Episode Grade: (9.0/10)
Controversy surrounding burned ballots pits the Roy children against eachother on a night of massive implications for Waystar and the nation as a whole.
Plot (42/50)
The election was the main focus of the episode. The Roys were particularly invested in the outcome due to the implications it could have on their contrasting agendas. As a result, they were more than willing to exert their influence over the decision to call the election. In the process, they dismissed their vaguely understood responsibility to report the objective truth. Ultimately, in announcing Mencken the winner of the election, they (specifically Roman) have gained a powerful ally.
Burned Ballots
At the start of the episode, everyone was preparing for a Jimenez victory. The possibility of a Mencken victory was so remote that Mencken himself was preparing for defeat. Then, roughly 100,000 burned ballots in Milwaukee threw everything in disarray. Mencken was already overperforming polls, but this gave him the opening he needed. Ultimately, the election came down to Wisconsin, and without the burned ballots, Mencken was leading by a significant margin. So, he pushed for the call with Roman firmly in his corner over at Waystar.
The problem is, of course, that an election can not be certified without counting all the votes. Furthermore, historically speaking, the mail-in ballots that were burned were overwhelmingly Democratic votes that would have likely swung Wisconsin in Jimenez’s favor. Darwin, ATN’s resident voting expert, brings this up as reason enough to wait. However, both he and Tom are powerless in the face of the Roys. In the end, the call is Kendall and Roman’s, and if it were up to Roman alone, the call would have already been made.
Conflicting Agendas
At some point in the evening, after results came in for critical states, Connor finally accepted the reality of his situation. Eventually, he strikes a deal with Mencken (thru Roman). In exchange for his endorsement, Connor will be appointed as ambassador to Slovenia. Of course, he had turned this position down in the previous episode, but now that he no longer believes he can win, he’s more willing to salvage what he can. It is unclear if his endorsement was a significant contributor to Mencken’s overperformance; however, it is a sign of Roman’s absolute commitment to Mencken.
On the other side of the aisle stands Shiv. She seems more genuinely concerned about the integrity of the election, but she too is more than willing to use the election to advance her personal agenda. She’s in frequent communication with Jimenez’s team thru Nate, but it isn’t yielding any results. She also has Mattson in her ear. He’s concerned that Kendall and Roman might ruin ATN’s reputation. She tries to exert her influence over various characters, but with no official position at the company, she too is powerless. There’s only one person that can halt Roman’s onslaught, and that’s Kendall.
The Decision
Kendall was paralyzed for much of the episode. While others around him had clear visions of what they wanted to happen, he did not. Much of that came from his daughter’s recent struggles as a result of Mencken’s rise. A Jimenez victory would alleviate much of Sophie’s anxieties while a Mencken victory would exacerbate them. On the other hand, a Mencken victory would significantly boost his ability to fend off the GoJo acquisition. Then, in the background, there’s his sense of responsibility to do what’s “right.” Add Roman and Shiv yelling polar opposite calls for action, and it is clear to see why Kendall freezes in place.
Eventually, he comes up with a possible way forwards. If Jimenez is willing to block the GoJo deal, then Kendall would make sure ATN hold off on the call. This way, he can support the “right” candidate win while also supporting his personal agenda to keep hold of Waystar. All he needs is some sort of concrete signal that Jimenez would be willing to play ball. So he turns to Shiv, who knows that Jimenez will most definitely not play ball.
Shiv pretends to call Nate and falsely reports that Jimenez would be willing to play ball. She isn’t convincing though, so Kendall calls Nate to get a more concrete commitment. That’s when everything unravels. Nate probably reveals that he never communicated such a message to Shiv. Kendall, shocked by the betrayal, goes to Greg for confirmation of Shiv’s intentions. Greg then likely revealed that Shiv was in cahoots with Matsson. Kendall, now deeply wounded by Shiv’s manipulation, makes the call. ATN calls Wisconsin, and in turn, the election, for Mencken. He will be the next president of the United States.
