I Never Saw Shiv As A Succession Villain, But This Season 4 Scene Almost Made Me Change My Mind

I love a good, heated debate about my favorite TV shows, but the “Shiv is the worst character in Succession” arguments always make me roll my eyes. Does the youngest Roy sibling do some terrible things? Absolutely. Shiv’s awful treatment of Tom is definitely when the character is at her most villainous, but her behavior is nowhere close to as bad as her father Logan, siblings Kendall and Roman, or even her poor put-upon husband. Sure, Shiv enjoys just as much privilege as the other members in her billionaire family, but she at least tries to be a good person.

Shiv truly sees the horrors of not only having someone like Jeryd Mencken become President of the United States, but also in ATN prematurely calling the election for him. Yet because she’s an ambitious woman who’s vying against her siblings to take over Waystar Royco, and happens to be a better schemer than Kendall or Roman, she’s “the worst“? She’s not — by a long shot. But there was one scene in Succession season 4 that almost made me stop defending Shiv for good.

Shiv Showed Her True Elitist Colors At The Dive Bar In Succession Season 4

She Acted Like She Was Above Drinking At A Dive Bar

Succession season 4, episode 2, may be best remembered for Logan’s crushing, “You’re not serious people” speech, but “Rehearsal” actually featured Shiv’s most unlikable moment. Following his disastrous wedding rehearsal dinner with Willa, Connor hilariously described the type of dive bar he wanted to go to and drown his sorrows. While he was thrilled when they entered an authentic “American” bar, Roman and Shiv in particular turned their nose up at the establishment. When Kendall was taking drinks orders, Shiv snootily replied, “House red? Do I dare? No, no, no… just a club soda with a sealed lid. Uh, nothing from that tainted nozzle.”

Shiv’s disdain at the idea of drinking at a regular bar sent shivers down my spine. She fancies herself a moral person who fights for the good of the everyperson, especially in the face of her wealth and power-obsessed family, but when she’s actually faced with living like one, even for a single night out, she shows her true colors — that she actually thinks she’s better than the people who drink there.

You could argue that Shiv was trying to hide her pregnancy at the time, and may have feigned disgust to avoid suspicion on why she wasn’t drinking, but if that’s the case, she truly deserves an Oscar because that level of unadulterated snobbery is very hard to fake. And her attitude points to the most disturbing fact about the Roy siblings as a whole.

The Roy Siblings Are At Their Worst When Interacting With “Regular” People

Abusing Those Outside The 1% Is A Game To Roman

The genius of Succession is that even though we know the Roys are terrible people, we can’t help but care about them, particularly when their family dynamics take center stage. I truly felt sympathy for Roman whenever he desperately tried to win Logan’s approval, or pride for Kendall whenever he stood up for his siblings. But when we pull back and watch how the Roy siblings interact with “regular” people, we see how monstrous they actually are.

This is no more apparent than in the Succession pilot, when Roman sadistically offers to pay a young boy a million dollars if he scores a homerun at a baseball game they’re playing, only to rip up the check in the kid’s face when he’s tagged out. (The boy is the son of the groundskeeper.)

An equally disturbing story is one that happened 15 years prior to the events of the show at Kendall’s bachelor, in which he, Roman, and the other celebrants paid an unhoused man to get Ken’s initials tattooed on his forehead. Roman, who was feuding with Kendall at the time, tracked “Tattoo Man” down and offered him $1 million for photos of the tattoo (the man had since had it removed).

If this horrific treatment of a human being isn’t bad enough, Roman is completely demeaning to the man he asked to come into the office, touching him without his consent and getting others to inspect his forehead for faint traces of the tattoo. Roman offering the man money had nothing to do with trying to right a wrong — he wanted to get one over on Kendall.

Interestingly, arguably the biggest villain in all of Succession, Logan Roy himself, is the kindest to everyday people. He takes sick pleasure in abusing his high-earning employees, but he treats his bodyguard, Colin, with the most respect. After Roman’s gross mistreatment behavior in the baseball scene, Logan shakes the boy’s hand and says, “Magnificent effort.” This is likely because, unlike his children, Logan didn’t come from money. Shiv and the others think they’re better than everyone else because of their wealth, and that proves they are, indeed, not serious people.