succession season 2 yacht

Solandge, the yacht used in Succession, costs $1million a week to hire

In last night’s Succession Season 2 finale on HBO, the Roy family and their top Waystar-Royco aides spent time onboard Logan Roy’s luxurious Mediterranean yacht, ostensibly on a brief cruise vacation.  However, the Mediterranean cruise was actually intended to give Logan (Brian Cox) the opportunity to take time off to decide who should take the fall to save Waystar-Royco’s tarnished reputation following the company’s mismanagement scandal, and a congressional hearing on the matter.

Logan finally decided that his troubled son Kendall (Jeremy Strong) would be the “blood sacrifice” to save the company.

If you saw last night’s season finale and wondered about the luxurious yacht that provided the setting for the episode, here is everything you need to know about it.

The superyacht in tonight’s episode of Succession Sign up for our newsletter! Get updates on the latest posts and more from Monsters and Critics straight to your inbox. By submitting your information you agree to our T&Cs and Privacy Policy. Length: 85.1 meters Crew: 29 Cost: 1,000,000 euros to rent per week https://t.co/jaPEubbK6m — Dan Diamond (@ddiamond) October 14, 2019

@Succession_HBO is that M/Y Solandge? Used in S2E10? Nice. — Daniel B Nash Sr (@DanielBNashSr1) October 14, 2019

Solandge was the yacht used in the Succession Season 2 finale

The yacht used in last night’s episode of Succession was the famous 85.1-meter Lürssen motor yacht Solandge . Solandge is one of the world’s largest and most iconic luxurious motor superyachts available for charter.

The weekly summer and winter charter price for a Mediterranean cruise is listed as being from €1,000,000 ( currently about $1,102, 642 plus expenses ).

Solandge was first listed for sale in 2015 at an asking price of €179 million. It was finally sold in a deal brokered by the luxury yacht brokerage firm Moran Yacht & Ship in 2017. The deal, said to be the biggest yacht deal of the year in 2017, was reportedly worth €155,000,000.

Solandge was built by Lürssen in 2013. The luxurious granite, marble and wood interior of the yacht was jointly designed by Rodriguez Interiors and Dolker & Voges. The exterior was designed by Espen Øino ( Espen Oeino).

The yacht is able to sleep 12-16 guests in eight large staterooms. It is also able to accommodate a large gathering of overnight party guests in en-suite cabins. Facilities include a sauna, steam room, massage room, beauty salon, gym, sun deck, outdoor swimming pool, dance floor, bar, outdoor cinema, and nightclub.

The boat has a cruising speed of 15 knots and a top speed of 17 knots.

Solange won the Monaco Yacht Club’s La Belle Classe Superyachts award at the 2014 Monaco Yacht Show.

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Let’s Talk About the Yacht Clothes on “Succession”

By Rachel Syme

In January, 1973, a reporter for the Los Angeles Times flew to Nice, France, to interview the director Herbert Ross about “The Last of Sheila,” a mystery picture that he was shooting on the Côte d’Azur, much of which took place on a luxurious, hundred-and-sixty-five-foot yacht called H.M.S. Malahne. The gilded ship, which was built in England in 1937 and once helped evacuate soldiers from Dunkirk, became something of a Hollywood fixture in the nineteen-sixties and seventies: it served as the floating production office for “Lawrence of Arabia” in Jordan, was a regular Mediterranean clubhouse for Elizabeth Taylor and Frank Sinatra, and popped up in “The Last of Sheila,” as the watery summer home of a sinister film producer played by James Coburn. (There was a kernel of truth buried in this fiction: at the time of filming, H.M.S. Malahne was the property of a womanizing film producer named Sam Spiegel, who was allegedly so handsy with actresses that Billy Wilder once said that he had “velvet octopus arms.”) Dark things can happen out at sea, when people feel unmoored from both the shoreline and a landlocked sense of morality. “The Last of Sheila,” written by Anthony Perkins and Stephen Sondheim—who used to host infamous mystery parties together in New York—pushes this idea to murderous excess. A group of glamorous strangers (including Raquel Welch, Ian McShane, and Dyan Cannon) set sail, people start dying, and it’s up to the viewer to discover whodunnit. In his Los Angeles Times interview, Ross acknowledged the inherent creepiness of floating stories: “If you have a group of people on a ship,” he said, “the ship becomes a metaphor for existence, you can’t help it. . . . it’s about civilization and barbarism.”

I could not stop thinking about “The Last of Sheila” while watching the Season 2 finale of “Succession,” which traps the Roy family and their closest remora on a superyacht in the Adriatic. Like H.M.S. Malahne, which would look like a dinghy beside the Roys’ “boat” (rich people never say “yacht”), their sea vessel is also the setting for a kind of murder mystery. After a series of scandals involving Waystar Royco’s cruise division (dark things happen at sea!), the company’s board demands a “blood sacrifice,” a scapegoat that they can tie up in litigation while the empire sails on, more or less unscathed. Each person who boards the ship knows that they could end up as the one overboard.

And yet they look fabulous. Relaxed. Expensive. Carefree. Cool in Top-Siders and floral maxidresses and gossamer pareos. Like Cannon in “Sheila,” who wore oversized tinted glasses and a circus of colorful caftans and straw hats, even as she was fearing for her life, the Roys, in resort wear, are engaging in high-stakes high fashion, on the high seas.

When I wrote about the fashion on “Succession” earlier this fall, I argued that the Roys are a family of “little pleasure or sparkle,” that, in spite of their money, they are tasteful to a fault, dressing protectively in uniforms of beige cashmere rather than in eccentric couture. I spoke to the show’s costume designer, Michelle Matland, who told me that this was accurate—but that she could not wait for me to see the finale, where we would get to see a different side of the Roy dress code. “I shouldn’t even be telling you this,” she said, at the time. “But they go on a yacht. We get to see them at play.”

Even with this tip-off, the Roys’ maritime peacocking came as a thrilling visual surprise. At last, here was the family in private, dressing only for each other. “Sails out, nails out, bro,” as Kendall instructed Cousin Greg . And while their fashion choices are more adventurous at sea—Tom’s pink linen Ralph Lauren jacket, Shiv’s flowy white Hobbs jumpsuit with an oversized waist sash, Willa’s floral Equipment dress, which she likely bought after seeing it on Kate Middleton—there is still a sense of gloom that seeps through the pastels. I spoke to J. Smith-Cameron, who plays Gerri, Waystar Royco’s general counsel, who did her best Sue Mengers impression in a series of Cynthia Rowley caftans. Smith-Cameron told me that she wanted to look like she was seasick with stress, even in spangles. “We see these people on this plush boat on the Adriatic with delicious food, and there’s a pool and a slide and Jet Skis,” she said. “But everyone is filled with dread. So it was actually meant to be jarring: beautiful surroundings with long faces and furtive glances, not people enjoying themselves. So all of our resort wear is meant to look nice but at the same time be amusingly counter.”

Matland echoed this sentiment. Tom, for example, is coming off his disastrous performance at the congressional hearings on Waystar Royco’s crimes and is “highly agitated,” she said. “His clothing, which was a lot of Ralph Lauren linen suits, is there to belie the fact that he is on the edge of a breakdown. He is constantly trying to look as if he is comfortable—pink linens say honeymoon, vacation, enjoyment—but it is there to cover for the fact that he is unhinged.”

Matland’s goal with the episode was to telegraph the shared anxiety that each character feels while laundering this panic through the resort-wear section of Bergdorf Goodman. Kendall (Jeremy Strong), who quietly slumps around, wears a tiny Paul Stuart trilby hat (Strong’s idea), which Matland says serves as both a security blanket and as a sign that he is feeling deeply insecure. “The hat was crumpled, if you’ll notice,” she said. “It was purposefully imperfect.”

In the final twist, when Kendall turns saboteur, he is back in his city armor: a sharp, fitted Tom Ford suit that almost shines like sharkshin. He sheds the earth tones that he has been wearing all season and dons the color black—a mournful color, but also one that marks him as an assassin, capable of patricide. He’s lost his blingy Oliver Peoples sunglasses, the typical eyewear of rich scions who have a trust fund and personal shoppers who run errands to SoHo; he is at last seeing clearly.

Sunglasses were crucial to this episode, Matland told me, when it came to winking at subtle differences between characters. Shiv, for example, wears traditional Ray-Bans, a sign that she wants to traffic in old-money rituals rather than in flashy ostentation. (“It was significant that she did not wear Gucci or Prada,” Matland said.) Tom’s sunglasses in his much memed chicken-stealing moment , right after he breaks down about his unhappy marriage, are Persol, an old-world Italian brand favored by worldly celebrities, most notably by Anthony Bourdain, who wore his pair all over the globe. His shades are as close to representing rebelliousness as one can get in the Roys’ world. Tom is past his breaking point; he’s having his Brando moment.

Logan never lets his guard down, even in the sun—his sun hat is wool, from Walker Slater, a tweedy, posh haberdasher from Scotland. Nor does Roman, who, despite being the most feckless character, may also be the most authentic, in that he almost never changes his costume. “He has a uniform he’s super-comfortable in,” Matland said. “Blue oxford button-ups. Always.”

As for Shiv, most of her boat wear, including her cream pinstripe suits, is Ralph Lauren Purple Label, a sign that she arrived on the ship most prepared for professional ruthlessness. She wants the top job, she’s dressed for it, and she’s willing to throw her husband under the bus for it, save for a rare moment of weakness in front of her father. Her one whimsical touch is an oversized straw hat with a black ribbon, from the Brooklyn brand Lola, which makes her look pampered and pastoral, like an extra from “ Anne of Green Gables .” Even with her sharp, new-ish bob and architectural wardrobe, Shiv is still a spoiled, priggish little girl who throws tantrums if she can’t get her way, and her accessories betray her true nature. (As a side note, Smith-Cameron told me that she was so taken with Shiv’s hat that she went out and bought one for herself after the episode wrapped.)