Character Development (15/15)
For Kendall, Roman, and Shiv, this was basically a magnified episode of sibling fighting with crazy high stakes. For power players like Matsson, Mencken, and Jimenez, it was like watching a fight with your fighter involved. And then you have the fringe players. The likes of Tom and Greg were in no man’s land for much of the time. In a sense, this episode was a dramatic reproduction of the Milgram experiment.
Roman
I’m starting with Roman because he had the single largest change of fortune from the previous episode. His indecision and generally erratic decision-making had led to a number of missteps. There was no sign of the indecision here, and his erratic behavior was complementary to the chaos that ensued. His ability to be decisive where others were not gave him a significant edge over both Kendall and Shiv. Of course, he had no business being this decisive on such an important matter, but that’s not what counts in this case. For Roman, what mattered was gaining Mencken’s favor, nothing more, nothing less. And by the end of the episode, he’d managed to do just that.
On face value, this may seem inconsistent with Roman’s character. However, when you look a bit deeper, it makes sense. Roman’s never been able to do it on his own. That hasn’t changed. Sometimes it seems like he’s doing it on his own, but in reality, he’s just doing Mencken’s dirty work. Ultimately, Roman has a subservient tendency that he hasn’t been able to shake. He’s jumped from Logan to Gerri to Kendall. And because Kendall was not as dominant as Logan or Gerri, he’s now moved on to Mencken. Actually, he didn’t just move on to Mencken, he went all in on him. Roman knows that they’re in the endgame, and make no mistake, this is his play.
Shiv
Tom’s ominous warning to Shiv a couple episodes came true at the worst possible time for her. She had been walking the right rope expertly ever since Logan’s death, but it all came undone here, and she has no one to blame but herself. Well, maybe she can blame Greg too. Greg somehow always finds himself in the possession of critical information, and this was no different. He’d spent the previous night partying with Matsson during which Matsson revealed his working relationship with Shiv. Greg tells Tom, who offers advice in the form of a fantastic analogy. Tom then tells Shiv, who tries to coerce Greg into keeping quiet. She fails miserably.
She fails because as a result of one of her major weaknesses: overestimating her position. Honestly, her attempt to silence Greg was pathetic. She tried to make him uncomfortable by asking if he found her attractive. When he dodged that, she literally threatened to kill him. Greg was unphased, this is ordinary Roy language after all, but he was open to negotiating a deal. Shiv’s response? She doubled down on her threat to literally kill Greg. Shiv’s not this stupid, so it must’ve been arrogance that led her to act this way. She could not fathom that someone like Greg might dare cross her. But why not? Between the three main Roy children, she holds the least amount of power.
More Shiv
Shiv knows that her brothers hold more power than her, which is why she teamed up with Matsson in the first place. That’s also part of the reason she tried to reconcile with Tom. However, their latest bust up the previous night had left her at a significant disadvantage heading into election night. She tries to remedy this by half-heartedly apologizing, but after he refuses to apologize back, things go south. Tom says some things that get her worked up, so she dumps news of her pregnancy on him. It was an ugly conversation, but it gets worse.
Tom questions the truth of Shiv’s pregnancy. It looked like Tom believed her, but he probably felt like her dishonesty and manipulation no longer knew any bounds. Regardless, she was being honest and in a state of vulnerability, so his reaction was piercing. This sequence makes her decision to take advantage of Kendall’s vulnerability later on even more egregious. Kendall wanted her to get some sort of commitment from Nate, on Jimenez’s behalf, that they would block the GoJo deal. Of course, Shiv doesn’t want them to block the deal. In fact, she had just lobbied Nate the previous day to ensure that the deal goes through.
So, she pretends to call and reports that Jimenez would be willing to do a deal. However, she wasn’t decisive in her lie, so Kendall calls Nate himself. That’s when the web of lies begins to unravel. Kendall suspects that Shiv has been working with Matsson. He gets confirmation from Greg. When he confronts her, she’s unable to lie her way out. She tries to appeal to Kendall’s sense of right and wrong, but it’s too late. She’s destroyed any modicum of good will by betraying his trust. The lies have finally caught up.
