Promo "Heirs" season 4 episode 2 (HBO)
One of the main issues that accompanies "Heirs" from the beginning is the gap between business and emotions.
In the cold and alienated world of the upper percentile of the upper percentile, emotions are a sign of weakness.
A loophole calling for a thief.
On the other hand, precisely this approach produces so many scarred and traumatized characters, that this deprivation in their lives leads to decisions and behaviors that would not have occurred in other cases.
This is also the reason that the strongest quote from "Return to General", the second episode of the season that was full of enviable screenwriting creativity, belongs to the most ridiculed character of all.
The one who did the complete cycle of emotional abuse until she came out the other side immune to emotions.
"The best thing about having a family that doesn't love you is that you learn to live without love," Connor tells his younger brothers, just before he leaves what was supposed to be one of the happiest nights of his life.
He knows that Willa never thought about living with him because of love, but he was willing to settle for pretending, because, as she says, "Fuck it, how bad can it get?", and even that show crashes with Willa's inability to even express emotions Engineers read from the script, it remains intact.
"You're all chasing after dad: 'Love me, please love me. I need love. I need attention'. You're obsessed with love, and I'm a cactus that grows on the rocks and feeds on insects that die inside me. I don't need love, it's like a superpower."
Connor may be a failed politician, a bad businessman, a bizzare morbilli collector and a generally laughable personality, but his actions are done out of a self-conviction that he is promoting his own interests.
We don't know much about Logan's childhood, but it's likely that the tough Scotsman who single-handedly built an empire in a foreign country wasn't raised in silk gloves.
He also has scars on his back to prove it.
This forging in fire from childhood made him the businessman he grew to be in his adulthood.
In a parallel reality, Connor was actually his preferred successor.
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don't need love
Connor, "Heirs" season 4 episode 2 (Photo: HBO)
It was, as mentioned, one of the funniest and wittiest episodes of "Heirs", with a chain of great one-liners, some of which are too juicy to mention on the record.
As always, Greg and Tom were there exchanging tearful descriptions of Logan on the ATN news floor ("He looks like Santa Claus the Assassin"; "He looks like 'Jaws' if everyone in 'Jaws' worked for the Shark"; "It's like Israel— Palestine, only harder and much more important", about Kerry's audition), but it seems that the winner of the episode is a novel that got the levels perfect time and time again, and landed them with genius ("What happens if I kill a Buddhist? Do I get to be reborn as a Buddhist in the next incarnation? "; "Daddy was a god, now he's selling his empire to the Swedes from 4chan and handing out jobs to pacifiers"; "Oh wings, I wonder what creature you ripped them from. Maybe it was a mammal"; "I can't look away from the bald guy talking about NATO").
It is precisely the character that ostensibly serves as the comedic anchor of the episode, Kerry and her terrible and amazing audition, that hides a much bigger story inside her.
The sale of Waystar put Logan in an existential crisis.
The signs were already seen in the previous episode, but they intensify in this episode.
He's looking for something to hold on to, something to remind him that he's still the god from the Empire, that his power is still in his loins.
Kerry started out as a helper/lover, but she grows slowly as his confidant precisely because of the bad alternatives to this title.
Therefore, Logan's attempt to relieve himself of the need to clarify to her why a career in television is probably not what is written in her cards, is not typical of him.
He is a man of truth in the face, contempt for feelings, net efficiency.
This point also explains a lot about his new attitude towards ATN.
Logan is a micro-manager who swims in everything that goes on in his business down to the smallest detail.
When Tom tries to smear him and the employees with stories about an increase in the number of viewers, Logan mentions that this increase was done alongside a 40% jump in costs, and even employees at the news network know that 40 and 15 are not equal.
Except that Logan doesn't think of ATN in the usual, cold terms of profitability.
Like Kerry, she also serves as a kind of fountain of youth for him.
Possibility to refresh, reinvent, conquer and win.
A way to stay in the game.
Next to this ambition, the waste of pizzas, inefficient employees and offices much larger than necessary - is marginal.
Logan's "The Wolf of Wall Street" speech sharpens the desire to cry out to the world that he is still alive and kicking.
Like Jordan Belfort, he makes it clear to his employees that not only does he have no intention of going anywhere, but he plans to be more blunt, more brutal and wilder.
News is not a business of money, but of power.
Ability to dictate a world view, pressure decision makers, create and bury heroes.
It is no coincidence that real mega-rich people in the world and in Israel are willing to lose a lot of money for the possibility of owning an influential media outlet.
This power is a tremendous tool for businessmen like Logan to get their way in any field.
This power is stronger than money, certainly for those for whom money no longer plays a role.
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hides a much bigger story.
Kerry, "Heirs" season 4 episode 2 (Photo: HBO)
Back to Val Shiv's feelings, who is in a delicate state in terms of her self-esteem.
Her dense protective shell is built on power plays, where she seeks a position of control that will allow her to break contact before she is hurt.
Tom was an integral part of this setup, but the last few months have completely undermined him - first with the betrayal in Italy, then with becoming Logan's crony, and now with a classic Logan move of "burning" the top divorce lawyers so you can't hire their services.
Shiv carries with her so many emotional traumas from childhood, that she does not stop to think if there is another motive for Tom besides the desire to sabotage her plans.
Tom secretly hopes that such moves can torpedo the process and perhaps cause a rethinking of the two's relationship.
