He later sobbed: “I want I used to be … residence.” Certainly he was going to say “lifeless” – and that was earlier than the waiter guilt resurfaced.
He didn’t take his personal life in these horrifyingly ambiguous ultimate frames … did he? We now face a fretful week’s wait to search out out.
The inheritor obvious
Roman shot himself within the dick. Was Shiv, as she stated, “the one candidate left within the area”?
Line of the week
“Life’s not knights on horseback. It’s a quantity on a chunk of paper. It’s combat for a knife within the mud” – The Tao of Logan Roy.
Notes and observations
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Does Comfry kissing Greg on the cheek imply their date went nicely? Both means, he was quickly utilizing her as a “date ladder” to commerce as much as a contessa-cum-influencer (Swiss actress Ella Rumpf). If solely Roman hadn’t snuck in first.
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This week’s director was Mark Mylod, who’s helmed a formidable 11 of Succession’s 28 episodes thus far.
Rejoin us subsequent Monday for the can’t-come-quick-enough season finale. Within the meantime, valued wedding ceremony visitors, please go away your ideas and theories beneath.