Characters / Succession: Kendall Roy

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Main Characters (Logan Roy, Kendall Roy, Siobhan "Shiv" Roy, Roman Roy) | Extended Roy Family | Waystar RoyCo | Other Companies | Politics | Other Characters

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Kendall Logan Roy

"If dad didn't need me right now, I don't exactly know... what I would be for."

Portrayed By: Jeremy Strong

"You're my number one boy."

— Logan Roy

Kendall — Logan’s middle son (and the oldest child from his second marriage) — has been employed in a senior position at Waystar and is primed to lead the company when Logan retires. However, he is a recovering drug addict who has yet to gain the full trust of his father.

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A-L

• Acquired Situational Narcissism: Pretty much any time that Kendall gets a taste of power, he immediately lets it go to his head.
  • After taking over the company as acting CEO following Logan's stroke, Kendall proceeds to strut around the office, trying to behave and conduct business like Logan, which leads to him partnering with Stewy and inadvertently putting the company at risk for the rest of the series.
  • After exposing the cruises scandal at the beginning of season 3, Kendall proceeds to delude himself into thinking he's some kind of hero to the public, which leads to him throwing wild, celebratory parties, ignoring his legal team's advice, and making increasingly pathetic attempts to paint himself as a martyr for social justice.
  • Tragically, as soon as he thinks he's secured the role of CEO in the finale, Kendall immediately ruins it by reverting back to his season 1 self and behaving like an arrogant Manchild while emulating his dad. This leads to Shiv voting against him, thus costing him the company.
• Addled Addict: He spends the majority of Season 2 as a puffy-faced, visibly strung out, suicidal kleptomaniac — and, after one particularly epic bender, shits his own bed.
• Age-Inappropriate Dress: When he's not wearing suits, Kendall seems to prefer gaudy and immature clothing that is more in line with a college student or someone in their 20s, such as the glittery bomber jacket he wears to his birthday and the sneakers with which he tries to impress a group of artistic twenty somethings.
• Alas, Poor Villain: At the end of the series, Kendall loses his final shot at the CEO position and is left an Empty Shell staring out at the Hudson River, contemplating suicide once again. While this did come as a result of his own actions, it's impossible not to pity him after the sheer amount of torment his father put him through ended up being All for Nothing.
• AM/FM Characterization: Kendall is shown to be a very big fan of rap music, with his very first scene on the show having him rapping along to Beastie Boys in his car. The eighth episode of Season 1 also has him listening to "Nobody Speak" by DJ Shadow featuring Run the Jewels to pump himself up for a client meeting.
• Amicable Exes: Initially he's on fairly good terms with his ex-wife Rava, but things end up getting more tense between them. Things become more amicable in Season 3 again, only to spiral downward in Season 4.
• Annoying Younger Sibling: Connor mostly pities and resents him (they’re both mentally ill and Kendall doesn’t get cast out like he did, while also sharing similarities with his institutionalized, abused and possibly dead mother), but Ken does get his annoying giggly turn in “Too Much Birthday”, making fun of Connor shitting on a camping trip.
• Anti-Role Model: According to Culkin and Snook, Shiv and Roman look at how much of an open wound Kendall can be, and how he’s treated in the family because of it, and clam up their own emotions in response.
• Apologises a Lot: His natural state is to hang his head like a frightened prey animal and say he’s sorry, though this tends to be around Logan or when he’s going through an episode, not when he’s actually done something wrong.
• Asshole Victim: Zigzagged He is a rich, entitled jackass guilty of manslaughter; while he deserves punishment for his actions, his Trauma Conga Line in Season 2, which culminates in a near-suicide, lends him a measure of sympathy. On the Internet, this has been explicitly compared to the Theon/Reek storyline on Game of Thrones, with Kendall's actor backing this comparison.
• The Atoner: Subverted in Season 3. While he does care about the assault victims, his frequent level of distraction, treating women around him like shit, curling up in private, and references to water, along with his base instinct to defend his dad, make it obvious what he’s thinking about. It’s only in the final episode of the season that he admits personal responsibility for killing the waiter, also crying that he couldn’t get all of them out of the business.
• Attention Whore: He craves any attention, even if it’s bad, and will eventually cause him to spiral into a depressive episode.
• Batman Gambit:
  • Despite often coming across as awkward and socially out-of-touch, Kendall can be surprisingly adept at manipulating people to his own ends. For example, early in the series, he wants to get some negative press about the trouble at Waystar without being the source of such a story. He gets around this by calling Lawrence Yee, insulting him and demanding that Lawrence run no stories about Waystar. This, of course, gets Kendall both the story he wants and an excuse if he's asked about it later.
  • He also does this when being The Dragon for Logan, using his known weak appearance to lure people into thinking they can say what they want either against Logan or about the biography, giving them enough rope to hang themselves with, and then reporting back.
• Because You Were Nice to Me: He’s so used to Logan either not giving affection or using touch as control, that he’s cried at least three times from someone actually being kind to him and comforting him.
• Belated Love Epiphany: He has one about Rava. Although he seems to have treated her very badly, he seems convinced they'll get back together until he realizes she's dating someone else.
