Loving the show, guys. Just wanted to comment, I think Roman's confrontation with Matsson on the mountaintop is one of the greatest scenes in television history. His brain was broken by that photo of his dead father on the way up, which I think anyone who has lost a parent can understand. It was so human, the way he felt that he had to defend his dad's honor. Anyway, keep up the good work!
If you look at Roman’s sweater he is wearing, it is his fathers, just like he asked Greg to get when episode 1 happened in season 1. He has always loved his father and wanted him close. I think he is numb but at the same time he really has come to terms of this for a while.
and even Shiv mention something about keeping a Logan's sweater is less racist that keeping ATN, did she was talking about that specific sweater may be?
It's seems like now with Logan gone, Matsson has kind of taken up that central role for which everything revolves around. All of the old heads want to get in his good graces, Shiv's now inside track on Matsson's thinking, and Kendall and Roman both despise him to the point they try to blow the deal. Interested to see how these dynamics play out, can't believe we only have 5 episodes left. Great reactions as always!
thank you!!! had to comment cause you guys are one of the only channels that understood Mattsson raised the offer as a F you to Roman and Kendall, not simply because Shiv greased the wheels. Made an offer that if they refused their jig would be up.
"Shiv greased the wheels" I am acctuly so confused why Shiv is getting credit for anything this episode. She was basically useless. The board wanted the dead and so did Matteson, raising your offer is a common move in the business industry when ur trying to buy a company, that why Matteson laughed and scoffed it off when shive said it. The only people who didn't want the deal were Kendall and Roman and Matteson went around them to the board the only power shiv has is to blow up the deal with the blood story
@@jimmylee9120 Shiv is actively trying to sell and showed influence over Matsson with the kill list which will give her influence, Roman tried to tank the deal by waiting it out and instantly blew up in a tantrum, Kendall is making it incredibly clear that he thinks he fits Logans seat. All 3 of them won, besides Shiv they are too stupid to know it.
Matteson is a bored, manipulative narcissist. He’s excited at the prospect of Shiv playing along to F over her brothers and revel in the destruction of a family/his competitors. Kendall wants to be Logan and tank the deal to run Waystar as a pretend Logan. Roman wants to honor his dad’s legacy and keep ATN work with the sibs. He has the most family “loyalty” (I think he’s just trauma-bonded) I think Shiv is the most like Logan - she’s going to get the deal done for more money and gain power within the new company and continue to work her way up because she’s confident she can play Matteson down the road. Remember the letter she released trying to take down Kendall and Roman and Connor wouldn’t play along? She may not have the most business experience, but she’s the most ruthless. I’m still rooting for Tom.
It was fun watching you guys speculate on what's gonna happen, but the truth is we don't know. I'm confident that I won't be disappointed, and it'll be interesting to see how they wrap it up, but I can't look away.
Jeryd Mencken is the fascism-curious Republican presidential nominee played by Justin Kirk of Weeds fame (his character appeared a few times last season, but has only been mentioned by name this season), and ATN is letting his campaign directly involve itself in their editorial meetings, which is obviously a massive ethical breach.
The crazy thing about this episode is that Kendall and Roman won the negotiations by trying to do the opposite. They "failed successfully" because by showing that you're willing to walk away from the deal they forced Mattson to overpay for all of Waystar. Looking from the outside, the brothers look like negotiating geniuses who made the deal of a lifetime. The irony of it all is that they succeeded in normal business terms because they failed at what they actually wanted to do, kill the deal. They accidently became great negotiators.
They didn’t win the negotiation. Mattson got what he wanted. He had to pay more but he basically was able to work around Kendall and Roman and go right to the board with his offer. He made it seem like they won but he was basically telling them that they tried to rank the deal but he was able to outmaneuver them and gets what he wants anyway. And he had this conversation with shiv earlier when he said “so all I have to do is pay more money and I’ll get it”? That’s what he did. I think he probably has some respect for Roman for standing up,to him, but he wanted the deal anyway and he takes satisfaction in making sure he gets what he wants and Roman and Kendall look small. Even though they return as conquering heroes to their own team who don’t realize they went their to tank the deal not get more money from Mattis.
@@johnr8095 that's what op said. kendall and roman failed to get what they really wanted but they still succeeded in raising the price and overselling waystar so to outsiders, it looks like they won the deal negotiations.
@@johnr8095 And Shiv helped him do it by telling him to bump the price to a figure the board couldn't refuse. They were already prepared to accept the offer at $187/share, so bumping it another $5/share made it undeniable.
So, I was thinking, this is what kendall did when he gutted vaulter. He pretended to be on vaulters side, then gutted it while they were looking in the other direction. Here, they did what was needed to get the higher price, they just thought they were tanking the deal. At the end, when mattson asked for the photo, he wanted the photo to figure out whether he had been played. If they were sad, he won, if they were happy, then it was all tactical. With shiv sending the photo, he now knows how to play them
@@attabanana4709 That was to hold off talks about unions. Matsson thought they were so bad at acting like they didn't want to sell that he was second guessing himself and being like did I just get played out of more money, he knows Shiv wants to sell for sure so he'll do give her some concessions, the funny thing is that Shiv still thinks the others want to sell.
