Succession season 4: The power rankings - who’s up and who’s down now that everything is to play for?

HUGE Succession season 1-4 spoilers below

It’s been a crazy 24 hours for Succession fans as episode three absolutely blew the lid off the remainder of the series. Just as the drama of Connor’s wedding was getting going, Logan Roy, patriarch and CEO, died on board his jet as he was traveling to Sweden to see GoJo CEO Lukas Matsson.

His exit has left a giant power vacuum at the top of Waystar Royco, which is almost certainly why the writers thought it was so important to bump Logan off now, only three episodes into the last ever, ten episode season. It means that the remaining seven are going to be absolute carnage.

Without Logan, all of the power structures that we’ve become so comfortable with (Logan and Tom, Logan and Kerry, the sibs, the cronies all bowing down to Logan) have been instantly zapped into oblivion.

So who is going to be the successor? Here’s our own power ranking, which will be updated after every episode.

Our top three

1. Gerri Kellman – All rise for the best dressed at Connor’s wedding

Episode three sets matters up for Gerri to take over. It was pretty obvious what the writers were trying to do here. Having been both interim CEO of Waystar Royco and General Counsel to Waystar Royco, if Logan died without the whole firing drama, Gerri would likely slip right into the CEO spot, and thus the drama would abate for a while. But oh no, that would be too easy.

Instead, Logan fires Gerri, via Roman, a couple of hours, or minutes even, before he dies. Roman delivers the message, Gerri is furious at both him and Logan, and so a terrible rip develops in the relationship between Roman and Gerri, which was once one of the most solid (albeit deeply dysfunctional) across the entire series.

So will Gerri try to take revenge on Logan, Roman and/or everyone else? Will the firing be honoured now that Logan is dead?

And will Logan’s cronies crowd around Gerri as a means to cling to power, or will they support the wishes of their boss? There is one telling moment where Karolina includes Gerri on the list of people that need to be informed of certain things in the post-death proceedings. Perhaps there is likely to be a group that overlooks her firing to back her.

2. Lukas Matsson – Yes, he’s still knocking around

Matsson still holds a lot of power here. If he pushes through the GoJo deal, there’ll be no Waystar Royco for the Roys to fight over, but they will have PGM to make their own. But this is unlikely to happen after episode two, where it became pretty clear that the GoJo deal is about to bomb – everyone except Logan wanted to push Matsson for more money, but Matsson said he would back out if anyone made such a move. So really, the fate of everyone’s lives is in the hands of Matsson – will he or won’t he make the deal? And might he be spooked by the sudden drop in value of the company in the wake of Logan’s death, and drop the whole shebag?

3. Shiv Roy – Logan’s once successor appears again as a real contender

Shiv was (understandably) freaking out over the death of her father, but she was still the most composed member of the siblings. It was Shiv who gave the statement to the press (where she managed, somehow, to hold it all together). And it was Shiv who was level headed and practical while Roman was denying Logan was dead and Kendall was running around organising conference calls with world-class doctors. She also gave that comment at the end of the statement about the fact that the Roys will be ushering through the successor. It sort of made you feel like she, too, is absolutely not done with Waystar Royco, and her behaviour showed she’s a real contender.

The rest of the gang, is descending order

Kendall Roy

Look, Kendall wants Waystar Rocyo and he always has and this mania about taking over the company should not be underestimated. Last episode we saw that he is willing to let everything around him be destroyed, just so he can get his hands on his father’s company. We know he’s obsessed with his dad, always has been and always will be and it does give him a sort of edge. Not only does he have a seat and shares, but this unbridled ambition means he will fight to the end.

Roman Roy

We feel like we may have jumped the gun a little last episode as we got very excited about a change that we thought we perceived in Roman’s behaviour (being more mature, actually being pretty decent), which we thought could indicate that he was next to take over. But episode three showed him to be his usual childish self. He exploded at Shiv, unable to keep a handle on his emotions, and then denied his father had died, even though it was pretty clear by that point that he had. That’s ok, it’s a trying situation to say the least. But it did make us remember that he isn’t quite the power player we had allowed ourself to believe. But what if he were to join forces with Gerri? Now that would be a show we’d want to watch.