• Beneath the Mask: The start of Season 3 has him having a panic attack in the bathroom before pretending that everything is fine and he’s some cool crusading puppet master. But he’s Kendall, so embarrassing public breakdowns come fast, and the manic bluster doesn’t last long before he’s sliding back into misery and just asking his dad to let him leave quietly.
• Berserk Button: Despite the other person clearly having a point, and all the self-loathing, he really hates being dismissed as being The Mentally Disturbed; Karl’s essentially saying “don’t worry your crazy little head about it” in the second episode, knowing just how to draw him out and get him plotting.
  • A late reveal in the series, but bringing up his infertility and saying his kids aren’t his is a way to get him enraged. It even overrides his Big Brother Instinct as he attacks Roman for it.
• Big Brother Bully: While he loves Roman and protects him from Logan, it’s left ambiguous but leaning towards did happen about the dog cage, and they’re all too conditioned to accept it was horrible. Playing “Rape Me” at his sister’s press conference was also a big Kick the Dog moment.
• Big Brother Instinct: It's buried under a lot of dysfunction but it's definitely there.
  • Immediately yells at Logan, and comforts and examines Roman after Logan backhands him so hard he knocks one of Roman's teeth out. Like the Papa Wolf incident below, it's one of the only times he stands up to Logan directly, and this time it's even while he's in the midst of pathetic subservience to Logan.
  • Kendall also has his moments of protectiveness towards Shiv, including yelling at Logan for making her cry (he was high at the time, but nevertheless), scolding Tom for speaking disrespectfully to her (and asking her if she wants him and Roman to take him down for hurting her), and pushing through his own grief and shock to offer her comfort when they hear the news of their dad's death.
• Birds of a Feather: He bonds with Naomi Pierce over their shared issues with drugs.
• Black-and-White Insanity: Whether it’s the drugs or the bipolar (or a mix of both), he needs to see Logan as the devil or God, himself as either pure victim or deserving of every imaginable punishment, and either saving or spitting on his family.
• Break the Haughty: His entire storyline in the show, starting with the very first episode when he gets told that no, he will not be succeeding Logan in running the company.
• Broken Tears: He breaks down in Logan's arms in Season 1 finale after Logan threatens to expose his involvement in the death of a waiter. Later in Season 2, he cries in front of Shiv when confronted about his defeated subservience to their father. Season three has him cry on his birthday, and he has a sobbing fit while telling Roman and Shiv about the waiter.
• But I Read a Book About It: He actually has a decent grasp on business theory, but lacks the experience and "killer" instincts Logan is convinced someone needs to succeed in the position he so covets.
• Butt-Monkey: Kendall often fails to achieve his goals in brutally humiliating fashion, and lacks any respect from his family and most of his employees. Gets worse over time.
• Byronic Hero: See Deconstructed Character Archetype below. On the surface, Kendall checks the boxes: he's depressed, arrogant, whiny, and unbelievably entitled, yet has a lot going on beneath the surface and is perfectly capable of being kind and genuine. However, the former qualities tend to outweigh the latter, making him sympathetic, yet incredibly hard to root for.
• Calling the Old Man Out: He finally stands up for himself and rips into Logan in the Season 2 finale — on live TV, no less.
• Cannot Tell a Joke: He’s so repressed and tightly wound up that any actual attempts at humor fall flat.
• Conditioned to Accept Horror: By Season Three, Kendall is already used at being thrown under the bus by Logan, which explains how apathetic he is in the season's finale while Roman and Shiv are visibly crying - it may have helped that he got through his tears when he confessed to Roman and Shiv about his role in the death of the waiter.
• Conflicting Loyalties: A big part of him wants to be like a common person with consequences for his actions, while another part - especially with cruises and Season Two - wants to be let off because he was just following daddy’s orders. He ends up being more of a dithering, self-loathing, plastic Jesus who can’t handle anything thrown at him.
• Chronic Backstabbing Disorder: Logan might be terrifying and deserving of it, but Kendall even manages to go back on his word with Greg and says he might have to burn the guy after all, plus ruining Dust for humiliating him after claiming he’s a good man. Not for nothing that Logan looks directly at him in “Hunting” when complaining he’s surrounded by snakes, and Kendall sells out everyone in not liking Pierce a minute later.
• The Chew Toy: He brings a lot of it on himself, but as Tom points out, anyone around can see that Kendall gets fucked over and over, while Logan has never been fucked once. Jeremy Strong once snuck into the writers room and saw one of the rules of the show being “Kendall wins, but he loses”.
• Color Motif: Kendall has a noticeable fondness for the color brown, which seems to be his go-to clothing choice for all high-stakes situations outside of work hours — both when he wants to blend into the background (i.e. when he's visiting the family of the waiter he killed) and when he wants to stand out (his brown tux in a sea of black at a gala). He is also seen wearing brown in the Season 2 promotional poster. Brown is associated with both decay and dependability, which is fitting for a character who is both the Addled Addict and The Dutiful Son. ^note In the business world, brown is seen as a weaker and less desirable color choice than black, navy or charcoal, and was in fact not considered an acceptable business color until the 1980s. (It should be noted that Kendall's color palette in Season 1 was much more austere and formal; it's only after he's broken down at the end of Season 1 that he starts wearing "muddied" colors and taking some fashion risks with his clothes).
