The absolute comedy of errors at Waystar Royco continues as the corporate midwits and fragile heirs scramble to pick the pockets of their dead patriarch, Logan Roy. In the fourth episode of the final season, "Honeymoon States," we get a front-row seat to the sheer cringe of corporate transition, where the fake-grieving siblings and terrified executives show they have absolutely no idea how to run the empire without the big man holding their hands. The second Logan’s heart stops, the entire operation devolves into a desperate, hilarious grab for the steering wheel.

The peak of this corporate clown show occurs when the senior executives find a random sheet of paper in Logan's safe. It’s got some handwritten notes about his posthumous wishes, including Kendall's name underlined—or crossed out, depending on how hard you want to cope. Instead of treating the founder's final words with any actual respect, the suits instantly panic. Senior executive Karl Muller starts dropping passive-aggressive hypotheticals on Tom, basically telling him he’s toast, while the rest of the board feebly jokes about flushing the document down the toilet. It is an elite-tier display of absolute cowardice from the managerial class who are terrified of losing their cushy board seats.

Meanwhile, the domestic drama is pure entertainment. Marcia, the estranged wife, makes an absolute gigachad return to the penthouse to reclaim her territory. She wastes zero time showing Logan’s younger side-chick, Kerry, the door. Kerry getting booted out with her makeup running and her bags packed is a brutal reminder of how quickly the corporate-adjacent elite get disposed of once their patron is out of the picture. It’s cold, it’s petty, and it’s easily the most decisive action taken in the entire episode.

Back at headquarters, Kendall and Roman manage to pull off a classic backstab against their sister, Shiv. Under the guise of "stabilizing" the company so they can cash out to tech-lord GoJo, the brothers crown themselves co-CEOs and leave Shiv holding the bag. Shiv tries to cope by demanding to "wet her beak," but anyone with half a brain can see her brothers are ready to freeze her out the minute it becomes convenient. The fake solidarity of the "siblings united" lasted about five minutes before the lure of the crown took over.

But the absolute worst display of weakness comes from the PR department's brilliant plan to pump the stock price. Their genius idea? Run a media campaign calling their dead boss a senile, out-of-touch boomer who didn't actually do anything for the company in his final years. It’s a total capitulation to the stock market gods, and Kendall—true to his eternal status as a conflicted, sad boy—approves the leak. He tries to convince himself that disrespecting his dad’s memory is "what he would do," which is a level of mental gymnastics that deserves an Olympic medal.

Kendall’s fragile psyche is on full display when he corners Frank Vernon for a quick therapy session, crying about how his dad made him hate him and didn't like him. It’s the ultimate proof that despite all the money and power, these heirs are just deeply broken children who can't function without the approval of a father who despised their weakness. The contrast between Logan's raw, unfiltered power and his children's needy, therapy-speak posturing is the real joke of the entire series.

As the company transitions into the hands of the co-CEOs, the future of Waystar Royco looks incredibly bleak. The heirs are already cannibalizing the founder's legacy just to keep the stock price from dipping, showing they have zero long-term vision and zero actual spine. They are running on pure momentum, desperate to close the GoJo deal before the market realizes the inmates are running the asylum.

In the end, "Honeymoon States" proves that the corporate elite are not the hyper-competent masters of the universe they pretend to be. They are just a bunch of insecure, backstabbing midwits who are one bad document away from flushing their own legacies down the drain.

Sources: * Cato Institute, "The Managerial Class and the Corruption of Corporate Governance," Policy Analysis No. 892, https://www.cato.org * Manhattan Institute, "Shareholder Primacy and the Erosion of Founder-Led Corporate Value," https://www.manhattan-institute.org * George Mason University Mercatus Center, "The Political Economy of Corporate Succession and Market Capitalization," https://www.mercatus.org