Succession [spoilers]

[Zorral]

Just now, Zorral said:

They think he's Kyle Rittenhouse.

~~~~~~

The PJs are still flying, it looks like, since it opens with the Roys in a PJ, on their way to somewhere in Virginia to pick the candidate of their choice for next POTUS. As usual though, it’s not about anything other than the Roys and each other.  And why in hell does anybody think Tom is going to go to one of ‘those’ prisons and be among gen pop?  It’s also never about being anywhere: they process, as it was called in the Medieval and earlier Renaissance, from one vast, blah, bland, beige place via their blah bland beige PJ interior, to another vast bland, beige place. Others are supernumeraries on the stage of their endless quarrel other, incapable of quitting each other. Even Kendall, who made a pretense of quitting the Roys, somehow ends up in the nameless Virginia location in a vain attempt to suborn any other Roy from Logan’s back – even feckless Tom!  OK, so that happened. Kendall lost the Best Lawyer because he wouldn’t follow her advice.  He’s going down.  Again. Nothing new to see here.  Move on to the next bland blah as the Roys and their ilks continue to destroy the USA YAY.

 

 

[RumHam]

5 minutes ago, Zorral said:

They think he's Kyle Rittenhouse.

~~~~~~

The PJs are still flying, it looks like, since it opens with the Roys in a PJ

 

I assume they can still use them, just the company doesn't pay for them anymore. 

[Larry of the Lawn]

Shiv is just next in line to be the next Kendall, between last episode being punished for saving the company and then this week letting herself get dragged into the Fascist photo shoot... it's on the Lear Trajectory now (royalty not pj) and Shiv is the next kid to get sidelined. 

 

The Greg and Tom makeup scene was heart warming.  

[Zorral]

It's more on soap opera trajectory; same damned thing over and over again.  Even deaths, murders, amnesia, getting accused -- even indicted -- for crimes -- characters getting played by new actors, nothing changes anything.  Just as nothing ever changes for the toxic billionaire class.  Just as they don't actually lose the PJs. You honestly do not believe the Roys are personally PAYING for that jet out of their personal purses?  That's the entire point of companies and corps.  (Others have noticed this too, re the PJs.)

[RumHam]

20 minutes ago, Zorral said:

It's more on soap opera trajectory; same damned thing over and over again.  Even deaths, murders, amnesia, getting accused -- even indicted -- for crimes -- characters getting played by new actors, nothing changes anything.  Just as nothing ever changes for the toxic billionaire class.  Just as they don't actually lose the PJs. You honestly do not believe the Roys are personally PAYING for that jet out of their personal purses?  That's the entire point of companies and corps.  (Others have noticed this too, re the PJs.)

I'm no expert on private jets or corporate expenses, I'm just making an assumption based on what the show has presented. Maybe the deal hasn't gone into effect yet. But if it came down to flying commercial or paying out of pocket I absolutely believe they would pay out of pocket. Money is nothing to these people.  I don't think Logan is going to go broke paying for his own jet fuel. 

[Zorral]

1 minute ago, RumHam said:

I'm no expert on private jets or corporate expenses, I'm just making an assumption based on what the show has presented. Maybe the deal hasn't gone into effect yet. But if it came down to flying commercial or paying out of pocket I absolutely believe they would pay out of pocket. Money is nothing to these people.  I don't think Logan is going to go broke paying for his own jet fuel. 

Nope.

This is just another of the very many elements the show just drops because it is no longer interested, and like billionaires, has moved on to something else.

[RumHam]

3 minutes ago, Zorral said:

Nope.

This is just another of the very many elements the show just drops because it is no longer interested, and like billionaires, has moved on to something else.

...But what are you basing this on? It seems like it's just your opinion but you're awful sure of it. I'm normally the first one to point out a plot hole but not when there's a perfectly logical explanation. Logan has to get places. He's not going to fly commercial. He is ludicrously wealthy. It's not hard to puzzle out. 

[Winterfell is Burning]

3 hours ago, RumHam said:

Pretty much has to be Shiv right? Not wanting to help elevate that neo-nazi to the presidency. That dude is terrifying by the way. Like Trump if he was younger and more coherent and could maybe not vocalize every horrible thought that comes into his head. 

I loved Greg taking a stand "please don't make Connor the president"  I'm glad they explained the basis for his suit against Greenpeace, even if it seems incredibly thin. I think I missed why those young republicans were hoisting him on their shoulders? 

Edit: Forgot to say that Roman has been horrible this season. He had a moment after the kidnapping where he was pretty sympathetic but now that he's the favorite son he's just the worst again. Maybe worse than ever. 

Shiv seems most likely now.

I thought the guy was basically a charismatic, much better looking Ted Cruz. Which is indeed a scary thought.

My guess is episode #8 will be Caroline's wedding- the episode title is Chiantishire, and they mention the wedding is in Tuscany (quick google search indicates lots of British rich people moving into the area, giving it the nickname). Also, seems clear the season is structured with each episode taking more or less a day (a trick they learned from Deadwood) around big events (Kendall's birthday, the Republican event, the stockholder meeting, etc).

 

 

[Ran]

56 minutes ago, RumHam said:

Logan has to get places. He's not going to fly commercial. He is ludicrously wealthy. It's not hard to puzzle out. 