In “Succession,” no detail is out of place. Like a classic whodunnit, it is the kind of show that begs rewatching, studying, squinting at with a gimlet eye. If you run the finale back, you might wonder when exactly Cousin Greg decided to betray Logan and give Kendall the incriminating documents that he stole. Was it while shirtless and in baggy swim trunks, drinking a mediocre rosé, or was it while he was wearing a navy Lacoste polo on the Roys’ private jet? When Greg first boards the yacht, in a striped French blue sweater and tailored khaki shorts, he looks suspiciously like Tom Ripley, a sleek interloper in the world of luxury who is willing to kill to survive. Perhaps even then Greg was eager to turn traitorous. Matland, who worked on the film “The Talented Mr. Ripley,” understands more than most how to make summer attire appear instantly malevolent. She creates a world of sunny poplins and ivory linens and breathable cottons, but, in the end, we are the ones left holding our breath.

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By Troy Patterson

By Ian Parker

You, Too, Can Charter the ‘Succession’ Yacht…for $1.1 Million a Week

Who owns the ‘Succession’ yacht? Learn more about the ‘Solandge,’ the 279-foot boat the Roy family boarded in the HBO drama’s second season.

Oct. 15 2021, Published 11:29 a.m. ET

Who owns the Succession yacht? Certainly not Succession star Sarah Snook , who told Page Six on Oct. 12, that she has no interest in such an expense. “You own a boat like that, you’ve got to maintain a boat like that,” said Snook, who plays Shiv Roy on the show. “It’s like $12 mil a year or something like that to maintain. Who wants to spend money on that?…Give the money away; no one needs that much money. There’s a ceiling where money makes you happy, and beyond that, it’s just greed.”

Of course, you don’t have to own the 279-foot yacht featured in the HBO drama ’s second season to enjoy its amenities. You can also charter the luxurious vessel , but you’d still need deep pockets.

Who owns the ‘Succession’ yacht?

The Solandge found a new owner in March 2017, after being listed for sale with Moran Yacht & Ship for 155,000,000 euros (about $180 million). However, the identity of the buyer hasn't been revealed.

Actress J. Smith-Cameron, who plays Gerri Kellman on Succession , discussed the boat with BuzzFeed News in Oct. 2019. “I think it’s a Saudi-owned superyacht . I believe the word ‘Solandge’ is made up of the letters of the kids’ and cousins’ names. I think somebody told me that. It may or may not be true. But it seemed like a good choice because it seemed like a parallel universe for the Roy family.”

BOAT International reported that the Solandge sale was the biggest brokerage deal of 2017 at the time. “We would like to take this opportunity to congratulate her new owner and thank her former owner for recognizing our expertise in selling large quality yachts and entrusting us with the sale of Solandge ,” Moran said upon the sale.

How do you rent the ‘Succession’ yacht?

The Solandge is available for charter through Moran Yacht & Ship, but it will set you back. You can charter the vessel for a summer week in the Mediterranean or a winter week in the Caribbean and the Bahamas, but both charters cost 1,000,000 euros per week, or about $1.16 million.

Moran touts that the Solandge is “one of the finest vessels currently available for charter and is one of the world’s largest and most iconic yachts.” The yacht sleeps 12 guests in eight state rooms, with a private owner’s deck and suite. A crew of 29, meanwhile, sleeps in 15 crew cabins. Built in 2013, the Solandge won the "La Belle Classe Superyachts" award from the Monaco Yacht Club at the 2014 Monaco Yacht Show, and the award for the best exterior at the Monaco Yacht Show Awards.

The Solandge ’s top deck features an outdoor cinema and a nightclub, the main deck features an indoor-outdoor gym, and the lower deck features a dive center, a tender garage, and a sauna. The saloon interior, designed by Aileen Rodriguez, boasts a floor-to-ceiling panel of backlit amethyst quartz, a large bar of amethyst-and-honey onyx, and a dining table under an amethyst-and-rose-quartz chandelier. And don’t forget about the onboard beauty salon, swimming pool, jacuzzi, and helipad!

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Which yacht stars in the TV series 'Succession'?

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By Katia Damborsky   29 October 2019

The 279ft (85m)  charter yacht SOLANDGE is the yacht in HBO’s  Succession. Hitting TV screens in 2019, the season finale of season 2 gives viewers an inside glimpse into life on board the Lurssen luxury yacht in the Mediterranean .

The curtain closed on season 2 of hit HBO show Succession earlier this month, after a dramatic season finale filmed on board SOLANDGE cruising the Mediterranean .

The series gives viewers a peak inside the six-deck superyacht, which can be rented from €1,000,000 (approximately $1,136,000) per week plus expenses.

While the yacht is fictitiously owned by the Roy family in the series, Succession showcases the type of lifestyle you can expect when chartering million-dollar megayachts ; from stylish helicopter departures to zipping between islands on a luxury tender.

The finale of Succession Season 2 is filmed on board superyacht SOLANDGE

Succession is an award-winning comedy-drama which centres around the life of the uber-wealthy and highly dysfunctional Roy family.

At the helm of the family is patriarch Logan Roy, a media titan who heads up and controls an international media conglomerate. After his health takes a turn for the worst, his adult children must each face the prospect of becoming heir to the family business. 

Rife with power struggles, backstabbing betrayals and family loyalty, Succession offers a fresh take on abuse, media and wealth in contemporary America.  

Succession showcases the type of lifestyle you can expect when chartering million-dollar megayachts.

The dramatic end to season 2 of Succession premiered in October 2019, with the finale to Succession filmed on board the motor yacht SOLANDGE.

This glamorous setting gave us plenty of scandal; Logan disingenuously suggesting stepping down as CEO, Connor's iPad getting thrown overboard and of course, the shocking final moments where we see Kendall blowing the whistle on his father.

How much does it cost to rent the yacht in Succession?

The cost of renting luxury yacht SOLANDGE is upwards of 1 million euros (or 1.136 million dollars) per week plus expenses during both the winter and summer. This price does not include the cost of food, drink, fuel dockage, VAT and tips.

SOLANDGE features in our article, the world’s most expensive charter yachts which cost over $1 million to rent per week .

What does the yacht from Succession look like inside?

With her Lurssen pedigree, innovative design and stunning selection of amenities,  SOLANDGE is recognised as one of the world’s most iconic superyachts.

She is home to all the facilities you would expect on a yacht of this calibre, including a sleek swimming pool with jet-stream technology and a cutting-edge chromotherapy spa with Hamman and treatment room which both integrate light therapy. 

Her main deck plays host to the expansive owners’ suite, which enjoys his and hers en suites with adjoining dressing rooms, a private lounge-cum-office and a private deck area with dip pool and intimate seating areas. 

While chartering her, guests can make use out of a fully-stocked wine cellar and an elevator with the capacity for nine.

Inside superyacht SOLANDGE

SOLANDGE features ornate interiors from Florida-based studio Rodriguez Interiors. A palatial theme is reflected in plush fabrics, a rich colour palette and a selection of semi-precious stones, including amethyst, honey onyx, gold leaf and rose quartz.

The design team behind SOLANDGE has also sourced plenty of glass fixtures from Murano, an island near Venice famed for its rich history of glass-making. 

Her opulent finish is evident in the main salon, which is flanked by two walls of LED backlit amethyst that imbue the room with a soft lilac glow.

An elaborate focal point, the walls have been created by slicing a piece of amethyst into tiny segments with diamond wire and gluing them to a glass sheet, before then being covered by a panel of Plexiglass studded with LED lights.

Another talking point aboard the charter yacht is the floating central staircase, which features a sculpted ‘Tree of Life’ statue ascending the full height of the yacht.

In total, 1,423 points of light illuminate the space with a warm glow. Themes of nature continue in the owner’s suite, where backlit mullions depict the Garden of Eden. 

In total, around 25 wood veneers have been used throughout luxury yacht SOLANDGE. On the lower decks, where there is typically less light, the yacht features darker, ebony finishes; higher up, lighter blondewood and caramel finishes are more prevalent.

This delicate mix of traditional opulence and contemporary punches of colour and texture lend SOLANDGE an atmosphere quite unlike any yacht.

A motor yacht of her calibre makes the perfect backdrop for Succession, and it’s hoped we’ll see SOLANDGE return to reprise her role as the Roy family’s luxury yacht in season 3.

If you’d like to learn more about chartering M/Y SOLANDGE, please get in touch with your preferred yacht charter broker .

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85m Lurssen 2013 / 2022

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Succession Season 2 Finale Recap: Who Did Logan Throw Overboard?

Dave nemetz, west coast bureau chief.

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Succession ‘s Roy family wrapped up Season 2 by hashing out their issues aboard a luxury yacht… and one key character went down with the ship.

Sunday’s finale starts back in D.C., with a bewildered Cousin Greg withering under the glaring spotlight of a tough Congressional inquiry, while Logan takes a call from a big-time shareholder, warning him that someone needs to take the fall for the cruise ship scandal… and “we feel that probably it should be you.” Logan doesn’t love that idea, of course, and gathers his brood in Venice for a stay aboard his decadent mega-yacht. (It’s almost like a Below Deck Med crossover episode.) There’s plenty of drama afoot: Willa’s play got hammered by bad reviews, Kendall brought Naomi Pierce along… and Tom is very flustered about Shiv planning a threesome with him and an old female friend.

Logan is a bit shellshocked when confiding in Kendall, but he says no to bringing in Stewie again, and the mood is grim. (Even Tom knows there’s going to be “a head on a spike.”) Connor comes begging to Logan for one of his newspapers to cook up some good reviews for Willa’s play… and oh, a loan of “a little hundred mill” (!). Logan says yes — but only if he gives up his silly presidential bid. Then he invites everyone to drink up tonight… because tomorrow, they’ll have to come up with a plan together. Roman gleefully starts taking bets on who’s getting canned, and Logan raises some alarms about Naomi joining Kendall on the boat. “I just don’t want you f–ked on drugs,” he bluntly tells his son, and a compliant Kendall sends her away the next morning. Plus, Tom finds a way to ruin the threesome before it even starts, concluding he’s just not feeling that “naughty.” (Not a shock, to be honest.)