The structure of the separation agreement does not really concern him.
In a desperate attempt to regain a sense of control, Shiv decides to make a move that seems far-fetched so far: joining Stewie and Sandy in an attempt to block the sale of Westar to Gojo, and extort additional funds from Tason.
Stewie and Sandy are also outsiders who ended up on the board thanks to the previous takeover attempt.
For them, such a move is risk-free: if it fails, they will stay at Wistar, if it succeeds, they will increase their capital.
If Shiv fails, she is left out of Weistar and also loses the capital that would allow her to build her own empire.
Until now, the business thinking was that such a move was an unprofitable risk, but now emotion comes into play.
How illogical this move is can be learned from the difference in Shiv's own attitude from the previous episode to the current episode.
Even then, the feelings of revenge and the need for control led her to inflate the Pierce deal, when it was already clear that there was no need for it.
Half a billion dollars seemed meaningless to her then compared to a "final number" like 10 billion dollars.
And suddenly she is willing to risk blowing up the deal for the possibility of earning $100 million.
It doesn't end there, she and her brother repeat the strategic mistake of the attempted rebellion at the end of the past season, and introduce a new side into their circle of conspiracies that seems innocent, even though it has a real interest that is contrary to theirs.
Last time it was Tom whose conversation with Shiv made him realize he was going to stay in the air and rushed to warn Logan, and this time it's Connor that the deal explosion will hit his pocket directly.
This approach will exactly lead Logan to the place where he feels so comfortable: divide and rule.
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Built the move perfectly.
"Heirs" season 4 episode 2 (Photo: HBO)
It's easy to dismiss Roman's betrayal as a weak character, but the quality writing of "The Heirs" has been building this move consistently since the beginning of the season.
We know that Roman is a person who hates conflicts, despite the blatant exterior.
In his utopian script there is a balance of forces that allows the different forces in his life to live together in a kind of distorted harmony.
This is also the reason that throughout the two episodes he actually turns out to be the more balanced and responsible side of Roy's children, the one who presents the logical arguments for action and refuses to act impulsively.
Roman wanted to leave the fight with Logan behind and start something new with "The Century".
Megalomaniacal, hollow and sleazy as it was, "The Century" still offered the Roy children a chance to raise money from investors for a new venture, instead of wasting their fortunes on a failing company with a completely opposite character to their own.
He tried to fight this argument in the face of Shiv's apparent lack of enthusiasm that dragged Kendall along, once PGM was officially brought up as a possibility.
In the next step, Roman insisted not to exaggerate the chain of offers to Nan Pierce, reminding Shiv and Kendall that half a billion dollars is a lot of money that can be used to buy "sushi and other nonsense".
The price gouging that was done very transparently on the backs of the brothers, taking advantage of their eagerness to screw Logan, was also done in the end with Roman's very reluctant consent, after he felt that he was once again alone in the battle.
Four times throughout the episode, Roman tries to overturn the deal's move: when he first hears about it by answering at the "viewing party" at Kerry's audition, when they meet Stewie and Sandy on the street, during the conversation at Connor's dress rehearsal, and after Kendall Mathson's conversation.
Time after time he loses, with the last time Shiv and Kendall press his feelings of inferiority because of an innocent correspondence with Logan.
This turns out to be a particularly painful point for Roman, who found himself time and time again pressured by his brothers to do as they wished, fearing that he would be left without them and without Logan.
During the conversation he mentions a traumatic trip to Europe, where apparently this tactic was widely used.
"Stop making alliances against me like you're Lennon and McCartney and I'm George," he slams them.
The conversation with Logan at karaoke makes him realize that all his warning bells were right.
He is on the impulsive and immature side of the business world.
One in which he felt very comfortable until recently, but it was precisely when he separated from his father that it became clear to him how problematic and destructive he was.
Of course, this does not mean that Logan does not take advantage of Roman's constant fear and feeling of inadequacy in front of him, but he could not have done so if Shiv and Kendall had not prepared the ground for him.
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A masterful tactic.
"Heirs" season 4 episode 2 (Photo: HBO)
Logan's tactic is masterful because it again catches his children completely by surprise.
They expected him to burst into the room in a rage and scream at them until they break, but it is precisely the apologetic appearance that undermines the uniform front.
Unlike his children, Logan is a shrewd businessman with a flair for complex deals.
His attempt to speak to the rational part of his children is authentic.
There is an appreciation there for the move they made against him on Pierce, and an attempt to teach them that there are cases where "saying the highest number" is not the right way.
When Shiv slaps him to go demand more money, he asks her why, and gets the typical arrogant answer from Kendall: "Just good business sense, we need to make our own pile of money."
The disappointment he shows is real.
"I love you, but you are not serious people," he shoots and leaves the room with a perfect connection of all his children's traumas in one sentence.
Outside, when he is on the street, Logan is reminded again of his loathing for the city where he became king.
Despite the excessive wealth, the castles and the helicopters, he still sees himself as a simple people.
He had known the city before it had grown, when there was room for people to whom nothing was given easily, before the rats had become fat as skunks and could no longer run, before his children had become the likeness of the people he despised.
"The night of long knives is coming," he tells Roman, "You are not a piercer. Smart people know what they are."
Roman has indeed been wise so far, but now that he is once again in the clutches of the emotional abuser who made him who he is, will he have the courage to continue and stay that way?
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