Indeed. The plane(s) ultimately belong to him, he no doubt has layers of holding companies, offshore and otherwise, owning it, and he no doubt directs various streams of revenue to it. 

There are many ultra-wealthy individuals who personally own their jets. Or even fleets of jets. John Travolta owns three personally, and one or two more are owned by production companies he's a co-founder of. Suffice it to say, Logan Roy is a lot richer than Travolta. He's mega-yacht rich.

[Zorral]

1 hour ago, RumHam said:

...But what are you basing this on? It seems like it's just your opinion but you're awful sure of it. I'm normally the first one to point out a plot hole but not when there's a perfectly logical explanation. Logan has to get places. He's not going to fly commercial. He is ludicrously wealthy. It's not hard to puzzle out. 

Ya, enormously wealthy people with enormously wealthy assets DO NOT PAY FOR ANYTHING WITH THEIR PERSONAL MONEY.  Not these days.  In ye olden days, such as the middle ages, their vassals paid for their processing. (Along with the Italian money lenders, whom they always sort of thought they didn't need to pay back.)

Why does Logan have entire firms of tax lawyers on the payroll?

Breakdowns of how this works is in about a zillion books since the heyday of the Junk Bond Kings of the 1980's.  It's only when the corporate structure breaks down from -- stupidity, overreaching, fraud and debt load, that is too massive to keep going.  That's the only way personal assets such as houses and yachts and jets get taken away.  Often they are the first things to go, because those things are there to be seen and can be taken.  Everything else is buried in pixels offshore.

 

[Ran]

Well, yes, of course he structures the ownership such that he  puts up assets as collateral to get sweetheart loans to fund his lifestyle. He's still on the hook for the loan repayments. Of course, his asset (probably stock) will likely increase in value faster than the interest accruing on his line of credit, so ultimately he's making money while also owning his own jet.

[RumHam]

35 minutes ago, Zorral said:

Ya, enormously wealthy people with enormously wealthy assets DO NOT PAY FOR ANYTHING WITH THEIR PERSONAL MONEY.  Not these days.  In ye olden days, such as the middle ages, their vassals paid for their processing. (Along with the Italian money lenders, whom they always sort of thought they didn't need to pay back.)

Why does Logan have entire firms of tax lawyers on the payroll?

Breakdowns of how this works is in about a zillion books since the heyday of the Junk Bond Kings of the 1980's.  It's only when the corporate structure breaks down from -- stupidity, overreaching, fraud and debt load, that is too massive to keep going.  That's the only way personal assets such as houses and yachts and jets get taken away.  Often they are the first things to go, because those things are there to be seen and can be taken.  Everything else is buried in pixels offshore.

 

So when you say they just dropped this plot point because the writers are no longer interested, you mean you wanted them to go into all that? 

 

[Larry of the Lawn]

oops.  nevermind.

[Zorral]

3 hours ago, RumHam said:

So when you say they just dropped this plot point because the writers are no longer interested, you mean you wanted them to go into all that? 

 

Not particularly.   Except ... a Big Thing was made of Roman going ballistic, so to speak, previous ep, about losing the PJs, and for the Deal, losing the PJs thus became a plot point or some other point -- it got Time. Logan even made big deal out of that Deal that supposedly Pinky made, which included loss of PJs. And today, nobody remembers. Which seems, plotting wise, a bit careless, wouldn't one think, when we open the next ep on a PJ?

[Zorral]

4 hours ago, Ran said:

He's still on the hook for the loan repayments.

Which is the point -- why they don't actually own them.  Look at the assets of shoggoth and how they are targeted and how he's losing over and over.  Even selling his great big gold hotel in D.C. where he extorted huge amounts from his 'supporters' to stay and have meetings. It's sold at a loss. Like everything else shoggoth owned/owns.

And this is the Thing -- shown over and over, shoggoth is a lousy biz guy, unlike Logan.

[Larry of the Lawn]

I think part of the show and the characters is that losing the "PJs" just means they make like .00005% less a year each, which you know, is something.  It's like if you or I had to start paying out of pocket for a $1.25 coffee at lunch each day.

*I'm sure the math is wrong but you get the point.  No one knows how much a gallon of milk is, dad.

[Larry of the Lawn]

Just noticed that the the official Succession podcast, which i have never listened to before, features Anthony Scaramucci as a guest on the most recent episode, which seems hilarious in concept.  

eta: within the first few minutes of speaking Scaramucci says the phrase "Jeb Bush is pregnant with Woody Johnson'

[RumHam]

Succession’s plot twist prompts surge of interest in leaving money in wills to Greenpeace

Quote

Now Greenpeace is hoping to benefit in real life as well as in the fictional world of the media conglomerate Waystar Royco. Thousands of people have looked into leaving money to the environmental group since the darkly comic storyline about Cousin Greg losing his inheritance and then threatening to sue the organisation was broadcast. More than 22,000 people have accessed online advice about making donations in their wills to Greenpeace. The group’s legacy webpage has also seen a tenfold surge in traffic since the episode was first broadcast earlier this month.

 

[Zorral]

to them! Ha!

[Zorral]

Spoiler

Nobody's going to prison, not even white collar prison, as was surmised, because people like that don't.

One does wonder though, how people as relentlessly miserable and horrible 24/7 manage to keep walking around.  Guess they do it only by making other people miserable.