5
Succession Series Finale
a blood heir
Barely anyone is talking about the gigantic reveal in the final scenes of the series that Ken is (probably) sterile/unable to conceive. The skull-crushing rage that flares up in him at the mere mention of his non-biological children in the context of bloodlines and his claim to the throne… He wasn’t angry at Roman in defense of his children, he was a narcissist with a core wound exposed - after ken split open Roman’s stitches, Roman splits open Ken’s with these very comments - his kids are “randos”.
Ken, as we’ve known him, is a living overcompensation of ambition in the face of incompatibility with patriarchal lines and dynastic family structure. He can’t conceive, and he carries that everywhere, and wrestles with it in everything. Rewatch/reconsider this series from this perspective.
It explains so, so much. His distance from his kids, who, in his family, are a source of shame for him because they fill a void. Logan’s souring on Ken as primary heir could very well be related to the perceived dead end of his bloodline, and that could have been left largely unsaid until that fateful face off when he loses Shiv and Roman’s vote and hears his father’s words from the mouth of his brother.
I concede that the show succeeded (zing) in delivering complex characters, not explained by one detail alone, but this particular insinuation is huge.