‘Succession’ Season 3, Episode 6 Recap: What It Takes

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Succession

What is Needed

Season 3 Episode 6

Editor’s Rating 5 stars *****

Photo: Macall Polay/HBO

The sequel requires an episode like “What It Takes” over a long period of time. We know enough about Waystar and ATN and the Roy family to compare Rupert Murdoch, his children, and the toxic legacy of News Corp, or perhaps Donald Trump and his children to fail. If a show like Succession refers to, say, the Trump family more directly, perhaps we can understand Don Jr. as a sort of Roman Roy, a poor simp eager to please the distant, abusive father who would never love him. Such a show can only hint at the impact of their family intrigue in the real world as it will be immersed instead in the small, no doubt fun internal conflicts that envelop daddy and the kids behind closed doors.

The title “What It Takes” refers to Richard Ben Cramer’s book about the 1988 presidential election, a classic of political nonfiction and perhaps the definitive book about how campaigns work. The ’88 election was a mad scramble to replace Ronald Reagan after he reached his two-term limit, with former VPs George HW Bush and Bob Dole vying for the Republican nomination and Michael Dukakis, Gary Hart, Dick Gephardt, and a hopeless Joe Biden mixed it up on the Democratic side. There have been a lot of wild twists and turns in the news media, especially among Democrats, that lead to a nominee, but it’s not as if the media itself has a thumb on the scales. Like any healthy democracy, it was decided by the people of New Hampshire.

The twisted twist of “What It Takes” is that the actual process of who will be president- or who will be nominated on the right, however- is completely vague, decided in the lobbies and suites of off-the- books events than campaign stops and ballot boxes. Just as Logan Roy casually considers the interim CEO of Waystar from his PJ’s cabin, he can also act as kingmaker from the couch of his hotel suite, despite being the person responsible for intimidating the current president, ” the raisin, “because of the test. for the second term. He’s looking for the next white man who looks like the strongest opponent and will agree to a hands-off approach to Waystar’s criminal misadventures in exchange for favorable coverage on ATN. These are things that shouldn’t happen – the DOJ should be independent of executive influence, elections should be the decision of the voters – but, in Succession’s yellowing perspective, do.

So who should be president? We were offered four candidates: There’s the current vice president, Dave Boyer (Reed Birney), aka “Martin Van Boring,” the chatter of about being anti-Big Tech and having a habit of constantly wetting his lips. (“He’s like a cartoon bear and always has a picnic hamper nearby,” Roman said.) There’s Rick Salgado (Yul Vazquez), a RINO-type who seems uncomfortable with the party’s rabid base but may have mainstream appeal. There’s Connor Roy, a fringe anti-tax dipshit which candidacy is such a joke that even his family members cannot help riffing on it. And then there’s Jerryd Mencken (Justin Kirk), an entirely white supremacist and fascist who happens to be also the most charismatic opponent right now.

The bottom line for Logan Roy – and the bottom line, as we’ve learned in the real world, for Rupert Murdoch and Donald Trump – is not a question of ideology but power. Presidential candidates are assessed for their popularity with viewers and how much they can benefit from ATN’s ratings and Waystar’s business interests, but what they believe is less important. Those adjustments can be made if they have not already been made. A network where Ravenhead is a famous primetime demagogue could accommodate a guy like Mencken, and the rest of the programming will fall in line, even if the advertisements land on an online pillow distributor. Logan needs a winner, especially now, when he is under threat from the DOJ and its shareholders.

The rift within the Roy family in Mencken is really debilitating. Shiv has proven himself worthless if not politically flexible-not long ago, he played a chief advisory position with a flamethrower like Bernie Sanders, and now he’s arguing for a less formidable option. We’re used to seeing Roy’s business as an entertaining full-contact sport so Shiv’s real bewilderment and disgust at Mencken’s candidacy was a cold splash of water on his face. If there’s any thought that a corporation like Waystar-or, you know, News Corp-will draw a line on fascist authoritarianism, “What It Takes” will lose it. Mencken’s extremism may come back to bite Waystar eventually, perhaps yielding the Succession equivalents of NewsMax and OANN, but Roman thinks it’s good for business and his daddy agrees. They are probably right.

Eventually, Shiv made a ridiculous choice without a spine. She couldn’t refuse to be included in a photo with Mencken and continue to be “part of the family,” so she arranged a pose that puts her as far away from him as possible. “You win, Pinkie,” her father said of this embarrassing and embarrassing defeat. He took chances with his father and it will continue to abuse him for it, as he did after he reconciled with his bitter opponents last week. He was not smiling in the photo. He was not next to Mencken. But he should know that he is an accomplice, and we should know, as viewers of this entertaining show, that there are no corporate guardrails to prevent the worst people from taking control of the country.

• Kendall’s prolonged refusal to listen to her lawyer – who, annoyingly, doesn’t tell her everything she wants to hear – results in a serious deterioration of her status in the cruises scandal. His provocative responses in a preparation session (“I approved illegal payments because I wanted sexual assault and I wanted to cover it up”) to actual questioning by DOJ officials. Meanwhile, Waystar is burying the DOJ in the papers, running a fake internal investigation, and pondering the works until the crisis was news yesterday.

• Roman green-lighting suggests a hit film called Dr. Honk, about a man who knows how to talk to cars, that Hollywood could be a great place for his talents.

• Even by Succession standards, Will Tracy’s script is saltier and more colorful than usual. One-liner options from “ATN primary”: “As a libtard, how would you like to say elephant asshole?” “Hey Shiv, is it true you’re at a hate fest, burning books and measuring skulls in Nuremberg, Virginia?” “I’m not saying this is going to be a full-fledged Third Reich, but I’m really worried that we could end up in a Russian Berlusconi-ed Brazilian fuckpile.”

• A very good episode for Tom, whose imminent prison sentence earned him the nickname “Christmas Tree” around the office because others, like Greg, could hang up their “bauble of corporate wrong-doing” in its branches. In the meantime, she’s too depressed to make friends with Shiv, who’s still on contraception (“It’s like throwing too much cake batter on a brick wall”), and picking up overcooked omelets at a local diner to feel what the prison can be like food.

• But he may not need to be incarcerated! Kendall arranges a secret meeting to encourage Tom to join his team and get an immunity deal for turning on Logan. The offer is nice, if not for the fact that Tom will betray his wife and throw his fortune at a man who always loses. At this point, Tom was so resigned to his fate that he ordered dinner like Bill Murray on Groundhog Day: “I’ll take the griddle hero special with double hash browns, fully loaded, and plain waffles and a large cup of plain temperature. water. ”

• It seems impossible for Willa to hate Connor more than after he proposes to make his play a horrible event, but uses his body to gain favor with the obscene donor (Stephen Root) responsible for Future Brings Freedom Summit is hate on another level.

• Tom and Shiv’s vineyard produces screw-top wine that seems as rotten as their marriage. “It’s earthy, kind of Germanic,” seems wine-speak for “It literally tastes like shit.”

• Greg line of the week: “I just feel like, because of my physical length, I can be a target for all sorts of wrong adventures.”

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