Kendall thinks Tom isn’t a big enough skull, though, and Roman recommends they spice his sacrifice up with “some Greg sprinkles.” (Greg: “I object.” Roman: “Who cares?”) Connor volunteers himself, in hopes of grabbing a golden parachute, but Logan walks away from the table, thinking they have “half an idea” and they’ll finish up later. He and Kendall take an emergency meeting with Stewy, offering to accept the hostile takeover on certain terms… but Stewy flatly says no. He shrugs off Kendall’s anger, thinking he and Sandy have the shareholders on their side. Meanwhile, Shiv and Tom share a private beachside picnic, and Tom fumes about how she threw him under the bus — and how she sprung an open marriage on him on their wedding night. (“I am not a hippie!”) He confesses he’s been “pretty unhappy” with her, and works up the nerve to talk to Shiv’s dad. Actually, though, he just sits down next to Logan and takes an awkward bite of his chicken before fleeing.

Shiv huddles with Logan, and he promises if Tom is the victim, “I’ll take care of him.” Then he drops a bombshell: “Ken works… it hurts.” But “it plays,” too, he thinks. He turns to his daughter and asks her what she thinks, noting that this is a job for a future CEO. Shiv hesitates, but then tells her dad: “Just not Tom… Please. For me.” Later, she calls in Kendall to see Logan… and Kendall sees the writing on the wall. Logan says Tom and Greg won’t work, and the shareholders won’t accept him stepping down himself. (Which is a lie, but anyway.) An ashen-faced Kendall assures him it’s OK, as Logan prepares him to confess: He knew everything about the cruise troubles, and will take the fall.

Alright, it’s your turn: Give tonight’s finale a grade in our poll below, and then hit the comments to share your thoughts.

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Just add in the slow burning grin by Logan as he watches his favorite son Kendall throwing his bastard Father to the wolves, the realization that he raised Kendall to be the heir to his throne. Logan knew all along he had to be the one, and what a way to go.

What a finale! This is the best show on TV and best thing on air since Mad Men… this episode showed why. I cannot wait until next year to see how it plays out.

Kendall gave his dad a Judas kiss at the end of their meeting. A tip-off. Tom wondering if he would be less unhappy without Shiv as opposed to how unhappy he is with her was genuinely moving.

Sheesh what a finale. Maybe it was just me but it looked like Logan was proud of how that played out. I’ve been saying all season that Kendall is a killer and he showed it.

Exactly what I said. He told him he wasn’t a killer, Kendall proved him wrong… or perhaps, Logan knew this was going to happen?

Logan setting his kid up for success

Kendall has been a lion in the tall grass all season.

That was amazing! Amazing! I can’t wait for next season

This show is one of my favorites and it just gets better and better! I can’t wait for next season!

Watching Kendall accepting to be the “sacrifice” had me in tears, however, his father taught him one more lesson when he said:”you’re not a killer”. Kendall showed dad!! In fact, I think Logan was proud of his son for the first time!!

That little smile playing on Logan’s lips in the last scene says it all. He set the whole thing up to save his baby…the company. He started hatching the plan the minute he got the “hard phone call” from the biggest shareholder. Can’t wait for next season.

That was one of the best episodes of television that I have ever seen.

I watched the episode twice tonight. When Kendall was seeing Naomi off at the speedboat she said something to Kendall that made him stare into space. I could not decipher what she said about how Logan loved Kendall. Anybody know?

She said Logan loves the broken Kendall, and Kendall looked absolutely stricken when she said that.

WOW! WOW! WOW! Truly the best show on television. I was blown away by the finale. Can’t wait for season 3.

So Id like opinions here, was this Logans master plan all along? The family manipulation is evil, but did he craft Kendall the entire time? Telling him he is not a killer, knowing that would challenge him? Telling him prior to that his current girlfriend was a part of his drug problem? Evil genius?

I know some people think Logan wanted Ken to do this all along, but I don’t think so. Why would he put himself through the public humiliation of his son’s betrayal, when he could have stepped down and satisfied the shareholders that way? I know he’s constantly testing his children, and I do believe he was actually a little proud of how hard Kendall punched back, but I truly don’t think he expected Kendall to throw him under the bus and then back over it

He maybe thought exposing himself would be a sign of weakness, like only someone with strong morals and real consciense is capable of admitting that he did wrong, of showing regret. It is showing that one is human, has weaknesses and is capable of changeing for the better, of apologizing. I think he has a reputation to maintain as someone cold, calculating, an old school businessman, a KILLER. And killers dont admit they have done something wrong. They refuse to give up power and control. They prefer to make it seem like they have been betrayed…I think it was all calculated from the moment on he received THE phone call..He is a master of manipulation. He knows exactly which buttons to push when it comes down to his children…telling Ken hes not a killer was a deliberate provocation…and it was a win-win for him and Ken…that way Ken gained back his dignity and his much needed self confidence…his power…it was almost a gift to Ken…and I think Ken will be CEO…I think it has always been Ken…just my humble opinion…another point of view.

Would not surprise me if Jesse Armstrong wins another Emmy next year for writing for this episode

I absolutely knew that this was going to happen. I think that Logan and Kendal manufactured this to make Logan the sacrificial lamb and get Kendall the top job, identifying him as a herl

I agree with you, I think it was Logans final master move. It was no coincidence. Hes so intelligent it scares me.

I just wish the kids would all talk like humans, particularly Kendall and Shiv who both appear to be androids. I don’t think they even blink, has anyone seen them blink?.

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This Is Not for Tears

• Edit source
• 3.1 Starring
• 3.2 Recurring
• 6 References

Premise [ ]

On the Roys' grand Mediterranean yacht, Logan weighs whether a member of the family, or a top lieutenant, will need to be sacrificed to salvage the company's tarnished reputation. Roman shares his hesitations about a new source of financing, as Kendall suggests a familiar alternative. Shiv proposes taking her open marriage with Tom to another level. [1]

Plot synopsis [ ]

Greg takes the stand

Greg is called to testify before Congress regarding the sexual misconduct on Waystar's cruise-lines . He fumbles his way through the testimony, seemingly nervous in front of Senator Gil Eavis . In the car, Logan watches the testimony with Hugo as they discuss who will be the scapegoat following the scandal. Logan then receives a call from a high-profile shareholder of Waystar's, who suggests that Logan take responsibility for the crimes.

Following the testimony, the Roys decide to vacation on their yacht. Connor and Willa , who is upset that her play has been panned by critics, are first to arrive. Shiv arrives with Tom and suggests that the two of them to have a threesome with a female yacht employee, though Tom is clearly uncomfortable with the idea. Tom sees that Gerri and Frank have followed them on board, and starts to think that this may be more than a "family holiday." Kendall soon arrives with Greg and girlfriend Naomi Pierce .

Connor and Willa are scrolling through the reviews of her play when Willa, frustrated upon seeing that they're mostly very negative, tosses Connor's tablet into the sea. Roman , Karl , and Laird arrive via helicopter, after returning from Turkey where they had been held for being potentially dangerous foreigners. The men seem a bit shaken up, but Laird says that Roman did good in terms of handling the deal, and that Asgarov will allow them to go private. Laird reminds the others of the consequences of Waystar remaining public, and leaves the yacht so that they may discuss amongst themselves. Connor then asks Logan for money, admitting that his campaign is robbing him and he can't cover the loss of Willa's play. Logan agrees, so long as Connor suspend his presidential campaign. Logan then asks Kendall to make Naomi leave, claiming that she enables his drug abuse. Naomi is disappointed that Kendall won't leave with her, but complies.

Logan is disappointed to wake up to no sign of Marcia , as he was hoping she'd join them on the yacht. At breakfast, Logan nonchalantly offers himself as the scapegoat, but the others deny and begin debating other options, relieving Logan. Ken suggests Gerri, Roman suggests Frank, and Frank suggests Karl. Karl suggests Gerri as well, but Roman defends her, saying that Tom is the logical choice due to his previous involvement with the cruise-line. Roman also adds that Greg could be sacrificed as well. Several others, including Shiv, agree that Tom is the most viable option, although Kendall adds that he might not be "big enough". Connor volunteers, asking for cash in return, which amuses Logan and he thanks Connor for the gesture. Logan then leaves to reflect, before he and Kendall travel to a Greek island in attempt to enlist financial aid from Stewy , who denies them. [Notes 1]

While relaxing on a beach, Tom confesses to Shiv that he is unhappy in their marriage. He confesses that he's not sure it was ever a good idea, but wishes to salvage it. Shiv, taken aback but feeling guilty, wishes to salvage it as well. Back at the yacht, Tom eats some of Logan's food in front of him, just to spite him. Shiv then goes to speak with her father. She does not initially reveal her intentions of speaking to him, but soon begins begging him not to get rid of Tom. Shiv is then asked to choose between her husband and her brother Kendall, and although pained by it, motions for Kendall to speak with their father.

Logan breaks the news to Kendall

Logan informs Kendall that he will be the blood sacrifice. Kendall suggests that he deserves punishment for what happened to Andrew Dodds , which Logan dismisses as a case of "No Real Person Involved", but not this. [Notes 2] Kendall, disappointed, asks if he was ever considered for the position of CEO. Logan admits that he wasn't, saying "You're not a killer. You have to be a killer." Kendall kisses Logan on the cheek and the two leave to inform the others of the decision. [Notes 3] Roman is appointed to COO and Frank will be responsible for cleanup.

