Recap / Succession S04E09

"Church and State"

Frank: This is it, huh? He's gone. He's really gone.
Gerri: How much of you is glad?
Karl: Well, we had our fights, but I miss him.
Gerri: Stockholm syndrome, crossed with a little bit of China syndrome.

The siblings prepare for Logan's funeral as protests begin to put the city in a gridlock. Shiv encourages Matsson to release his bad numbers so they'll get buried under the flood of news from the funeral and ATN's controversial election call, which Tom is stuck at ATN wrangling. Kendall and Rava get into an argument because the latter feels unsafe attending; Kendall's emotional state is further challenged with the news that Jess is quitting. Shiv pitches herself as American CEO to Matsson as a way of appeasing Mencken.

The funeral begins. Despite the family's attempts to stop him, Ewan gets up and gives a speech about how while he loved Logan, he disapproved of his brother's legacy. Roman gets up to give the speech he'd been rehearsing, but breaks down and is unable to. Kendall takes over and manages to give a soaring eulogy, which Shiv follows up with a more personal speech. The family buries Logan at the mausoleum he'd purchased.

At the reception, Kendall, Greg, and Connor all try to make headway with Mencken, but Shiv is able to steal him away to meet Matsson. Kendall tells Roman that they have to work to swing Mencken in their favor; Matsson tells Shiv that Mencken is open to the plan of having an American CEO. A frustrated Roman enters a crowd of protestors, but is swept in by the crowd.

---

Tropes:

• Actually Pretty Funny: Karl is seen enjoying some of the more absurd aspects of Logan's funeral and not trying particularly hard to hide it. Ewan also acknowledges that the joke that Logan had often told was terrible, but funny.
• Break the Haughty: Roman begins the episode preening about his speech and making fun of his siblings. However, after Ewan's speech, he blows the eulogy (and, though it's never said out loud, his chances of being taken seriously both by Mencken and as a CEO), however, his emotional state becomes increasingly fractious, culminating in him trying to insult a crowd of opposition protesters only to nearly get trampled by the crowd and even pushing a protester that was actually trying to help him stand up. The final shot of the episode is of him disappearing into the streets, emphasizing that he's not so high above the ordinary person he derides.
• Brother–Sister Incest: Roman copes with his grief by making several incest jokes when he learns his sister is pregnant, like telling her that he'll jerk off to her breastfeeding. He continues by saying he'll proposition their stepmom Marcia and have sex with her at the funeral. On Logan's coffin.
  Shiv: I'm actually… I'm pregnant.
  Roman: (Beat) Is it mine?
• Casting Gag: Sally-Ann, the woman Logan cheated on Caroline with, is played by Brian Cox (Logan)'s real life wife Nicole Ansari-Cox.
• Cringe Comedy: All the Roys elbowing each other in an attempt to suck up to Mencken. Even he looks a little embarrassed.
• Everyone Has Standards:
  • Weaponised. Everyone, naturally, wants to prevent Ewan Roy from speaking at his brother's funeral, correctly realising that he will have little positive to say and that this may translate into public embarrassment. Ewan himself realises this only too well, however, and starts off by angrily shaming anyone who would dare prevent the brother of the deceased from saying some words at his funeral "because it might affect the share price". Realising that trying to stop him after this would just publicly expose them as heartless, calculating hypocrites, they back down and let him speak.
  • Kendall's loyal Girl Friday Jess has stuck with him throughout all his ups and downs on the show, but it's implied that Kendall throwing his weight behind the far-right Mencken is a bridge too far. She gives an evasive answer when he asks if that's why she's quitting.
  • Despite being a horrible mother always looking out for herself above her children, Caroline extends the courtesy of sitting on a front row at the funeral service alongside her and Marcia to Kerry and Sally-Ann, the Kerry to Caroline's Marcia.
  • While, like everyone else present, Gerri and Frank clearly look down on Roman for his breakdown at the funeral and consider it a sign of weakness and incapability, when Karl gleefully shows them that video footage of it is trending on social media they clearly consider the fact that the whole world appears to be gloating about it a little too harsh.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus: Pausing on the newspaper describing ATN's election call shows that Darwin ("flailing handmaiden to the Wisconsin call") getting wasabi in his eye was important enough to warrant a mention on the timeline.
• The "Fun" in "Funeral": Mostly downplayed, but Logan's funeral has its moments. Peter says a few inappropriate things, Caroline breaks protocol to have the mistresses sit at the front with the wives, Greg is, well, Greg (turning up out of breath as a result of cycling there, trying to get an introduction to Mencken and utterly failing to stop Ewan from giving a eulogy), Roman's attempted eulogy and subsequent breakdown trends on social media (to Karl's amusement) and the kids all have an opinion about Logan's mausoleum which he got in an auction for $5million (wondering, for example, if Stalin and Liberace were the other bidders).
• "Just Joking" Justification: At the reception following the funeral, Mencken softly mocks Roman for breaking down in tears but adds he's merely joking.
• Kick the Dog: Kendall uses Roman's funeral breakdown to beat his brother into submission after he realizes he might need him against Shiv and Mattson.
• The Missus and the Ex: Subverted. Caroline, Marcia, and the women Logan cheated on them with all sit together at his funeral, even if the brass is aghast Kerry gets to sit up front. Caroline actually arranges in on purpose just because she can, but the result is strangely heart-warming and Marcia even shows some sympathy to Kerry. They all enjoy themselves mutually, as if acknowledging how they all loved and suffered under Logan.
• "Not So Different" Remark: An example in which it's the person themselves acknowledging the similarity. In Ewan's eulogy, for all his excoriation of Logan, he admits that despite their divergent life-paths and beliefs the two brothers were ultimately cut from the same cloth, being inclined to coldness, holding grudges and keeping their loved ones at arms distance. Ewan also admits that he isn't as superior to Logan as he'd always liked to believe, but claims that the key difference is that he at least tries to be a good person, whereas he believes that Logan simply gave up doing so at some point.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Roman spends the beginning of the episode preparing to speak his eulogy at Logan's funeral in his usual confident and snide way, adding in witty, if slightly tasteless remarks as he practices his speech. When he actually goes onstage to deliver it though, his showmanship all but vanishes in the wind as he completely breaks down and starts crying profusely, showing how much his father's death has truly taken a toll on him.
• Pet the Dog:
  • After treating her like shit in the wake of Logan's death, Marcia is not only OK with Kerry joining her at the front, she even squeezes her hand at one point.
  • Amid his blistering eulogy of Logan, Ewan does make a point of noting that one of the few things Logan did blame himself for — the death of their younger sister Rose from polio — was not actually his fault.
  • After Roman steps down from the pulpit, unable to carry out the eulogy for Logan, all the other Kids stand up to console him.
• The Reveal: We finally find out why Logan and Ewan's deceased sister Rose is such a sore spot almost 80 years later — she had died of polio and Logan was suspected of bringing it to the family. He tragically blamed himself for his sister's death.
• Screw Politeness, I'm A Senior!: ...and the brother of the deceased. Ewan may be an octogenarian, but regardless of what anybody wants, he WILL speak on Logan's funeral and say exactly what he means to, even if at parts it come across as "The Reason You Suck" Speech.
• Shout-Out: Shiv compares Caroline to Cruella De Vil by saying she heard the sound of dalmatians howling upon seeing her.
• Speak Ill of the Dead: Ewan Roy's eulogy to his brother pulls no punches in declaring that, although Ewan loved his brother and leaves him to be judged by history, Logan was nevertheless a cruel, awful man who through his beliefs, actions and business not only hurt others but encouraged them to give in to their own worst impulses as well, and who on balance made the world a worse place.
• Sycophantic Servant: A swarm of suckups quickly forms around likely president-elect Mencken, consisting of most of the main characters.
  • Following Logan's burial, Kendall approaches Hugo and proposes a job for him, describing it as being "[Kendall's] dog". After being told that he will have nothing but scraps, but these scraps being worth millions, Hugo's respond is merely "woof, woof".
• Villainous Breakdown: Having only managed to cope with his father's death with questionable success throughout the season, the cruel billionaire Roman, for all his talk of being the man that made Mencken president, utterly melts down at the funeral itself, bursting into uncontrollable tears and being unable to deliver the eulogy which supposed to cement his place in the running as Logan's successor. This completely blows any chance he might have still had due to everyone viewing it as weakness, and to top things off he's ultimately unable to enter Logan's crypt. The stresses of the day ultimately culminate in him snapping and wading into a crowd of protestors at the funeral with (somewhat self-destructive) violence on his mind.
• Villainous Respect: Kendall wins Mencken's respect and becomes Roman's Replacement Goldfish after his speech praising Logan. Conversely, Roman is not even acknowledged by Mencken during the procession out of the church and later mocks him for crying and tries to cover it with a "Just Joking" Justification.
• What You Are in the Dark: Tom's absence affords Greg an opportunity to redistribute ATN's election night heroics, but he notably extols Tom regardless, ensuring they both rise in Mencken's approximation.