Kendall
Kendall’s sense of right and wrong is muddled with his personal interests, much like his siblings. Maybe he actually feels a sense of responsibility, but because of the other factors involved, there’s no way for us to tell. What we do know is that he feels some guilt towards his children, specifically Sophie because of her recent struggles with the hostile political environment. He feels like a bad father, and that weighs heavily on him. Of course, if we take a few steps back, the absurdity of the decision-making becomes glaring.
Kendall’s weighing the future of the nation (and the company) against his and Sophie’s emotions. That’s not to discount Sophie’s legitimate anxiety, but this is a wholly inappropriate way of dealing with it. Sophie doesn’t necessarily need the election to swing in Jimenez’s favor. Sure, it would help, but what she really needs is to know that her father is there to support her, as Rava pointed out. If he was serious about being a better father, he would make an effort to be present in his children’s lives. Compensating with extra security or by making a contentious election call is not going to cut it.
At various times during the series, Kendall has been utterly honest about his mental state, as was the case in his chat with Shiv. He tells Shiv about his aspirations to lead the company on his own. He also voices his insecurity about Roman and Mencken’s relationship. With that said, if the expectation is that she’d be OK with what he said because he expressed a desire to remain on friendly terms, then he was setting himself up to fail. Nonetheless, she took advantage of his openness, so his knee-jerk reaction was understandable. There’s a good chance he’ll regret it though.
Others
Connor pulled a U-turn during this episode when it became clear to him that he wasn’t winning the election, which makes his previously commendable conviction seem foolish. Don’t get me wrong, it was always beyond foolish of him to think he somehow stood a chance, but his conviction was commendable because he was committed to seeing out his plan. That same conviction now seems foolish because if he was going to take a deal, he should’ve taken it when he had greater bargaining power. In any case, he gets to be the ambassador to Slovenia for his troubles assuming Mencken is officially elected.
Moving on, it was fascinating to see how quickly characters gave up their values and folded their boundaries. In Tom’s case, he went from telling the Roys that it was his call at the beginning of the evening to telling them that it was their call by the end of the night. Tom bullied Greg into serving as his assistant for the evening. Then, he peer pressured Greg into doing cocaine with him. Still, we saw the supportive dynamic between the two when Greg mentioned Shiv’s alliance with Matsson. Did Greg use Tom’s advice wisely, though? He’s had this on-off alliance with Kendall, so it makes sense to choose him over Shiv, but could he have waited?
I seriously wonder if the writers had the Milgram experiment in mind when they were putting this episode together. I mentioned Tom and Greg, but there were more examples. Darwin folded under pressure even though he was obviously uncomfortable. Even Roman was empowered to make the call because he rationalized that his decision wasn’t final. They literally spelled it out in the conversation between Greg and Jess, so I feel like this was definitely what they were going for.
Theme/Messages (5/5)
- Lies usually catch up to people in the most inopportune of times.
- What responsibilities do corporations have to society outside of their shareholders’ material interests?
- People are most vulnerable when they open up and trust others.
- Indecision is an underrated weakness.
- If you aren’t familiar with the Milgram experiment, go read up on it. The experiment offers some valuable lessons on obedience to authority figures.
Acting (14/15)
This was one of those episodes where everyone was just about at the same level. Jeremy Strong (Kendall) and Sarah Snook (Shiv) were perhaps a hair above everyone else, but Kieran Culkin (Roman) and Matthew Macfadyen (Tom) were not too far behind. Other strong performances include Nicholas Braun (Greg), Alan Ruck (Connor), Juliana Canfield (Jess), and Justin Kirk (Jeryd Mencken).
Cinematography (14/15)
- High shot of the floor in ATN with Tom, Greg, and Pam walking across on the second floor (20:56)
- Symbolic shot of Roman walking by Kendall up the stairs as Kendall stands frozen looking down (36:00 onwards)
- Shot of Kendall and Roman arguing in the meeting room with ATN playing on the TV in the background (46:59)
- Shot of Kendall looking pensive (51:25 onwards)
- Fantastic scene between Greg and Jess to capture the tension of the evening (59:36)
- Reactions of the Roys as Mencken gives a speech about being for the people and not winning the election through “haggling” (1:02:24 onwards)
- Shot of Kendall looking distressed with Shiv arms crossed, out of focus in the background (1:02:57)