Logan hearing Kendall's speech

The next morning, Kendall and Greg leave for a press conference back in New York, Jess and Karolina joining them upon arrival. Logan watches the conference from the yacht, Shiv by his side. Kendall, in front of the press, begins to explain his role as scapegoat, but suddenly deviates and begins blaming Logan. He states that his father is a "malignant presence, a bully, and a liar" and has been aware of the events for many years but made efforts to cover them up. Additionally, he informs the reporters that he has brought documents proving his father's guilt, which Greg seemingly has on hand. The speech shocks the reporters, Karolina, and the rest of the Roy family except for Logan, who bears a faint smile.

• ↑ Logan offers Stewy three board seats, including Kendall's, and a say in their next appointment of CEO.
• ↑ NRPI is likely based on the real-world phrase "No Human Involved", which is most often used by police officers to describe crimes involving victims of color, female victims who are sex workers, and drug addicts. In Andrew Dodds' case, Logan dehumanizes him due to his drug problems.
• ↑ Although Logan doesn't know it yet, he has received the "kiss of Judas" (or "kiss of death") from Kendall, forewarning betrayal.

• Tom Wambsgans [to Shiv Roy]: I think a lot of the time, I'm really pretty unhappy. I wonder if the sad I'd be without you would be less than the sad I get from being with you.
• Kendall Roy: The truth is that my father is a malignant presence, a bully, and a liar, and he was fully personally aware of these events for many years and made efforts to hide and cover up. He had a twisted sense of loyalty to bad actors like Lester McClintock. And a disregard for the safety of migrant workers, non-union and union workers, and for vulnerable performers and guests. My father keeps a watchful eye over every inch of his whole empire, and the notion that he would have allowed millions of dollars in settlements and compensation to be paid without his explicit approval is utterly fanciful.
• Armstrong stated that he chose to play the Roy family on a yacht because of the history surrounding real-life media moguls, such as Robert Maxwell, having important family meetings on yachts. Mark Mylod noted that the yacht also, given the context, played on the metaphor of "throwing someone overboard." [6]
• The episode was nominated for several Primetime Emmy, Primetime Creative Arts Emmy, and Directors Guild of America Awards. [7] [8] Jeremy Strong [9] , Nicholas Braun [10] , and Matthew Macfadyen [11] all submitted the episode to support their nominations.

References [ ]

• ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 Succession Ep 10: This Is Not for Tears | Official Website for the HBO Series | HBO.com
• ↑ Shows A-Z - succession on hbo | TheFutonCritic.com
• ↑ 3.0 3.1 Succession : Season 2 , Episode 10: " This Is Not for Tears "
• ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 Succession | Official Website for the HBO Series | HBO.com
• ↑ ‘Succession’ Showrunner Talks Season 2 Finale Twist – The Hollywood Reporter
• ↑ 2020 Emmy Nominations: Nominees For 72nd Annual Awards – Deadline
• ↑ DGA Announces 2019 Awards Nominees for: Dramatic Series; Comedy Series; and Variety/Talk/News/Sports (dga.org)
• ↑ Jeremy Strong (‘Succession’): Emmys 2020 episode submission revealed - GoldDerby
• ↑ Nicholas Braun (‘Succession’): Emmys 2020 episode submission revealed - GoldDerby
• ↑ Matthew Macfadyen (‘Succession’): Emmys 2020 episode submission - GoldDerby

• 1 Kendall Roy
• 2 Logan Roy
• 3 Siobhan Roy

Succession Season Two Recap: Who Is the Last Roy Standing?

Two years is a long time to have gone without the hit HBO show—get up to speed here.

Confused? We get it. It feels like an eternity has passed since we last saw the Roys and we’re here to catch you up. Below, refresh your memory on where we left each of the Succession characters before tuning in to season three.

Kendall Roy

The latter half of Succession ’s second season revolved around the now-public controversy in Waystar Royco’s cruise division, resulting in congressional hearings, tanking stock, and general chaos. After a few disastrous testimonies (thanks, Tom), Logan decided that the public needed a “blood sacrifice,” someone high up in the company who could take the fall, staving off frightened shareholders.

In the season finale, Logan decides that Kendall, his issue-riddled, hyper-ambitious son, will take the fall. This comes after a number of smaller incidents between the pair during the finale. Logan advises (i.e. forces) Kendall to send home Naomi Pierce, a woman with whom Kendall’s formed a bond over the past few episodes. There’s also a failed deal with Kendall’s friend Stewy, who notes that shareholders simply care about profit margins, and less about keeping the business in the family.

Kendall acquiesces to Logan’s plan, or seems to, with his father telling him that he’s “not a killer.” The prodigal son returns to New York for a press conference, where he is set to admit to wrongdoing, thus throwing himself under a bus (or cruise ship, if you will) to save his father and the family business. However, in a move that makes all the more sense in the context of Kendall’s prior treachery (season one’s vote of no confidence in Logan and the attempted takeover at Shiv’s wedding), he changes course.

Live on camera, as his family watches from their yacht, Kendall reveals his father’s involvement in the cruise scandal and goes on to condemn Logan in a number of ways. He calls the patriarch “a malignant presence, a bully and a liar.” “I think this is the day his reign ends,” Kendall says.

As Kendall spirals, Roman has been trying to earn his father’s trust, taking a more prominent role in the family business. He seems to have succeeded, saving himself from the cruise scandal chopping block. In episode nine, Roman was almost killed trying to take the company private with a source of independent wealth, which he attempted to secure in eastern Europe. He was held at gunpoint, but received a semblance of a deal. However, despite differing feelings from Logan’s advisors, Roman advocates against taking the money, noting that the deal seemed like too much trouble and too sketchy. As a reward, Logan offers Roman the COO position when Kendall is axed.

Meanwhile, Roman’s intriguing relationship with Gerri, Waystar’s general counsel, continues. He defends her from being sacrificed (“Haven’t we killed enough woman already?”) and the pair continue their sexually explicit (though lacking in touch) trysts. A poster for season three certainly fueled speculation about the continuation of this arrangement.

Shiv is clearly her father’s favorite, though continues to say the wrong thing at the wrong time. She began season two with an offer to succeed her father as CEO, a proposition she lost after advocating for a “dinosaur cull” at the company. Logan fluctuates between feeling proud of his daughter and being, well, sexist. It’s uncertain whether Shiv has done enough (leaving her job in politics, witness intimidation in a congressional trial) to place herself back in the running, but she’s certainly trying. She even offers up her husband, Tom, as the “blood sacrifice,” much to his dismay.

In terms of Tom, the season ends with Shiv’s marriage on the rocks. Tom is finally able to confront his wife about their “arrangement” for an open marriage, which she proposed on their wedding night. As the pair get some alone time in a cove, Tom tells Shiv, “I wonder, if the sad I’d be without you would be less than the sad I’d be being with you.”

Arguably, the Roy child the most off his rocker, Connor continues to act as comic relief. He’s hemorrhaging money from his paid escort-turned girlfriend Willa’s Broadway show and attempts to run for president in a distinctly Trumpy manner. Connor needs money and asks Logan for a loan—just, you know, $100 million. Logan concedes, provided that Connor abandons his presidential ambitions.

Cousin Greg

Greg Hirsch (aka Cousin Greg aka Greg the Egg) spent season two strategizing which side in the family war he should take. All the while, he gives up his own inheritance, fully buying into his future in Waystar. Greg was also involved in the cruise ship scandal early on, as Tom ordered him to destroy documents detailing the events. For his own security, Greg kept a few crucial pages, which he parlayed into Roy family capital on various occasions. However, Greg also becomes embroiled in the scandal, testifying (hilariously) before Congress; Roman also nominates him to take some of the blame (did someone say “Greg sprinkles?”).

Though he doesn’t end up getting axed, Greg sides with Kendall, giving him access to the incriminating documents. It is these papers that give Kendall the ammunition he needs to take the shot at his father. Kendall drives away from the presser, Greg in tow.

Of course, there’s still Logan. And, if two seasons of Succession have taught us anything, it’s that he is not to be underestimated. However, after helicoptering onto the yacht to run his version of Survivor , Logan can't make the decision on his own and asks his family and advisors to make the hard choice for him. Of course, his own suggestion to step down is purely performative. When he eventually picks Kendall (mind you, at Shiv’s suggestion), it’s all just seems a tad too easy.

Logan’s relationship is also strained. After he names Rhea (with whom he had an affair) successor to the CEO seat, Logan’s marriage with his third wife, Marcia, fractures. Even after the deal with Rhea explodes, Marcia is nowhere to be found and Logan sleeps alone in the finale.

Season two ended with Logan and the rest of the Roys watching Kendall’s press conference. As Kendall betrays him, Logan watches the scene unfold, wearing a slight smile that just, almost, looks a little like pride.

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Everyone Is Obsessed with Shiv Roy’s Outfits from the Succession Finale

By Abby Gardner

There are many things that will be missed now that HBO’s Succession has wrapped up its masterful second season: super-rich people telling each other to “fuck off,” the shenanigans of Tom and Cousin Greg(ory), Roman and Gerri’s interesting dynamic, Kendall’s sad eyes. But I’ll especially miss Shiv’s phenomenal fashion.

The only daughter in the Roy clan had a serious sartorial glow-up in season two, and the Internet loved every second—to the point that there will surely be an uptick in turtleneck and high-waist pants this fall. (See our ranking of her best outfits here .) Coupled with a perfect bob haircut and a renewed desire to get back into the family business, Shiv was all about power moves this season. And as the family took to their massive yacht in the finale, Shiv’s vacation outfits did not disappoint.

If you thought Shiv would abandon her signature style just because she was headed to warmer climates, you’d be very wrong. My personal favorite was the creamy white high-waist number that was such perfect “rich lady on a gazillion-dollar ship.” Or maybe the blue halter look.

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She also worked in some floral prints and a large sun hat. “Shiv Roy in boat clothes! #Succession,” one fan tweeted.

