Succession S4 Premiere: Roman Is The Only Roy With Any Sense

"Succession" Season 4 has finally kicked off, and the Roys are once again proving to be the best bumbling buffoons in the game.

The debut episode of the final season immediately addresses the elephant in the room: yes, Logan Roy (Brian Cox) is moving forward with Waystar Royco's sale to GoJo. As expected, his children still aren't taking too kindly to their family business being ripped apart by tech bros, despite the fact that they'll walk away with an unimaginable amount of money. While Logan is ready to sell off his life's "work" to GoJo, he's also eager to snatch up Pierce Global Media, Waystar's most prominent competitive conglomerate. Depending on how you look at it, it's a final hurrah for the great media mogul to snatch up the competition or a very pricey [expletive] you to Nan Pierce (Cherry Jones), the matriarch of the company.

And Logan would have gotten away with it if it wasn't for his meddling, annoying, but all too entertaining to watch kids.

In the end, Shiv (Sarah Snook), Kendall (Jeremy Strong), and Roman (Kieran Culkin) snatch up PGM for an absurd $10 billion, like its chump change. In their defense, PGM is still a viable asset that could prosper if given the right guidance and treatment — IP is still IP. But they're idiots. Well, most of 'em. Roman is once again the only Roy who hesitates when it comes to the deal. Instead of trying to one-up their dad, Roman proves that he's the only savvy business person amongst his siblings. Not only does he scoff at the idea of throwing away so much money into a dying company, Roman sees the forest for the trees and acknowledges that a PGM acquisition is nothing more than a flex.

The first few minutes of the debut episode drive home that the Roy siblings are working on The Hundred, a brand new entertainment-tech company — think Substack meets MasterClass meets a lot of nonsense. It's unclear what The Hundred is and if it'll prove to be successful, but it's an original Roy product nonetheless, one that already has investors lined up. As expected, no one really has their heart in The Hundred besides Roman, who is more eager than ever to prove himself and move on from the events of Season 3.

The moment the possibility of purchasing PGM sprouts up, Kendall and Shiv are ready to pounce on it — no matter the cost. The other siblings can't imagine a future where they're not at war with their father. It's probably why Kendall and Shiv aren't worthy successors anyway... they have too much to prove and not enough to back it up. Roman, meanwhile, hesitates and meditates on the idea of jumping into bed with PGM, realizing that it's probably best to just divorce themselves completely from their father and his occupation with Pierce and build their own media empire. Roman straight up calls the duo out on abandoning The Hundred, something they've worked on for months. He also realizes that other parties are tied up with The Hundred, namely the investors who flew in to hear their pitch — Roman is the only Roy who acknowledges that their time is being wasted.

Ultimately, Roman folds in and gives his siblings the go-ahead to buy PGM, but this still doesn't undermine how his hesitancy is appreciated. Aside from sending lewd texts, Roman is the most cautious of the Roys and is the one who expresses the most business acumen. During his tenure at Waystar, Roman found himself in the middle of several business deals, working diligently with his father. And if that wasn't enough to actually make him a solid player in the world of corporate handlings, it should be remembered that he's one of the few members of the family who have participated in the training management program.

While Shiv's ego is too large to control and Kendall is only subservient to the latest idea he's cooked up, Roman is the only Roy who exercises caution and restraint. His biggest flaw? Falling into peer pressure. When push comes to shove, Roman has proven countless times that he can actually make sensible, smart, practical decisions. Season 1's botched rocket launch, though rarely mentioned, was a valuable lesson for the Roy to be more sensible with his actions. Season 2 saw him expertly brave a militia in Turkey while trying to nab a deal for his father and the penultimate season had him go directly to GoJo's CEO and concoct a viable deal. While the GoJo chat certainly spiraled out of control, it shows that Roman actually provides results. Roman shows legitimate promise as a leader in the tech and industry world, and it's his siblings who are tying him down. If he weren't a Roy, he probably would have been one of Logan's competitors. 

"Succession" Season 4 continues to air on HBO.