Previous Power Rankings:
This week on Succession … Roman makes an escape. Shiv has a present for Tom. Kendall hatches a plan. And now, the Power Rankings:
1. Kendall Roy (last week: 3): While all of us expected a biblical conclusion with the old man sacrificing you at the altar, your eyes were firmly set on Greek mythology. It is hard to know what was the final straw that made you decide to make a kamikaze run at your dad. Maybe it was when he dragged you into the home of the boy you killed or the tepid response to your KenWA rap. He may not have liked the good reviews you got when you fricasseed Gil Eavis or he simply could not stomach the idea you found a little bit of happiness with a kindred spirit across the Roy/Pierce divide. Whatever it was, you realized that blackmail stops working when you no longer allow yourself to be pressured by it. Might your dad go nuclear and spill the tea on your own personal Chappaquiddick? Maybe, but you decided it was time to take a stand and show him you are a killer. And so, with the help of a cousin who returned the favor of your giving him a sick condo by handing you the receipts that will blow the cruise line scandal wide open, and in front of an assembled media horde who expected you to take the fall, you pulled the pin on a grenade that might end up sinking the entire ship Fuck Off. But at least you are free.
2. Sandy Furness & Stewie Houssani (last week: not ranked): It looks like slow and steady may yet win this race. Without doing much of anything, you now have the whip hand. While the Roy family flailed about trying to evade your grasp, you just kept plugging along, picking off shareholder support. You were confident enough in your position that you passed on Logan’s last minute peace offering and that was before his number one son pulled off the biggest heel turn since Hulk Hogan joined the nWo. The only question is whether you still want this now poisoned chalice.
3. Cousin Greg(ory): (last week: 9): Perhaps we did not appreciate the subtle game of one Gregory Hirsch. After all, when we first met him, he was smoking swag weed and vomiting out of the eyes of an amusement park costume. His toenails are not aesthetically pleasing and he is socially awkward, a benign fungus, if you will. But Greg has quietly navigated Roy family politics, an affable Ichabod Crane riding the bench and doling out high fives when the coach calls a time out. Sure, he picked up a bit of a coke habit and does not exactly shine when the lights are brightest, but he wisely switched horses mid-stream, moving out of Tom’s orbit and making a key ally in Kendall. While Greg needed some time to find good dealers to keep our number one boy on an even keel, he recognized the value in having a corporate secret or two up his sleeve. Now, Greg(ory) finds himself in an enviable win/win scenario. Turning evidence against Uncle Loges might get Grandpa Grumps to reconsider disinheriting him and riding shotgun with Kendall may turn out to be even more profitable than the $250 million hanging in the balance. Kudos Greg, you negotiated your own Grexit.
4. Logan Roy (last week: 1): Self-pity is not a good look even when you are staring down an existential threat to your rule, but you spent much of the time on your floating city ruminating on the injustice being hurled against you. Stepping down would be the right thing to do, but that is not the way you roll. It was telling that when you had a nautical Boar-on-the-Floor without the sausages, every person in your inner circle immediately pointed fingers instead of taking responsibility. This is the culture you nurtured. Gil Eavis may have pompously quoted Emerson, but he was not wrong, the company is a reflection of the man, and in this case, you value self-preservation over all else. You had no problem doing the sterile corporate math that one Kendall was a greater blood sacrifice than Gerri, Tom, and Karl (with a Greg sprinkle) combined. And when it came time to break the news to Ken, the best you could do was a half-hearted gesture to the nobility of sacrifice, but your heart was not really in it. When your son wanted the one thing you could have given him even if it was not true - validation that he could have done the job - you showed your true stripes, grumbling that he did not have what it takes. As Ken publicly turned the tables on you, was that half-smile an admission that you underestimated him or a frisson of excitement at the next game afoot?