Social media was very much here for all of her outfits, really. “Shiv’s white outfit, I need it. #SuccessionHBO,” one person wrote. “Every outfit Shiv wears, I want it. I want the entire LOOK! Sarah is BAD!!!!!!! #SuccessionHBO,” another said. This tweet sums up the general sentiment: “Fuuuuuuck, the Succession finale was so good. Also I want every one of Shiv’s outfits in this episode, her styling was fantastic.”

By Elizabeth Logan

By Deanna Pai

Sidebar: Her character’s reading Sally Rooney’s Conversations with Friends was perfection too.

I cannot wait to see what the styling team brings for Shiv in season three with yet another shift in the family dynamics after that finale—but I’m fairly certain I’m going to love it.

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Season 2 finale of Succession filmed on board Mega Yacht Solandge – Photo © HBO

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What happened in the 'Succession' season 2 finale?

Let's recap all the drama from the 'Succession' season 2 finale before you start those new episodes

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Our favorite dysfunctional billionaires are back! Succession season 3 kicked off on October 17, but before you click play on those fresh-from-the-oven episodes, let's catch up with the Roys and everything that happened in that drama-filled Succession season 2 finale, which aired a whopping two years ago due to COVID-related delays. 

Could you believe what Kendall did during that press conference? Or how bumbling Cousin Greg has turned into a veritable power player? What do you think is going to happen with Tom and Shiv's marriage? 

From the core Roys to the schemers that encircle them, here's a complete refresher on how did season 2 of Succession end, just in time for new episodes to hit HBO Max .

*Warning: It goes without saying but there are major spoilers ahead, people!*

• Is Succession on Netflix ? How to watch the hit series
• How many seasons of Succession will there be? Inside season four and beyond
• Succession filming locations : Enter the world of Waystar Royco
• What is Succession based on ? Behind the show's real-life inspiration

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'Succession' season 2 finale: What went down?

Season two of Succession simultaneously dealt both with the rise of Logan Roy's successor—would it be Kendall, Siobhan, Roman or, LOL, Connor?—and with the potential downfall of the media empire that he ruthlessly built over the years, as rumor has it that the company's cruise ship division has been acting as a major cover-up for serious crimes, including murder and sexual assault. 

The Succession season 2 finale, entitled "This is Not for Tears," finds the Roy family and its Waystar Royco cohorts on a—what else?—luxury yacht strategizing which member of the clan would be offered up as a "blood sacrifice" to take the fall for the cruise scandal ahead of the shareholders' meeting. 

Would it be Logan himself, like the investors suggest? Unlikely. How about Tom, Shiv's husband and the head of Waystar Royco’s amusement park and cruise division, with "some Greg sprinkles"? Maybe Roman, who's "widely known as a terrible person"?

In the end, they decide on middle son Kendall Roy, who had already spent the better part of season two acting as his dad's punching bag. According to the plan, Kendall would take the blame for the cruise division crisis and announce his resignation from Waystar Royco during a news conference. Instead, Kendall pulls a total 180 and publicly betrays his father, revealing to the press that he has hard evidence—remember those damning documents that Cousin Greg filched before Tom could destroy them?—that Logan not only knew about the criminal cruise cover-ups, but he personally signed off on them. 

"The truth is that my father is a malignant presence, a bully and a liar...this is the day his reign ends," Kendall tells the press, ripping up the pre-approved statement Logan wanted him to read, as the rest of the Roy dynasty watches the televised report in shock. The final shot of Succession season 2? A close-up of Logan Roy with a hint of a Mona Lisa smile on his face, whether out of being stunned or impressed, we don't know.

Backstabbing, boardroom drama, big-ass boats—what more could you want from a Succession finale? You'll have to watch season three to find out how that epic cliffhanger plays out.

Succession airs Sunday nights at 9pm ET/PT on HBO and HBO Max in the US, and on Monday nights at 9pm on Sky Atlantic in the UK.

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How ‘Succession’ Built a ‘Killer’ Season Finale

“ Deep Dive ” is a in-depth podcast and video essay series with the stars, creators and crafts team behind an exceptional piece of filmmaking. For this edition, the IndieWire Crafts team partnered with HBO to take a closer look at the Season 2 finale, Episode 10 of “ Succession ” — “This Is Not for Tears” — with creator Jesse Armstrong , executive producer and director Mark Mylod, actors Brian Cox and Jeremy Strong , as well as seven members of the crafts team.

It was the season finale that had everyone talking, with an ending that was both shocking and, in retrospect, a completely logical conclusion for Logan (Brian Cox), Kendall (Jeremy Strong), and the rest of the Roy family. Now climb aboard their $150 million yacht to find out how such a perfect episode of television was made.

In the podcast below, the filmmakers, along with actors Brian Cox and Jeremy Strong, pull back the curtain on filming the iconic “You’re not a killer” scene as well as Logan’s final smirk. Editor Bill Henry reveals the ways he needed to pull back in the editing room, even losing parts of scenes, to ensure what happens at the press conference remained a surprise, but still stayed true to Kendall’s journey to betray his father. Composer Nicholas Britell shares the music he wrote to capture the demons that brought Kendall to this dramatic decision.

You can listen to the podcast above, or by subscribing via Apple Podcasts , Spotify , or Overcast .

What you learn in the podcast above is how an episode of “Succession” gets made: How Armstrong intentionally over-writes episodes that he, Mylod, and the editors will trim whole scenes from in the editing room, as the show is allowed to constantly hone TV’s sharpest blade cuts. What’s remarkable — and is reflected in the video essays below — is how this applies at all stages of creation. “Succession” is a tightly structured piece of storytelling that is kept fresh by creatives who are constantly able to improvise and react to what unfolds. Adds Armstrong, “[Our] craftspeople are doing things that you couldn’t verbalize because they do them with rhythm. And they’re [involved] with all the choices that are there to be made, and you’re in sync with them — it just means that my work is much easier.”

Capturing the Roys: Revealing Reactions

On “Succession,” scenes are shot by two to three camera operators who are given a tremendous amount of freedom and encouragement to follow their instincts. Listening and reacting to characters, they pan and reframe to capture what they instinctively feel is most interesting. “The camera reacts with the speed of a human being rather than somebody who knows what’s going to happen next,” Armstrong said. “And that lets the comedy and drama play in a way which I think subliminally makes you feel like you’re in the room.”

This means the camera operators will often move off the character who is speaking, putting as much significance on those reacting to the speaker. “It isn’t just, ‘OK, grab that line.’ It’s as much about finding what’s going on underneath the surface,” Mark Mylod, who directed the Season 2 finale, said. The real gold is when the operators capture a character reacting “when they don’t think they’re being watched by other characters, but the camera is catching that moment, [and] we as an audience are let into their unconscious in a way. It’s a window into their souls.”

With three cameras rolling, scenes around the dinner table offer a lot of windows into a number of different souls. “With the amount that we shoot, and the number of cameras, and the number of takes when we have the time, and the level of improvisation and the subtlety of the actors who we’re working with,” Armstrong said, “it is infinite how you could cut the scenes. So, when I think of that, it makes me want to throw up.”

How to bring all these revealing moments together is the job of “Succession” editors Ken Eluto and BIll Henry. In the video essay above, Henry takes you inside the important breakfast table aboard Logan’s yacht in the Season 2 finale and explains how the syncopated rhythms of a scene like that are akin to cutting a musical.

The Gilded Cage: Crafting an Uncomfortable Luxury

It’s part of the DNA of “Succession” that viewers travel with the Roy family to places of extreme wealth and privilege. In a serialized narrative with virtually no standing sets, most new episodes take audiences somewhere new and extravagant, and the Season 2 finale is no exception as everyone climbs aboard Logan Roy’s $150 million yacht.

But how does the filmmaking team behind “Succession” avoid fetishizing the extreme wealth they’re satirizing? Just the act of peeling back the curtain on the extreme luxury we never get to see has a natural voyeuristic pleasure for the viewer.

In the video essay above, production designer Stephen Carter, executive producer and director Mark Mylod, cinematographer Patrick Capone, and series creator Jesse Armstrong analyze how a subtle use of filmmaking craft directs the viewer to focus on the discomfort the Roy family feels inside its gilded cages.

“We want to make sure that the audience, rather than being sort of seduced by the wealth porn side of things, really feels the neglect or the unimportance to them of all this expensive paraphernalia,” Carter said.

Not a Killer: Getting Into Kendall’s Head

There’s a darkness that hangs over Kendall Roy (Jeremy Strong) in Season 2 of “Succession.” Ever since the car crashed into the lake at the end of Season 1 — resulting in the death of the waiter and the subsequent cover-up of that death by Logan — Kendall has been mentally and spiritually tortured. In the video essay above, we go inside how Mylod and composer Nicholas Britell bring the viewer inside that torment by connecting it to the moment that caused it.

“Whenever we put the character in water, we make him vulnerable,” Mylod said. “We metaphorically crucify him, in the water.”

Composer Nicholas Britell describes the music he wrote for the Season 1 finale’s car crash as Kendall’s “true moment of darkness.” And it’s that music, “Kendall’s Return,” that the composer and editor Bill Henry bring back at key moments of Season 2 where that darkness, and the memory of the young man’s death, weighs particularly heavy on Kendall.

In fact, it’s that music that accompanies Kendall as he enters Logan’s state room for the famous “You have to be a killer” scene during the Season 2 finale. In the second part of this essay, we go behind the shooting of that scene with Mylod, Strong, Henry, and cinematographer Patrick Capone.

VIEW ALL DEEP DIVE COVERAGE

Den of Geek

Succession Season 2 Episode 10 Review: This Is Not For Tears

Of course it was going to end this way!

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This Succession review contains spoilers.