Great reaction and discussion! Such a superb episode. There is a will/trust as Frank said he was an executor, so that will be an issue. In terms of the deal, the Board is the directors of the company, whose duty is to act in the best interests of the company/shareholders. Therefore, the Board has to be presented with the deal offer and decide if they want to recommend it to the shareholders. Clearly, an offer that huge has to be recommended, otherwise the Board is at risk of breaching their duties. So, Roman and Kendall would need to somehow get the other board members to agree to a valid reason to not recommend it. That'll be tough at that price, which is exactly what Kendall did to Vaulter in episode 1! Also, I love how you appreciate the brilliance of the composer. He's so talented!
One of the other reasons I think Kendall and Roman cannot become Logan/killers is because this is all too personal for them. Matsson isn't doing this because he has any attachments or such, he said in a previous episode something along the lines of business being the only thing that makes him come alive. Kendall and Roman are still hoping to "make dad proud" you see and hear it so many times from those two when they're discussing it. Even Shiv is able to somewhat (we shall see) compartmentalize and say, 'Just get the deal done'. The boys are showing an incapability to not make it all so conflated.
The only reason Shiv can say "just get the deal done" is cause she isn't in any position of power at all. She's basically on the outside of the company she not in the board. Also she has no business experience.
@@jimmylee9120 She doesn't give a shit either way, she wants to sell. Roman and Kendall physically cringe whenever someone says Waystar or ATN are a toxic brand, she doesn't want anything to do with it. She's pissed off about Kendall and Roman because they are supposed to be a team, Roman remembers, Kendall doesn't care about it at all and thinks interim CEO is his in to be the next Logan, he's an idiot.
Last week I said I'm expencting something from Shiv because she doesn't like to be pushed a side so easily. And here she is :) I'm on her side because we've seen Kendall trying to ignore her, only Roman's saying that we have to inform Shiv whatever. Also I feel like she's using Tom because she needs ally, don't think she wants to get back together. (I actually ship her with Matsson tho :) I'm #TeamShiv but also have a feeling that the siblings will lose at the end because they have a huge ego and they're so selfish. I'm from Istanbul and I'm wathing the show by myself and the next day I like to watch with you and see your thougts :) Good job guys.
the thing that the "succession" already happened, Kendall and Roman won it; everything that will be happening in the 5 eps left is not gonna be a succession: it's gonna be a coup d'etat against both or at least one of them and I bet Shiv gonna make it. She has all the guys in her hands: she kept Gerri so she can take down Roman, she knows about Kendall and the dead waiter, she gave Tom some one to serve so she got Greg too, she got rid of all the male old guard except Karolina and she even knows Matsson "secret"...she got everything to win, she will be full Logan, turttle neck an all
Loved the review. One thing I see nobody's saying anything about the Lukas sex allegations. We spend a season regarding Royco's own issues with that. No golden parachutes if 50% of the deal in shares if the new company tanks behind that issue getting out.
Yeah the 50/50 shares is a huge deal. Kendall is right - Mattson doesnt understand the brand - ATN IS absolutely so successful because of their elderly old angry viewers (much like Fox news today).
There are 516,186,520 shares of Waystar stock. at $192 per share that's $99,107,811,840 for the total sale price of the company. This means roughly $2,477,000,000 for each of the kids assuming they're all holding the same amount of stock as Kendall which is 2.5% and I believe they are (at least pre-Logan's death since we don't know how much they get after that yet). The share could is from the birthday episode where Logan offered to buy Kendall out for $2 billion at $156.20 per share. The net worth of the kids (more specifically Kendall) has been all over the place throughout the show without the share price changing enough to explain it and no other moves explain the major changes. I say this because who knows if this real number is what the show will stick to or if they will change it again.
Elon Musk didn't personally pay $44B out of his own pocket to buy 100% of Twitter. He took on considerable debt, and he has a few minority investors who have small ownership stakes in the company. Jack Dorsey foolishly chose to retain his own 2% stake in the company at the time of the sale. He would have gotten $1B if he had cashed out when the sale closed, but instead he's got a stake that is now valued at about $400M, generously.
The dynamic between Matsson and Shiv is open to interpretation. I was believing what Matsson was saying about blood until he said “I like you, you are just like your father” to Shiv. Now I think he is just playing her and went to her because he read the room and knows the dynamic between siblings is sour.
@@wackybrattyx he knows she is vulnerable and wounded because she is not the CEO like her brothers. He is trying to get inside the brothers head through her. In the coming episodes I see him using her and maybe give her strong position at ATN as well.
You should pause when you have long comments to make. The dude on the right sometimes seems to forget the importance of dialogues (especially in shows like this one). :D About the style of filming, "Office-like": I've always found it brilliant. It completely fits the chaotic nature of the Roy family, the chaos of their interactions.
Hey Tom, thanks for watching and commenting! This is a great question and a tough one to answer. But to me it always felt like the resolution is for everything to blow up for the Roy’s. The kids have tried emulating dad and they’ve taken every possible shortcut to success. To me it points to them either not being able to be the killer(s) that Logan was, or just not having the experience and decision making to be as successful as he was. But again it feels like every episode is a curveball, so I’m not entirely sure where it’s going but I have faith in the writers to deliver a great ending. - Abe