• Creepy Monotone: His normal tone of voice, which, coupled with his dead-eyed delivery, makes him look less like a human being and more like a glitchy robot.
• Cuddle Bug: Roman’s affectionate, but Kendall is the only one in his family to actually ask for hugs. Season Two has the Shiv hug be the only knowingly kind touch he’s had in a long time (Logan using touch as a means of control), and he just clings to her while crying. The siblings all tend to be more cuddle-seeking during and after Logan's death, until the final schism.
• Daddy's Girl: Especially during the Humiliation Conga of season two. In exchange for being protected for what happened with the waiter, he has to metaphorically be his dad’s Sex Bot, as Roman so delicately puts it.
• Daddy's Little Villain: Particularly bad in “Hunting”, when he’s reduced to an Empty Shell making coffee for his dad, and the only limited joy he seems to get is selling everyone else out, as he’s essentially crawling on the floor for sausage, so why shouldn’t they join him?
• Death Seeker: Thinks about committing suicide multiple times in three seasons, and everyone knows he has the tendencies, Gerri telling him early on to not jump off a building. After hearing that Logan sent Greg to babysit him when he falls Off the Wagon, he gets very close to snorting so much coke that his heart would explode, seemingly out of sheer spite. He almost drowns himself in a pool near the end of Season 3.
• Deconstructed Character Archetype: Of the "sad rich boy" and Byronic Hero. He's so sorely lacking in self-awareness, so entitled, so responsible for his own failures, and so greedy (for more affection, attention, and power) that, instead of coming across as charming and Troubled, but Cute, he mostly seems pathetic, needy, and petty, and more of a Villain Protagonist than an Anti-Hero.
• Demoted to Dragon: Goes from his Archnemesis Dad's most direct and dangerous challenger to a beholden minion when knowledge of a murder grants Logan intractable leverage over him.
• Desperately Craves Affection: Kendall wants approval and love and will take it from anywhere he can get it, making him susceptible to Logan's manipulations. All it takes from Logan is an evening of not being horrible and a burger to make Kendall doubt his vote of no confidence and think he should push it back.
• Determined Defeatist: According to Strong, Kendall knew deep down he had lost by the time of Shiv’s letter, but he has to keep going thinking he’s a savior, otherwise he would just give up.
• Dirty Coward: Actively works behind his father's back to try to get him ousted while being generally genial and pleasant to his face. Though given who Logan is, it's something of a necessity. It then becomes a serious character flaw after he leaves the waiter to die on the eve of Shiv's wedding.
• Disappointing Older Sibling: Although he isn't Logan's oldest son (that's Connor), Logan makes it clear that he is also disappointed in him most of the time, despite being highly well-trailed.
• Disneyland Dad: Type II. He is estranged from his ex-wife and has either limited or no custody of his children, with their interactions restricted to Thanksgiving dinners and birthday outings to amusement parks.
• The Dog Bites Back: He gets no respect from his father, and is blackmailed into a subservient position to him in season 2 — until he finally stands up to his father, stabbing him in the back on live television.
• The Dragon: After Logan has blackmailed and broken Kendall, he essentially uses him as his number one enforcer, knowing that he'll do whatever task Logan requires with no question.
• Driven to Suicide: He contemplates throwing himself off the office roof in Season 2, but is barred from the possibility when the company erects barriers there. After a Despair Event Horizon at his 40th birthday, Naomi has to lead him away from the balcony, and he tries to kill himself by drowning after Logan tells him he's never going to be let go.
• Drowning My Sorrows: He falls Off the Wagon after his vote of no confidence fails. Shiv's letter implies that he's fallen off a fair amount.
• Drunk Driver: In the Season 1 finale, to disastrous and deadly results.
• Drunk with Power: He thinks he can be his dad with no actual experience in early season one, and during his manic wannabe Logan episode in season three, treats Comfry and the rest of his team so badly that they’re almost relieved when he goes back to the depressive phase.
• Dull Eyes of Unhappiness: He's already pretty dead-eyed at the show's start, but he gets worse as the series progresses, with people describing him as "a corpse" and "yuppie Robocop". After hearing that Mo is dead in “Hunting”, the camera stays on his Thousand-Yard Stare expression before moving onto Tom and Greg.
• Dumbass Has a Point:
  • He's not as business-savvy as he wants to believe he is, but he's completely right about local news being outmoded and digital media being a valuable asset.
  • Cocaine (adding to the way Logan’s raised them) makes him paranoid that everyone is trying to fuck him over, something Logan is more than happy to use, but he’s also right in “Lion In The Meadow” when he claims that Logan wants him back underneath him again.
• The Dutiful Son: Deconstructed. He worships and despises Logan in equal measure, working against him when he thinks he hasn't got his just rewards, but brokenly tells Shiv he doesn't know what he would be for if he wasn't being used by his father. Jeremy Strong called it a poisonous love story between Kendall and Logan.
• The Eeyore: He's a morose, unsmiling, dead-eyed guy, although it's hard to tell whether he simply has a depressive personality, has been browbeaten into misery, or some combination of both.
• Elemental Motifs: Several major turning points in Kendall's arc over the series tend to involve interaction with, or take place on, a body of water in some form or other. Fittingly the final image of him in the story involves him forlornly staring out at a river.
• Embarrassing Damp Sheets: He shits the bed after a night of substance abuse.