Succession Season 2, Episode 10

At the end of last week’s “DC,” two things happened that should have immediately clued audiences to what was going to happen in Succession ’s season two finale, “This Is Not For Tears.” First, Kendall Roy (Jeremy Strong) delivered a fiery defense of his father Logan (Brian Cox) and the Waystar Royco brand during his congressional testimony regarding the company’s problematic cruise line and the sexual harassment allegations against its head.

And second? Moments before the closing credits began, Logan told his daughter Shiv (Sarah Snook) that someone from their inner circle had to be sacrificed to the media, the government and their shareholders to finally fix the cruise mess. Not just anyone, though, but a “blood sacrifice.” In other words, one of the series’ preeminent Roy kids — Kendall, Shiv or Roman (Kieran Culkin) — was going to bite the proverbial bullet by the time this season came to a close.

read more: Kendall Roy Proves He Was a Killer All Along

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Of course, it was going to be Kendall. It was always going to be Kendall.

Then again, for all the effort series creator Jesse Armstrong and the Succession writers put into laying the groundwork for Logan’s inevitable decision regarding his own son, they’ve also been planting an entirely different set of crops alongside these initial seeds. Much of the show’s first season was just as much about who Logan was going to pick to succeed him as it was about Kendall’s efforts to oust his father in a hostile takeover.

And though the vehicular manslaughter he caused at the end of season one, and Logan’s engineered coverup of it in the second season premiere ultimately tanked these efforts, Kendall never really could have forgotten what his original intentions were. Sure, much of this season has been about portraying Kendall’s transformation into a soulless shell of a human being who is more than willing to do anything his father tells him . But does this mindless devotion extend to self-flagellation on such a massive scale? Yes and no.

Logan and the aforementioned Roy kids, along with eldest son Connor (Alan Ruck), cousin Greg (Nicholas Braun), Shiv’s cuckold husband Tom (Matthew Macfadyen) and the rest of the Waystar Royco legal and public relations teams meet off-and-on aboard the family’s massive yacht in the Mediterranean to discuss options. Many, including the always-willing-to-speak Roman, think Greg and Tom — who actually did try to cover up the cruise scandal (under orders, of course) and totally botched their respective congressional testimonies — should take the hit. It’s “half an idea” per Logan’s estimation, but he and almost everyone else there know it’s not enough. Especially Shiv, who goes to her father amid a brewing personal crisis with Tom to make sure he knows this.

read more: Succession Season 2 Episode 9 Review

“Why not what he discussed?” she reminds him. “Ken hurts,” her father admits in turn. “He was across the whole thing. It hurts. It plays, obviously.”

So, when Logan finally tells Kendall — albeit in a roundabout way, at first — of his decision to lay the blame on him, it actually does seem to hurt the otherwise emotionally distant Roy patriarch. The camera even goes in and out of focus on occasion, becoming blurry and clear again, almost as if a tear or two are breaking the episode title’s explicit rule against mournful emotions.

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“It’s okay dad,” Kendall tells his father once he realizes what’s happening. “It’s okay.”

“Thank you, son,” Logan responds. “The hearings, you did so well. But now you’re the face. You were across the cleanup. The optics make sense. And, what’s more, I trust you. I trust you in case it turns and gets nasty.”

Like with the dissolution of the digital media company Vaulter in this season’s second episode, along with plenty of other examples, Kendall immediately agrees with his father’s decision and goes along with it, though he does ask him if he ever thought he could do it. If he ever thought he was good enough to succeed him and lead Waystar Royco into the future. “You’re not a killer,” Logan tells him. And that’s the moment when those who have been paying complete attention to Kendall’s scheming, its implosion and his continuously downward spiral should have known what would happen in the episode’s final moments. Yes, he goes before the press to supposedly admit his wrongdoing regarding the cruise scandal. After all, is father is watching. Instead, Kendall plunges the dagger meant for himself into Logan, Waystar Royco and pretty much everyone else we could consider his flesh and blood.

read more: Succession Season 3 Confirmed

“I have been asked to explain my own role in the managing of illegality at the firm and associated coverups, and it has been suggested I would be a suitable figure to absorb the anger and concern,” he begins before going off-script. “But the truth is, my father is a malignant presence, a bully and a liar. He was fully personally aware of these events for many years and made efforts to hide and cover-up. He had a twisted sense of loyalty to bad actors like Lester McClintock.”

“This is the day his reign ends,” Kendall concludes as the room erupts in a flurry of shouted questions from the gathered press.

Cue Succession ’s Emmy Award-winning theme music and an amazingly calm Logan, watching the press conference aboard his yacht with a bewildered Shiv and Roman. They cannot believe what they’re watching, but according to the slow smile spreading across Logan’s face, it’s not all that fanciful. It turns out, he was completely wrong about Kendall. He is a killer.

Succession airs on HBO.

Andrew Husband

Andrew Husband is an entertainment and culture writer based in Boston, where he lives with Cosmo's real-world counterpart, Molly the Labrador. When he's not too busy…

Succession: Season 2

10 EPISODES | TV-MA

A bitingly funny drama series exploring themes of power and family through the eyes of an aging media mogul and his four grown children.

1 . The Summer Palace

Kendall tries to make amends with his dad. Logan receives stark advice from his banker.

2 . Vaulter

Roman and Kendall compete to "fix" Vaulter in their own unique ways. Greg wonders if ATN is the right fit. Shiv brings Tom in the loop.

3 . Hunting

Logan makes an unpopular decision to acquire a rival news company. Connor's presidential announcement video irks the Roys.

4 . Safe Room

Roman starts a management training program with the "normals" in the Parks division.

5 . Tern Haven

Logan tries to keep his family in line as they woo the owners of a venerable news media brand. Kendall makes his case to Naomi Pierce.

6 . Argestes

Logan's deal with the Pierces is threatened. Kendall, Shiv and Roman differ on damage control strategies.

A trip to the UK finds the Roy kids negotiating with their mother. Logan turns to Rhea for advice.

Logan reflects on his past and future upon returning to his hometown of Dundee, Scotland. Shiv conspires to take down Rhea.

Logan, Kendall, Gerri and Tom testify before Congress. Shiv is candid with a key witness. Roman’s business pitch takes a scary turn.

10 . This Is Not for Tears

The Roys vacation on their Mediterranean yacht, where Logan and the inner circle ponder who should be sacrificed to save the company.

Why Season 2 of Succession Was So Extraordinary

The HBO show had teased a “blood sacrifice” in its thrilling season finale, and it didn’t disappoint.

This article contains spoilers through the finale of Succession Season 2 .

Water is never a good omen on Succession . In the Season 1 episode “Austerlitz,” the ill-fated infinity pool in the New Mexico desert led to a tweedy psychotherapist losing his front teeth; at the close of the episode, as Logan Roy (played by Brian Cox) swam a few laps, viewers were able to see for a moment the scars that cover his back. In the Season 1 finale, “Nobody Is Ever Missing,” a chipper cater-waiter trying to facilitate a drug buy for Kendall (Jeremy Strong) drowned in a lake on the way back to Shiv’s wedding. And in “This Is Not for Tears,” last night’s conclusion to the show’s superlative second season, the Roy family and its associates basked in the azure incandescence of the Mediterranean before being led, one by one, to try on the metaphorical noose Logan was readying for a scapegoat.

Harbingers aside, “This Is Not for Tears” was, thanks to its aquatic setting, the most gorgeous episode Succession has had to date. Directed by Mark Mylod ( Game of Thrones ), it had the visual poetry and the psychosexual familial tension of a late Bertolucci movie, or one by Luca Guadagnino. A disconsolate Roman (Kieran Culkin) lounged in a blue linen shirt against a pile of turquoise pillows. Shiv (Sarah Snook) insulated herself from the sun with a giant straw hat and a pair of aviators. Kendall floated on his back in the yacht’s plunge pool, shot from overhead to contrast against the darker blue ocean. His bobbing body, with arms splayed, looked for a moment like a corpse, or like Christ on the cross. In retrospect, it makes sense— Succession has been readying him to be the sacrificial lamb since he was dragged, dripping, from the Icelandic rehab center’s pool at the beginning of the season.

Read: Why ‘Succession’ works so well as horror

Succession is a show about business empires, and about family, and especially about the peculiar toxicity and dysfunction that occur when the two intersect. Since the show debuted, it has presented a question: Which one of these three children (with apologies to Connor, but let’s be real) will inherit Logan’s kingdom? But there are also other kinds of bequests in the ether, as the scars on Logan’s back—paid forward as psychological wounds to his children and grandchildren—made clear. And so the question gets an extra dimension: Which of his children is Logan’s emotional heir, hungry and empty enough inside to meet his standards for an acceptable successor?

In Season 1, the obvious candidate was Kendall, with his Forbes covers, his desperate need to prove himself, and his multiple boardroom-coup efforts against his father. “I’m just concerned you might be soft,” Logan told Kendall early on, noting that business was essentially “a big-dick competition”; his son, cosseted by luxury his entire life, couldn’t measure up. “The only way he’ll respect you is if you try to destroy him,” Roman told Kendall midway through the first season. “Because, in your position, that is exactly what he’d try to do.” That same episode, a frustrated Logan physically lashed out at Kendall’s son, as if to remind Kendall that aspiring to be more like his father would come with obvious costs. In the end, Kendall’s own frailty gave his father a winning hand, and led to Kendall trudging wearily in Logan’s wake for most of Season 2.