5. Shiv Roy (last week: 2): When handed the opportunity to play CEO, when you were at the most intimate of tables, the place you yearned to be, with a man deciding the future fate of his company, your birthright, and a future he promised, you folded. You may be able to push around scared whistleblowers and be glib in front of a crowd of fellow one-percenters, but when the time came to swing the sword, when emotion had to be removed from the equation, your midwestern meat puppet, the man you have been stepping on and humiliating even before you exchanged wedding vows, finally forced you to find the tiniest sliver of humanity. Will it last? Will it matter? Who knows. If your dad finds a way to maintain power, you have one less sibling to worry about, but in the meantime, you need to do more than spoon feed Tom a fantasy threesome to make your marriage work.
6. Roman Roy (last week: 4): The hero of Asia closed out the season on a high note. Ro got a verbal agreement from a shady oligarch with enough fuck you money to take Waystar private, but was honest enough with himself (and Logan) to admit that if the money was actually needed, the offer was not solid. With Ken on the chopping block, he even got his old job back, but the victory may be pyrrhic. On the personal front, Tabs seems to be MIA, but you are more than happy to throw yourself in front of Gerri to save her bacon. Your unlikely ascent to the throne could still happen, you just need something untoward to happen to your dad and for Sandy and Stewie to decide the squeeze is no longer worth the juice. Keep your powder dry and your little dick ready, Mole Woman and Tarzan may yet run the show.
7. Gerri Killman (last week: 6): Sometimes putting emotional labor into a relationship pays off. Your partner treats you to a nice evening out on the town or is simply present when you need to process the struggles of your day. And while it would be nice to let your hair down and have a companion to mix you that martini as you try to wash off the latest dirt you had to handle on behalf of the Roy family, Roman steering the herd cull away from you was a greater reward for helping him work out his sexual kinks than any day at the spa.
8. Tom Wamgsgans (last week: 10): I will not lie, the early returns did not look good. You were the least enthusiastic participant in a threesome in, basically, the history of threesomes. You were the logical man to toss overboard after your embarrassing performance in front of the Senate and, not for anything, you actually did cover-up all the dirty dealings in the cruise line division. If someone deserved to have his head put on a spike, you were definitely at the top of the list. But you pulled a trump card. You looked at Shiv with those sad eyes and told her your marriage was not working. YOU’RE NOT A HIPPIE FOR GOODNESS SAKES! You are just a square from the midwest with old-fashioned values like not being cool with your wife catching some random cock when she feels like it. You were no longer going to be the doormat she wiped her feet on or the robot who mindlessly carried out her orders, even if it meant giving up the lavish lifestyle you have grown accustomed to. You stood up for yourself. You ate Logan's chicken. But in true Wamgsganian fashion, it may have been too little, too late.
9. Jess (last week: not ranked): It would be unfair to close out the season without acknowledging our number one boy's number one assistant. As is usually the case, Jess's lines are few, but her presence is meaningful. Serving as Kendall’s assistant is no picnic, between arranging satellite offices for a soon-to-be-shuttered website to triaging the payouts for his petty thefts, hers is a thankless job. But it may turn out to be an important one if Kendall survives the civil war he just started among the Roy clan.
10. Connor Roy (last week: 5): Tough week for Connor. Just as the nascent Conn-Head movement is picking up steam and his campaign is gaining traction by making his Senate hearing fist pump go viral, all those suction cups connected to his bank account - the real deal pieces of shit political consultants and the rent-a-girlfriend-who-is-not-really-a-playwright who saw a mark a mile away - have finally milked him dry. The Bank of D-A-D is ready to give you that $100 million lifeline, but there is a simple string attached, two actually. One is the obvious - ending the horse shit pipe dream you had of being President. The other, less so, the truth bomb he dropped, that you are basically as useless as the fake Napoleon dick you bought for half-a-mil. Time to head back to the desert, Connor.
Not Ranked: Marcia Roy; Willa; Tabitha; Hugo Baker; Karolina; Jamie (Laird); the unnamed yacht employee with whom Shiv and Tom were going to have their threesome; the merlot waterboard; Gil Eavis; Nate; Eduard; Naomi Pierce.
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