• Embarrassing First Name: The fact that “Kendall” is far more common as a girl’s name, and sounds a lot like “Ken doll”, does not go unremarked on by the other characters.
• Empty Shell: Spends much of Season 2 in this state, as he constantly speaks in a Creepy Monotone and obeys Logan's every command without question. Justified, as his guilt over killing the waiter in Season 1 and his constant drug abuse have clearly worn Kendall down to the point where's he's practically a mindless husk.
• Entitled to Have You: High on thinking he's solved the debt problem, he tells Rava they should get back together because not doing that would make him unhappy. And if he likes you, if you humiliate him and tell him you don't love him, well that just means you do actually love him, cos that's how he sees love.
• Establishing Character Moment: Kendall's first scene is him (badly) rapping to the Beastie Boys in the back of a limo (including the contextually ironic lyric, "We come together on the subway cars") while wearing noise-canceling headphones, much to his driver's chagrin; this shows how immature and out-of-touch he is (and also displays his unfortunate affinity for white boy rap). He then arrives to an important business meeting and immediately starts using casual youth lingo, showing how unfit he is for the world of business.
• Exhausted Eyebags: The waiter incident, his own guilt and Logan holding it over his head makes Kendall look like he aged ten years between season 1 and 2, when really it had only been two days.
• Extreme Doormat:
  • Even when he’s trying to stand up for himself, whether it’s for power or the right thing, he still has these tendencies, cleaning up his breakdown in the pilot, telling Lisa he’s her puppet and will do whatever she wants, and despite being better with his dad, can’t stop him from using his own son for power play. It’s only when he bands together with Shiv and Roman that he can be the strong one.
  • Politically, while Shiv and Roman are at least on their party lines (Roman helping a fascist, Shiv a right-leaning Democrat), Kendall has no conviction that isn't wanting to oppose or be Logan.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: "Evil" might be a stretch, but as selfish and corrupt as Kendall can be, he does genuinely care about his siblings and is extremely protective of his kids.
• Everyone Has Standards:
  • He'll more often than not lie down and die when it's his turn for abuse, but will step up when Logan hits his son, hits Roman, or calls Shiv a coward until she cries.
  • For how shitty and selfish Kendall is most of the time, he's nothing short of horrified when the waiter that crashes into the lake in Scotland drowns, and he quickly tries to dive down and save him a couple times before running away from the scene. The guilt of this hangs over Kendall for much of the series until he finally confesses in tears to Roman and Shiv in the Season 3 finale, where he openly acknowledges how horrible his actions were.
• Evil Is Petty: As much as he doesn't want to be, he's his dad’s son, and will respond to getting humiliated by trying to punch down on someone else. When Roman acts like his dad at the party, he takes it out on Shiv and Connor, and when he loses control in 3.02, he yells at all three of them just like Logan would, and hypocritically ruins Dust when they embarrass him.
• Eyes Always Averted: Kendall has a real problem with keeping eye contact. Everyone around him deals with it differently, Logan and Roman moving him around (with Roman far more gentle about it), Shiv demanding he look at her like an equal, and Stewy chasing it down, always moving so he’s in his friend’s eyeline.
• Fall Guy: Logan chooses him as "the blood sacrifice" for the cruises scandal, at which point Kendall decides he's had enough.
• Fatal Flaw: His debilitating issues with addiction — to drugs, and less obviously (but more tragically) to power — cause him to frantically chase the very things that make him the most miserable, be it blow or the position of CEO that he is clearly unsuited for. Most overtly, he would have finally had control over Logan had he not driven off for a quick fix during Shiv's wedding.
• Foolish Sibling, Responsible Sibling: The Responsible to Roman's Foolish, for the majority of Season 1.
• Four-Philosophy Ensemble: The Cynic.
• Four-Temperament Ensemble: Melancholic.
• Forbidden Fruit: Kendall Really Gets Around, but he’s also the one most caged and slut-shamed by Logan, while Roman (and to some extent Shiv) gets pimped out for business deals. It’s one of the reasons why Sandy is so interested in him.
• Functional Addict: He falls off the wagon after being fired, but more or less stays upright until "Nobody is Ever Missing."
• Gender-Blender Name: "Kendall" is nowadays more popular as a name for girls.
• Giftedly Bad: Kendall's rap in Season 2. His delivery is actually pretty good — he stays on the beat and his flow is decent — but the lyrics are so inane and cringeworthy that the end result is transcendently terrible. Almost happens again when Ken - who's actually not a bad singer - plans another performance that he realizes is utterly stupid shortly before and promptly cancels.
• Has a Type: Naomi, Rava and once-best friend Stewy all have in common that they know he’s pitiful, but will still look after him and hate his father.
• Hated by All: All of the Roys are detested both inside and outside of the family, but Kendall is usually the one who gets the brunt of the hate: His association with the Roy name means most normal people keep their distance from him to start with, his attempts to emulate their father causes Roman and Shiv to view him as a spinless suck-up, and Logan and his business associates view him as too tryhard to earn the fear that the former gets.
• Hates Their Parent: He is desperate for his father's approval, but just as desperate to ruin his father's life. He lampshades it himself by saying he loves dad, he hates dad, and will outsource it to his therapist, trying to dismiss how much it eats away at him.