At the same time, Shiv’s stock was rising. There’s no doubt at this point that Shiv is the Roy child most closely akin to her father—the most ambitious sibling, the most manipulative, and the least troubled by the little things, like empathy or guilt. (“This class-war shit—don’t you find it a little jejune?” is up there with “Let them eat cake” as a succinct encapsulation of personal callousness.) “My philosophy is, I literally don’t give a fuck,” Shiv told Nate (Ashley Zukerman) in bed while he was browsing his wedding registry; the personal motto applies to table napkins and china patterns, but also to the world at large. In Season 1, Shiv conspired with a senator who wanted to burn her father’s news empire to the ground. In Season 2, as Logan dangled the throne in front of her like a cat toy, Shiv was made newly vulnerable by the prospect of getting something she actually really wanted. Initially thrown off course, she was back at Logan’s side by “Dundee.” There, Shiv set up Rhea (Holly Hunter) to fail in a way that would facilitate Shiv’s path to the top job, and sweet-talked a woman victimized by Waystar into backing down.

Read: The ‘Succession’ kids finally understand their power

Last night, on board the Roy yacht, a craft as sharp and black as a kitchen knife, Logan let his children and consiglieres fight it out to see which one should suffer the sins of the company. It was a classic Roy reunion—there were no actual shouts of “Boar on the floor,” but the internecine conflicts and poisonous power struggles were the same. Roman, newly chastened by his brush with political kidnapping, couldn’t begin to compete: Having recently pleaded with his siblings to “talk to each other? Normally?” and opened up about how frightened he was in Turkey, he was far too tenderhearted to do more than defend Gerri (J. Smith-Cameron) and implicate Tom. Shiv, Tom’s own wife, agreed that Tom was a logical choice, leading him to lambaste her as they lay sunbathing in a private cove. “If I think about it, a lot of the time I’m pretty unhappy,” Tom said. “I wonder if the sad I’d be without you would be less than the sad I get from being with you.”

That equation, when applied to Logan, has always seemed simple. When Kendall was offered half a billion dollars by Stewy (Arian Moayed) for his Waystar stock in Season 1, I yearned for him to just take it and escape this life, these people. Naomi Pierce (Annabelle Dexter-Jones), as she was evicted off Logan’s yacht last night, similarly asked Kendall to come with her and abandon the life he’d been piecing together so carefully that he couldn’t see its cracks. But Kendall stayed, and as the episode proceeded, it became more and more obvious that he was being readied for slaughter. Shiv, who only episodes ago had been momentarily stunned by the sight of her broken brother weeping, told her father to save Tom and sacrifice Kendall—further anointing herself as Logan’s true successor. Logan, cheered by a family member bold enough to go right for the heart, agreed. “It hurts,” he told Shiv, “but it plays.”

That the backstabbing and betrayal played out against such an idyllic backdrop seemed fitting. One of the things that have made Season 2 of Succession so strong is its constant shift in locations—a mountain resort for billionaires here, a Hungarian hunting ground there. At home, the family members find comfort in familiar settings and coping mechanisms: the boardroom for Logan, politics for Shiv, irony for Roman, drugs for Kendall. But in new spaces, they’re forced into closer proximity with one another while their armor is taken away, making their damage harder to disguise. These are the kinds of situational setups that lead to riveting television, but also to glimpses of the characters as vulnerable human beings rather than comic archetypes. Tom, for example,  is infinitely more compelling when he’s baring his soul to his wife than he is embracing plutocracy by eating songbirds and actual gold.

And Kendall, tragic prince that he is, has always been Succession ’s heart. Having clung to the fragments of his father he could hero-worship for much of Season 2, Kendall was spurred by Logan’s betrayal to save himself. He gave his father a Corleone kiss. He agreed to take the fall. And then he turned on Logan in a stunning press conference volte-face, armed with Greg’s Chekhovian cruise documents and his own legitimate anger. “The truth is that my father is a malignant presence, a bully and a liar,” he said. My colleague Megan Garber has written about pestilence on Succession and how, despite themselves, the Roys can’t escape the symbolic manifestations of the corruption they sow in the world. In calling out his father as a cancer, Kendall was taking the first steps toward recovery. It was the closest thing to a happy ending anyone could have expected Succession to offer.

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Well, the Succession Season 2 Finale Exceeded Expectations

How the best and buzziest show on television is avoiding the game of thrones trap..

For a prestige TV season finale, there’s nothing harder to clear than high expectations. But Succession finished up its sterling second season as the best and buzziest show on television—maybe there’s some juice left in the whole, Paleolithic air-one-episode-a-week method— with an ending that was as satisfying as it was unexpected. At the end of Succession Season 2, the Roys gathered on a yacht larger than an apartment complex, kicked off their shoes, and took a few joyrides down a giant inflatable slide, all a decadent warmup for shanking one another in the front—only for the episode to end with a gloriously placed knife in the back.

The season-long pressure on Waystar-Royco came to a head in last week’s congressional hearings, when it became apparent that some kind of “blood sacrifice” would be necessary in order for the family to convey to the public and the shareholders that the Roys understood the extent of their corporate malfeasance. (Even though they don’t really.) This week, the family and their apparatchiks meet in a ludicrously outsize pleasure boat to feign relaxation as they putter around the Mediterranean sipping Burgundy and Champagne while scheming about who should take the fall. As culture editor Adam Sternbergh noted on Twitter , it was an Agatha Christie setup where no one dies, but everyone wants to be a murderer.

The pretend vacation culminates in a bravura scene at the breakfast table that’s a traffic jam worth rubbernecking: Everyone gets tossed under the bus. Everyone gets something delicious to do and say—“Greg Sprinkles”—even as the sequence makes a joke of everything they are doing and saying: The conversation is a farce. None of the blood Roys are ever seriously considered for sacrifice. Logan Roy (Brian Cox) begins the conversation by “suggesting” it should be him who takes the blame, which no one can do more than half-heartedly pooh-pooh, because it’s a half-hearted suggestion.* Instead, as in all meetings with Logan Roy, everyone is triangulating. The non-family members of the team run one another down first, but none of them are bold enough to point fingers at actual Roys. Pathetic Connor (Alan Ruck) offers to sacrifice himself but has no takers. The group ultimately gangs up on heinous buffoon Tom Wambsgans (Matthew Macfadyen), who is almost family, but not quite family, as his wife, Shiv (Sarah Snook), notes, and so is the perfect consensus fall guy, even to Shiv. To protect himself, Tom will later eat a piece of Logan’s chicken, a territory-pissing announcement of his unhinged nature that Logan sees as some gauche breach of decorum—way weirder and worse than, you know, gathering people in paradise for a show trial.

There’s always been the dangerous possibility that Succession could fall into a kind of Game of Thrones trap, where the audience becomes fixated on who will “win” the throne. But creator Jesse Armstrong and his staff have made assiduously clear that the Waystar-Royco “throne” is a porcelain crapper. Every single person on the show would be better off if they walked away, and their inability to do so is a moral indictment of them and the crusty pull of obscene wealth and power.

Though she went into Season 2 as the crowd favorite, one of this season’s major storylines has been the degradation of Shiv for exactly this reason: She keeps walking closer. Formerly the sane-ish, decent-ish Roy, she flushed her strategic skills and vague vestige of morality down the toilet by reversing her lifelong course of distancing herself from her father. After committing a series of strategic errors because she wanted Logan’s public approval (in the shape of the CEO chair) so desperately, she also tampered with a witness because—best-case scenario—she delusionally believed in her own future power. She ended the season by betraying her brother Kendall, and being so cruel to her husband that she made him—the deranged gas bag Tom, the guy who uses other people as a footstool—look emotionally sensitive. He’s “not a hippie” looking for three-ways with his wife and, you know, it is pretty janky to spring an open marriage as a fait accompli on your wedding night. At least he loves her. Maybe Season 3 will be Shiv’s redemption arc.

Meanwhile, Roman (Kieran Culkin), the adolescent cutup, finally stops being a smart aleck and tries being grown. He tells his dad the truth about a questionable deal. He asks his siblings if they could have a normal adult relationship. (They make funny voices in response, because, no, they can’t.) Like Shiv, he doesn’t want to announce his emotional affiliations to anyone, but unlike Shiv, he’s willing to stand up for the people he cares about: Gerri, who he romantically defends during the breakfast table scene, and then Kendall, in a moment that is the flip side of the brotherly bond we saw when Kendall instinctively defended Roman after Logan smacked him in the face a few episodes back. Roman’s now COO of a company that the Roys probably won’t hold onto for much longer, but, hey, kid brother came a long way.

And then there’s Kendall (Jeremy Strong). The finale is a kind of mirror image of last season’s: Both orbit around Kendall’s rapidly reversing fortunes. In the previous finale, Kendall accidentally killed a man just as he was about to take the company from his father. Logan pounced on this horrible accident as a strategic advantage. Kendall’s decision to act for himself went so badly, resulted in such tragedy, that he seemed to decide to stop doing it. For this entire season, at times tearful, at times suicidal, at times bed-crapping, Kendall has let go and let Logan run him. He has been his father’s mercenary, his unfeeling lieutenant, slicing and dicing Vaulter, screaming at whoever needs to hear it in the back of the plane, and crushing at the congressional hearings. He’s a person who no longer makes decisions of his own. He’s Logan’s killer.

But in the waning minutes of the finale, the use of that actual term “killer” seems to jolt Kendall out of his season-long stupor. (Or maybe it was before: When Kendall actually turned against Logan is a good one to chew over in the off-season.) Logan explains to Kendall that he has to be the blood sacrifice. Kendall is gracious. He accepts it. He gives his father a Fredo kiss. And then he asks: Did you ever think I really could have run this company? Logan hems and haws, but then says, no, because to do so “you have to be a killer.” Logan is speaking metaphorically, but Kendall is a killer, and it has been haunting him for months. That’s instantly where his mind goes: Maybe being the blood sacrifice is what he deserves, he says, for the accident. Logan reassures him that’s not true: The guy he killed, he wasn’t even a “real person.”

So Kendall, seemingly at his most pathetic, heads to a press conference where it appears he will take the fall for all that has gone wrong at his family’s business. He will say that he knew about everything, and that no one above him knew anything. And then he says the opposite.