Tom Wambsgans

Tom has been an ally of Logan’s throughout, meaning that Logan’s death has sort of left him in free fall. He even said to Greg on the phone that he’d “lost his protector”. But Tom’s a shark, and even while he was being a bit of a hero holding the phone to the unconscious Logan’s ear so his kids could say goodbye to their dad, he was plotting his next move. He called Greg and asked him to delete a file called ‘logistics’ and asked him to stick closely to Cyd, who runs ATN. What could he be up to? His future looked wobbly for a second, but he immediately realigned himself, leaving the tarmac with Shiv after giving her a tender hug. A Shiv-Tom collaboration could be massively formidable.

Connor Roy

Connor has a seat on the board, shares and his siblings do (mildly) take him into account. So yes, Connor is powerful in that respect. But he’s no megalomaniac, isn’t that smart (at all) and of course is running for president, so he’s not really a candidate to take over from Logan.

Greg Hirsch

Oh Gregory Gregory. We all love him, and he definitely isn’t the idiot he’s often made out to be, but that really doesn’t mean that he has much power and he definitely isn’t in the running for the top spot, no matter how much the internet wants it to be so. Where he is important is when he works alongside Tom. Photocopying papers, bribing Tom because of the photocopied papers. Deleting files that are called ‘logistics’. There are few things that Greg won’t do, which does make him quite dangerous in his own scattergun, Gregg-let way.

Kerry Castellabate

Logan’s girlfriend Kerry looked like she was flying high at the beginning of the episode, looking out of the window wearing sunnies, seated next to Logan. But then Logan died and now, arguably, she’s lost everything. She was absolutely manic on the plane as she approached the suits who were organising the next steps. Was this just that she was shaken by the awful events she’s witnessed, or was it also her fear about her future? Oh what a fall, Kerry.

Connor’s mother

Why oh why have we been suddenly hearing so much about Connor’s mother? She’s been brought up in both of the last two episodes, and we reckon it’s not for nothing. Her background? We know that Logan got her shipped off to a mental institution and Connor never forgave his dad for it. We don’t know if she’s died. But what if now she suddenly pops up? Will she have some sort of say in the proceedings? Does she own any shares and even if not, will she be able to influence Connor to, for example, vote against his siblings in an important board meeting? What does it all mean?

The Pierces

The Pierces also have quite a lot of power here. After all, they agreed to a $10 billion PGM buyout deal with the younger Roys, which they can back out of any time, totally destroying Kendall, Roman and Shiv’s plans. But, if we’re being honest, we think that the GoJo deal will fold and PGM will be out of the picture pretty soon.

Karolina Novotney

On the plane after Logan had died it was Karolina organising everything, and all of the lackeys followed her lead. Although it could be read as everyone working together in a time of crisis, it could also be seen as Karolina having a certain level of respect in the group, and therefore clout.

Frank Vernon

Another Logan crony that’s been around for years. Is Frank powerful enough to be in the running for the successor of the company? No, absolutely not. But could he gang up with other of Logan’s longstanding yes-men, and have real influence on who will take over? Yes. Frank has also been around for so long, we can only imagine the piles of dirt he has on Logan and how he could use this against the siblings to work in his favour.

Karl Muller

Karl is just like Frank, only slightly less nice and with less of a backbone.

Willa Ferreyra

Look, Willa is married to Connor now which means she’s suddenly way more powerful that she was one episode ago. She now has a legal right to loads of Connor’s money (although we don’t know the prenup she signed, even if it’s incredibly tight, we’re still talking millions) and Connor, who has a seat on the board and shares in Waystar Royco, does listen to Willa. But she’s so far down the list because Willa has shown absolutely zero interest in getting anywhere near the business, which makes us respect her more than anything else.

Stewy Hosseini

Stewy is always there, lingering in the background. Even though he’s outside of the inner circle, he still has a seat on the Waystar Rocyo board, so can absolutely cause problems for the Roys if he manages to get enough people to back him in boardroom votes. However, mostly likely he’d need to get several of the Roys on his side to get a vote to go through, which somewhat diminishes his power.

Lady Caroline Collingwood

Similarly, Shiv, Kendall and Roman’s mum has a seat on the board. Sure, she’s not interested in becoming the successor, but in the past she has literally worked against her children, siding with her husband, cheating them out of some of their inheritance. It means that she can’t be trusted and that she could definitely be persuaded by a nefarious actor to make decisions that would trip up people in the running for the top spot. Probably just for the fun of it.

Succession is currently streaming on Sky and NOW