• Heel Realization: After two seasons of self-flagellation while also trying to run away from all of it, he finally admits he’s not a good person when telling Shiv and Roman about how he killed the waiter.
• Heroic BSoD: Becomes just a shell of his former self in the second season, listlessly carrying out his father's orders like a drone. Also has several in season three, sliding back into misery and conflicting emotions about his dad when nobody can see him.
• Hidden Depths:
  • As humiliating as his rap is, his actual delivery is solid, with the lyrics being the issue.
  • He later shows himself to have an alright singing voice when rehearsing for another performance which never happens.
  • While not to Logan's extent, Kendall also does have some genuine skill at business and can be very successful when he is working with others who can balance out his weaknesses with their own strengths. Working together, all three siblings are even able to do what Logan failed to do two seasons prior and purchase Pierce Media, defeating Logan in the process.
  • Kendall has a natural talent for public speaking, delivering a strong presentation to investors in season 4, and later giving an outstanding off-the-cuff eulogy at Logan's funeral.
• His Own Worst Enemy: Many of his failures can be attributed to a combination of unchecked substance abuse, hubris, shame, self-loathing, and a desperate need to please his father.
• Horrible Judge of Character: Stewy calls him out early on in having faith in people who only ever fuck him over, and being surprised when they eventually do again.
• Humiliation Conga: From the get-go Kendall is subject to a series of public and private humiliations, but season 3 really ratchets them up. It’s hard not to feel bad for Kendall after a while.
• Hypocrite:
  • Ruins Dust after they embarrass him by calling them coke addicts (this after he’s done barely just shy of enough to make his heart explode), whines about Amir getting a nepotism job and mansplains to Shiv that she’s too emotional, this coming from a man who cries every other week.
  • In Season 3, Kendall complains about how Greg is little more than a parasite, and is especially upset that he plans to go back to working for Logan so he can continue to leech off of him. He seems to have conveniently forgotten how he spent much of Season 2 being a Professional Butt-Kisser for his own father, and did things such as rat out Roman during "Boar on the Floor" and shut down a part of Stewy's company simply so he could remain on his good side.
  • While high on drugs midway through Season 1, Kendall criticizes Logan for berating Shiv to the brink of tears shortly before the family therapy is to occur. Fast-forward to Season 3, and Kendall himself makes Shiv cry by playing "Rape Me" by Nirvana during a press conference she's having out of mean-spiritedness.
  • In Season 1, Kendall rebukes Logan for striking Roman. Come the series finale, Kendall strikes Roman when the siblings fall out during the vote to elect Waystar's new CEO.
• I Am Not My Father: He’s not a good dad, can’t even remember his daughter’s name, but he’s desperate to not be like his own father, apologising profusely when accidentally yelling at Iverson, and trying to be happy (when he’s accidentally killed a guy) dancing with his daughter at Shiv’s wedding.
• I Did What I Had to Do: Kendall really hates himself, and a lot of the time he can’t even convince his own mind of this, but he tries to tell himself he’s good because he agonizes over every choice (which of course people don’t see and so they think of him as weak).
• Ignored Epiphany: Kendall has realized multiple times over what a wretched excuse for a human being Logan is and that trying to gain his approval will never work and will only destroy him but he always comes back, either due to circumstance or in a desperate desire to gain the love he craves that Logan is happy to imply will come if he just does as he is told and a belief that he is nothing if he's not serving his dad.
• I Just Want to Be Free: Dark example, as it’s only when he’s hopped up on drugs or intensely drunk does he admit it (the original Nobody Is Ever Missing script had him feel like he was free now...in the car with the waiter), and the rest of the time he just can’t detach himself from needing his dad's love. When he finally asks to be let go, Logan refuses, and he tries/fails to kill himself, but gets back up eventually to be handmaid for his siblings.
• Inadequate Inheritor: What Logan believes him to be (and what he probably is, from what the viewer is shown of his business decisions).
• I Need a Freaking Drink: He'll often snort some coke particularly when he's stressed or is forced to do something he doesn’t want to do, like burn down his baby Vaulter because Logan wants to keep him in line.
• Inferiority Superiority Complex:
  • He practically oozes insecurity, desperation and self-loathing despite playing at being a confident, ruthless businessman. It’s partly explained by Logan’s treatment of him, telling him he’s broken and a nobody, but also the best little number one boy.
  • It's not revealed until the series finale, but Kendall is implied to be infertile, judging by Roman's incredibly cruel Adoption Diss regarding his niece and nephew, one of whom was apparently conceived via sperm donor. Or possibly Rava cheated or otherwise bore a child by another man, but either way it's clearly a very sore spot for Kendall, who already has a complicated relationship to masculinity.
    Roman: They are a pair of randos. One is a buy-in, the other is half Rava and half some filing cabinet guy, right?
• Informed Attribute: In-Universe example. Whenever Kendall declares himself the eldest Roy sibling to justify why he should be the new Waystar CEO, everyone else immediately points out that Connor is actually older. That said, it's still Metaphorically True since Connor has no interest in inheriting his father's business.
• Innocence Lost: Kendall tries to recreate the good parts of his incredibly traumatic childhood for a 40th birthday party, wishing he could go back there, and everyone but him seems to understand how much of a cry for help it is.