At the press conference, Kendall betrays Logan, with an assist from that lanky, benign fungus Cousin Greg, good old Greg Sprinkles. In an immensely satisfying, surprising turn of events, Kendall is, actually, a killer in the way his father meant it. Or is he? Is Logan’s smile in the final minutes one of pride or one of collaboration? Is that smirk because this was the plan all along or because Logan finally sees what he’s been waiting for: a true successor? It’s a wonderfully rousing ending that, this being Succession, I’m willing to bet by the end of next season, will no longer seem quite like a happy one.

Correction, Oct. 14, 2019: This post originally misspelled Brian Cox’s first name.

Where is HBO’s Succession Filmed?

HBO’s satirical drama ‘ Succession ‘ follows the Logan family that is known for being the pioneer of one of the world’s biggest media and entertainment companies. But the foundation on which their empire rests on slowly begins to crumble when their father decides to take a step back from the company. Since its release, ‘Succession’ has landed several accolades under its belt including multiple Primetime Emmy Nominations and Golden Globes.  Along with its excellent screenwriting and strong performances, the show also sweeps you with its stellar production and lavish set designs. So if you’re looking for a detailed guide to its filming locations, we have you covered.

Succession Filming Locations

‘Succession’ first reached the public eye when, on June 6, 2016, HBO gave the show’s production a pilot order. Soon after this, in May 2017, the network finally gave the production a series order. Once its casting was done, the principal photography of the first season of ‘Succession’ began in October 2017 and then went on till February 2018. During this span, the first season was shot in several different locations of New York City, New Mexico, New Jersey, and England’s  Herefordshire. The filming for season 2 began sometime in April 2019 and was wrapped up around July 2019. For season 2, new additions to the show’s filming locations included New York’s Lake Placid and Lake George, along with several locations of  Korčula, Croatia .

New York City

Embuing the locales of the elite and the powerful, both the seasons of succession walk you through several landmarks of NYC. The show’s filming first started off in New York’s Lexington Avenue and East 75th Street in October 2017. The production then moved to the Financial District of Manhattan in November. Other NYC spots in season 1 include Downtown Manhattan Heliport at Pier 6,  the Bellevue Hospital, Le Coucou Restaurant , Cipriani at 25 Broadway, World Trade Center, Chelsea Square Restaurant, Henry Ford estate at Jule pond,  and Cunard Building on Broadway to the East New York Freight Tunnel. Season 2 also introduces us to some new locations such as Six Flags Great Escape in Queensbury, Whiteface Lodge at Lake Placid, and Del Posto eatery on 10th Avenue.

Succession filming on E80 St and Madison Ave #NYC ⁦ @HBO ⁩ ⁦ @olv ⁩ pic.twitter.com/qb0mULKC4O — NYC CULTURIST (@nycculturist) April 1, 2019

https://twitter.com/EmilyKoopman/status/924036606264299520?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E924036606264299520%7Ctwgr%5E&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.thecinemaholic.com%2Fwp-admin%2Fpost.php%3Fpost%3D289322action%3Dedit

Many viewers would also recall Logan Roy and his third wife Marcia “Marcy” Roy’s grand townhouse from season 1. The scenes depicting this house were not filmed in one but many locations. The lobby scenes of the house were all filmed at the American Irish Historical Society at 991 Fifth Avenue located across from the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Whereas the remaining upper floors were created on soundstages at Silvercup Studios in Long Island City.

#MatthewMacfadyen and #SarahSnook filming #Succession #HBO in New York. 😍 pic.twitter.com/E7zH7ksR2Q — Eve (@Eveline_x3) March 24, 2019

On Thursday April 25th from about 5 pm to 11 pm @HBO 's #Succession will be filming on Main Street. Parking and traffic will be affected from Hayes Street to Saranac Avenue as detailed in their letter to the community. pic.twitter.com/LnIFIfjles — Lake Placid PD (@LakePlacidPD) April 24, 2019

For the New Mexico shoot of the show, the production hired 89 local crew members and close to 75 people for background talent. Among all the locations of the US State, the Santa Fe area was used the most.

From Santa Fe, the production of the show was moved to New Jersey on February 22, 2018, where its filming took place in and around the Atlantic City-Brigantine tunnel.

A few days after its filming in New Jersey, the crew shifted to England’s Eastnor Castel near Ledbury Herefordshire. In the UK itself, the ‘Succession’ Season 2 was also filmed in several locations of Scotland including Dundee’s riverside V&A Museum and Glasgow’s George Square.

Korčula, Croatia

For the filming of the final episodes of season 2, especially the yacht scenes, the production arrived at the Croatian coast where most scenes were shot in and around Korčula’s Old Town, close to the main square in front of the St. Mark’s Cathedral and also in a local restaurant, Cupido, which is located near the 5-star hotel Lešić Dimitri Palace.

Read More: Is Succession Based on a True Story?

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Succession: Season 2

Where can I watch Succession?

Season 2 Recap and Spoilers

Season Two of Succession delves deeper into the power struggles, personal betrayals and family dynamics within the dysfunctional Roy family.

The season begins with Kendall leaving rehab in Iceland just 48 hours into his stay, so that he can give a public statement about his decision to walk away from his part in the takeover of Waystar Royco.

During a family trip to the Hamptons, Logan consults his children over whether he should sell the company before privately asking Shiv to join the family business and be the next chief executive. When quizzed by Tom on how the meeting went, rather than telling him the truth she instead, tells him she has been promoted to ATN’s Chair of Global Broadcast News.

Having made his decision, Logan informs everyone that he wants Waystar Royco to be the ‘last man standing’ and the number one media conglomerate in the world. Decision being made, Logan and Kendall leave to meet Stewy and Sandy with Kendall being left to deliver the message that his father intends to fight - and he’s prepared to make it ugly.

Elsewhere, Tom, who is feeling righteous thanks to a new job at news channel ATN, brings Greg with him to work at the station. Connor decides to run for president and Shiv quits her job with Senator Eavis.

Despite his family advising him against it, Logan wants to buy another media company and does everything in his power to make sure it happens, including meeting with the current owners at their home. During the meeting Logan refuses to confirm who will take over as the next CEO, which leads a frustrated Shiv to reveal it is her. The head of PGM, Nan Pierce, agrees to sell the company to Logan if he confirms Shiv as CEO on the day of the merger. Despite refusing to do so, the Pierce’s agree to sell.

At an international summit, the Roy’s learn that the New York Magazine is aware of a scandal to do with Lester McClintok, who had sexually assaulted staff on the cruise line they own. With none of the siblings agreeing on how to resolve the issue, the sale of PGM falls through and Nan fires her employee Rhea for siding with Logan.

Logan and Rhea share a night together, and Rhea tries to persuade Shiv to become head of PGM. Suspicious of Rhea’s intent, Shiv tries to rally the others to help oust her, but after learning that the cruise scandal is about to be revealed by a whistleblower, she stands down and lets Rhea take the job as CEO. The whistleblower implicates Tom, Kendall and Gerri in the cover-up of the cruise scandal and they are all called to give evidence in front of Shiv’s former boss, Eavis.

Logan knows that someone will have to take the blame for the scandal, so a family summit is called, where they all come together on a yacht to decide who will take the fall. It isn’t long before chaos ensues and they all start to blame each other, with Shiv even offering up her own husband as the scapegoat. In the end, Kendall is chosen to take the fall.

Having accepted his fate, Kendall agrees to a press conference where he will take responsibility for the scandal and step down as COO. But, instead of delivering the pre-agreed message he goes rogue and tells the media that his father is a bully who was aware of the scandal the whole time.

The series ends with Logan watching the scene unfold on television, with a faint smirk on his face.

What was the scandal in Season 2 of Succession?

The biggest scandal in season two, was the public unveiling of the cruise scandal which Tom discovered in season one. After an article alleged that cruise executive Lester McClintock had pressured female staff into having sex to renew their contracts, which led to the sale of PGM falling through, a whistleblower came forward to reveal the full details of a culture of sexual exploitation.

This revelation led to a congressional hearing, where records and files were subpoenaed which revealed years of cover-ups, financial bribery and deleted logs. The scandal led to Logan assembling his family on a yacht to decide who would take the fall for the scandal. After much deliberation, Logan settled on Kendall as the best choice and prepped him to admit responsibility in a press conference.

But this move backfired as Kendall, wanting to prove to his father that he can be ruthless in business, tells the media that his father was aware of the cover-up all along.

What happened to Kendall Roy?

Season two saw Kendall fighting to earn back respect from his father, whilst simultaneously being verbally attacked by his own siblings who are unaware of the agreement Logan and Kendall made to cover up the car accident and death of the waiter at Shiv’s wedding.

After the cruise scandal is exposed to the public, Logan quickly realises that someone is going to have to take the blame. Refusing to be the one to step down, Logan invites everyone to a summit on the family yacht so they can determine who will be the face of the scandal.

With multiple contenders being considered, ultimately it is Kendall who is chosen by his father to take the fall and publicly accept responsibility for the scandal. Whilst being prepped for a press conference, Logan tells Kendall that he’s ‘not a killer’ – a dagger to Kendall’s heart, who has spent years trying to prove to his father that he is ruthless enough to succeed in the industry.

At the press conference, where he is set to admit to wrongdoing in order to save his father and the family business, Kendall changes his mind. Live on camera, with his family watching from the yacht, Kendall condemns his father and reveals he was involved in the cruise scandal from the beginning.

Why did Logan smile at the end?

The season two finale of Succession, sees Logan smiling after Kendall has publicly condemned his father and revealed he was aware of the cruise scandal. Jessie Armstrong, Succession showrunner and creator, revealed that the smile was in fact scripted.

After years of trying to win his father’s respect, Kendall’s move of condemning his father publicly was a moment of pride for Logan as it showed that Kendall had finally found his killer instinct. The smile reflected the moment Logan realised that Kendall might have the skills and characteristics necessary for that of the heir to the Roy dynasty.

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