• I Resemble That Remark!: When he’s playing "good tweet, bad tweet" with his groupies, one tweet gets to him before he covers up. “He clearly has mental health issues and crazy guilt, coupled with addiction. That's all this is, and it's sad".
• It's All My Fault: At first, he’s willing to take the fall for cruises like his dad wants, because it's payback/atonement for his role in the death of the waiter. Then Logan says it's nothing. This continues into the third season, trying to atone for that while in public saying it's about cruises, but finally admitting in a breakdown what he did and that he's not a good person.
• Ivy League for Everyone: He is a Harvard graduate. Justified in that it would be unusual for a media scion's son not to attend the Ivy League, given its reputation for admitting children of the rich and powerful (typically in exchange for massive donations).
• Jerkass Has a Point: Deconstructed. He often manages to accurately pin-point the faults of others, such as his dad's abuse, Roman's phony fratbro persona, Shiv's hypocritical behavior, and Greg's parasitic relationship to the family. However, he's often needlessly cruel and vindictive when he verbalizes those faults, ensuring they'll never take his observations to heart.
• Kick the Dog: Colin scares him, so he takes it out on Shiv, playing "Rape Me" by Nirvana during her press conference, and making her cry.
• Kiss of Death: Of the original, non-sexual, Judas-kissing-Jesus flavor. He kisses Logan on the cheek before going on live TV and laying the blame for the cruises scandal on his father.
• Knight in Shining Armor: Not wanting to admit the parallels between the women on cruises and being his dad’s number one boy, he tries to consider himself the champion against Logan’s evil, but he can’t manage it, something he at least finally admits both to Logan and his siblings.
• Knight Templar Big Brother: Deconstructed, as he’s the sibling with the fight response (Extreme Doormat for himself, getting in Logan’s face when it’s Shiv or Roman’s turn) and Shiv/Rome will mock him for being a plastic Jesus who wants to “save” them, but he also tries to ignore the fact that Shiv wasn’t protected like she should be, and Roman didn’t enjoy dog pound, because that would mean he’s failed in his role entirely.
• Like Father, Like Son: Subverted; he tries hard to be Logan No. 2, but is not ruthless enough to do so. But finally seems to be played straight as of the Season 2 finale, when he appears to be doing what Logan wants but actually backstabs him on live television - which is a very Logan move. Ends in “Chiantishire”, with Kendall – while wavering that he’s a good guy, and ends up admitting he’s bad in the next episode – genuinely just wants out and to disappear, but Logan just wants him close and under control again.
• Like Father, Unlike Son: He fatally lacks his father's savviness, ruthlessness and general force of personality and is tortured by that fact every single day and it forms the foundation of the terrible relationship between the two, not even able to take some comfort in knowing he at least has positive traits Logan lacks such as a conscience and ability to feel guilt and a sincere desire to do good.
• Locked Out of the Loop: A key reason Kendall is not ready to handle taking over the company is because Logan has been keeping so many things close to him — e.g. the fact that the company is about three billion dollars in debt.
• Love Martyr: Kendall has an unfortunate tendency to think if he’s getting humiliated that means whoever is doing actually loves him.
  Strong: When you grow up in a house full of abuse, you come to associate forms of abuse with forms of love. They become indistinguishable.

M-W

• Manchild: Obsessed with teen lingo and youth culture, hedonistic, prone to misreading social situations, and pathetically desperate for his father's approval.
• Martyr Without a Cause: Sees his dad as God even when he hates him, so that has to mean he’s “shitty Jesus” (as Roman calls him). “All the Bells Say” reveals he was really trying to rescue his siblings from the company, but instead of acting like some kind of parent making choices for them, all he really needed to do was tell him how bad he’s been feeling, and they would support him.
• Mean Boss: While he’s temporary CEO, he tries to pretend he’s good and would never go for an Unequal Pairing when he’s someone’s superior, but does and is pissed off to learn that the woman he’s with was told to give him a good time.
  Frank: [when Kendall can’t make coffee by himself] I thought you gave everyone the day off?
  Kendall: Skeleton staff.
• Meaningful Name: Kendall as a name is more associated with heiresses (such as Kendall Jenner), and his lack of masculinity is perceived as a great failing by his dad. Also “Ken doll”, showing off how plastic he is and how battered he is from being played with for so long. The second one is lampshaded in-universe, Shiv calling him a “fuck doll” when she’s mad at him, and Logan calling him “my plastic adversary”. His initials, K.L.R., foreshadow his Season 4 development into what Logan said he would never be: a "killer" capable of doing the top job.
• Minor Flaw, Major Breakup: Kendall breaks it off with a new girlfriend because she said "awesome" too much after meeting Logan.
• Mistreatment-Induced Betrayal: Kendall was loyal to Logan and had just completed a major deal for Waystar-Royco. He fully expected his father to name him the new CEO. Instead, Logan decides to stay on and treats Kendall as a failure. Fed up, Kendall tries to take over the company.
• Mood-Swinger: Kendall's manic episodes are intense but extremely brittle, with minor setbacks sending him into a tailspin of despair.
• Moral Event Horizon: In-universe, Shiv and Roman view him as having crossed this not when he kills the waiter at the end of Season 1 and goes above and beyond to ensure he faces no consequences for it, but when he blatantly denies having actually done that in the S4 series finale. It's not clear if they genuinely believe his claim that it was a ploy and are appalled he'd lie to them about that, or if they know he was telling the truth and are disgusted that he would deny it to try and get the CEO job.
• My God, What Have I Done?: He is left guilt-ridden and shell-shocked after accidentally killing a waiter at Shiv's wedding, although the guilt does not extend to coming clean and turning himself in.
• Narcissist: He’s desperate for a good image and for people to think of him well, and even when he has good intentions he manages to make it all about himself.
• Nervous Wreck: He’s either an anxious mess just barely keeping it under control, hanging onto mania or just emptying himself out like an Empty Shell broken robot to deal with it all.
• Nice to the Waiter: Ironically enough, and while he’s still vain and self-absorbed, he’s the one who will pay any kind of halfway decent attention to staff characters, even if a lot of it is out of wanting to be retraumatise himself ^note All There in the Manual He had a bad experience with a nanny. The lower employees at Waystar like him a little because he actually lets him have cereal as a free perk.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed: While the Roys in general are heavily based on the Murdoch family, Kendall in particular is similar to James Murdoch — Rupert Murdoch's "cool", liberal-ish son who funded Rawkus Records in the 1990s and helped launch the careers of Mos Def and Talib Kweli.
• Nominal Hero: At his best, he's trying to outwit, expose, and overthrow Logan for his own benefit.
• No-Respect Guy: His own father has no respect for him, his best intentions are frequently misinterpreted, and many of what he thinks are smart plays end up failing because he has relatively little business experience compared to theory. When he does find a strategy that could put him over Logan, he usually does something to ruin it.
• No Sense of Personal Space; Kendall is desperately touch-starved. Logan will use it to control and manipulate, while characters like Roman, Shiv, Stewy or even Jess will give him comforting touches or affectionate gestures to the head. Harriet Walter mentioned in an interview that Caroline kissing Kendall on the head and calling him a sweet boy is all she really knows how to deal with and help him.
• No Social Skills: Kendall has real issues in formal or social settings, using inappropriate language in a business meeting and struggling to maintain conversations. Almost everyone finds him incredibly off-putting as a result.
• Obliviously Evil: He's deluded himself into believing he's a good guy when he's not, only finally admitting it in "All The Bells Say".
• Obviously Not Fine: Kendall at the start of season three tells everyone he’s fine and is running on mania, but there’s scenes Beneath the Mask where he curls up like a little kid, and has a sobbing breakdown on his birthday. Things get worse until he admits to his brother and sister what happened with the waiter.
• Off the Wagon: There are allusions to a past stint in rehab in the first episode, and midway through the first season he starts using again.
• The Ophelia: Nastier than most examples: Kendall may think he’s a modern Hamlet, but he’s associated with water and drowning, emotionally regressed to the point where his 40th might as well as be his fifth, a Death Seeker who everyone knows is mentally ill, and his life is centered around his father.
• Overly-Nervous Flop Sweat: He's even described as "a sweaty corpse" at one point.
• Papa Wolf: Lashes out at Logan after Logan hits his son at Thanksgiving. And after Logan cosies up with Iverson after Kendall tries to commit suicide, he’s very clear that he doesn’t want his kids around his dad.
• Parents as People: He's not exactly "father of the year" but Kendall does at least make a sincere effort to be a good parent to his kids and, whatever can be said about him, he's light years ahead of Logan in that department and is making a conscious effort to not repeat history.
• Perpetual Frowner: Almost always has a look of pure misery on his face. Given how his dad treats him, his mental health issues and his bad luck in general, it's hard to say it isn't merited.
• Playing the Victim Card: While he is very much a victim of his dad, he gets this from his mother, wanting so much to believe he’s an innocent little martyr while knowing he’s really not and always slipping very easily into Then Let Me Be Evil.
• Politically Correct Villain: Not entirely (see below), but Kendall genuinely has no problem with minorities or gay people, having adopted an Indian child that he treats no differently from his biological son, formed a Teeth-Clenched Teamwork dynamic with the openly gay Lawrence Yee, and spoken up when Matsson childishly used "gay" as an insult. Additionally, while he does exploit the situation for his own benefit, he does legitimately think that the sexual abuse at Waystar is abhorrent, and is the first to suggest a proper investigation into it.
• Politically Incorrect Villain/Politically Incorrect Hero: He's neither a straight-up hero or villain, and of all the Roy siblings he's the one who cries most loudly about social issues, leading to derisive nicknames like "Wokahontas". It isn't entirely an act, but he does have misogynistic tendencies in the way he treats women (especially Shiv) and shows pretty extreme classism.
• Powerful People Are Subs: Roman’s the one with the degradation kink, but Kendall being naturally submissive - with a tendency to think that any attention is good attention, as well as making out with Naomi after she affectionately calls him a little nobody, something he’s been told regularly over two seasons - is one of the many reasons why Logan thinks he’s a failure.
• Preppy Name: Kendall, which is posh-sounding enough even without being associated with real-life and fictional heiresses.
• Pretty Fly for a White Guy: Enjoys listening to ‘90s rap and often tries to use "cool"-sounding slang or wear expensive sneakers when meeting with clients.
• Prone to Tears: He cries more than anyone else in the show, either crying fits or just looking like he's about to cry.
• Property of Love: Kendall’s thing is that even when he’s trying to be top dog/posturing as Logan, he still wants to be owned, by Logan (if dad didn’t need me right now, I don’t exactly know what I’d be for) - which is why Logan’s “you’re my boy/you’re my son” works so well -, by a partner who he can get to be his dad in a nicer package, or even by Shiv, who he asks to look after him when she assumedly becomes new CEO/dad.
• Puppy-Dog Eyes: He's pretty good at the "eyes wet with unshed tears" look, although it never works on anyone in-universe. Logan openly complains about them, calling them the "doggy evils".
• Raging Stiffie: In the show's second episode, he gets a very inappropriate erection in the hospital's waiting room when his ex-wife hugs him, which he claims is due to adrenaline.
• Really Gets Around: Logan certainly seems to think so, and Shiv tells him he’s addicted to sex and relationships.
• Recovered Addict: One of the reasons Logan doesn't trust him is because he went through rehab.
• Replacement Goldfish: Kendall wants so badly to be parented, that he’ll just imprint daddy on anyone who shows him slightest affection, Frank, a childhood nanny he apparently tried to fuck, Stewy, Naomi, Rava, Shiv, wanting to go straight from being his dad’s to her’s.
• Right for the Wrong Reasons: Runs into this trope a lot, especially in Season Three. His criticisms of Logan, the company and his siblings are mostly dead on, but they're borne more from spite, his own mental breakdown, and his desire to be seen as the only good one in the family rather than any true desire for change, and are abandoned as soon as he thinks he has a shot at getting back in Logan's good graces.
• Rightly Self-Righteous: He’s right that his dad is awful, but he makes the mistake of blurting out loud that he’s a good person with pure intentions, when not even he really believes that.
• Ripped from the Headlines: His car accident in the Season 1 finale is based off the infamous Chappaquiddick incident.
• Romanticized Abuse: In-character, Kendall can’t tell the difference between being loved and being abused. It’s most apparent with Logan, but he wants to be helpless or useful while fucking, humiliates himself in “The Disruption” thinking he’s loved when he’s still Hated by All, will run from people like Stewy or Rava who genuinely love him, and is far too wasted to have sex in “Vaulter” but doesn’t seem to care.
  Kendall (to Naomi, about Logan): He loves me. He... he... he... he does, I think it's just a wrong kind of love expression.
• Sarcastic Confession: When Greg compares Kendall to OJ Simpson "except if OJ never killed anybody." Kendall says, "Who said I never killed anyone?"
• Selective Obliviousness: Both Logan and Yee call him out for only realising about the corruption relatively recently, and getting on the high horse about it.
• Sex for Solace: After burning down Vaulter, he gets wasted, moves and slurs his speech like he’s underwater, tells Greg he’s looking for love in all the wrong places.
• Significant Wardrobe Shift: At the start of the series, he's the heir-apparent to Logan and dresses like a typical uber-wealthy finance bro. Once he's ousted from the company and forced to abandon his ambitions, he ditches the bland businessman look and the austere colors and starts wearing a lot of browns instead.
• Sketchy Successor: After Logan's death in season 4, he and Roman step up as co-CEOs to run Waystar Royco, though it's only meant to be until the Gojo deal goes through, at which point Matsson will be the new CEO. Though Kendall does manage to have some moments of success, like his well-received investor presentation, on the whole, he is as he always was: not as decisive, business-savvy, or competent as Logan with some truly pie-in-the-sky ideas. Come the series finale, with him, Roman, and Shiv deciding to support Kendall as sole CEO to stop the Gojo buyout, it seems like this is just the new state of things.
• Small Name, Big Ego: He wants so badly to believe he’s the crusading moral defender in season three, which while Logan does deserve it, it’s mostly to pretend that he’s got over being broken in season two/make up for the waiter/his own narcissism, and he just keeps getting beaten down and humiliated until he crashes at his birthday party and has a sobbing breakdown.
• Speaking Like Totally Teen: Multiple times, he tries to use casual and slang-y language to deal with business associates, which goes poorly.
• Speech Impediment: If he's nervous or uncomfortable, he will stammer and stutter his way through conversation, with his dialogue eventually dissolving into "uh uh uh"s. It's a tell in Season Three; when the manic mask slips, he goes right back to stammering.
• The Starscream: Once Logan makes it clear that he sees Kendall as a weak man unfit to inherit the company, Kendall throws all his weight behind trying to usurp his father's position.
• Sticky Fingers: His Trauma Conga Line sends him into a downward spiral of self-destructive behaviors, which include kleptomania.
• The Stool Pigeon: Neither Shiv nor Roman are particularly surprised (just upset) when he rats both of them out in early Season Two, implying he’s always been daddy’s little snitch.
• Sympathetic Murderer: He accidentally causes the death of a waiter in the Season 1 finale and, although he attempts to save him, eventually runs away from the scene and successfully hides his involvement in said death from the authorities. While this behavior is inexcusable, Kendall's subsequent remorse, as well as a season-long Trauma Conga Line involving blackmail, pathetic subservience to Logan and thoughts of suicide, lends him a measure of sympathy. He was willing to take the fall for the cruises until Logan said there was no real person involved, and admits he deserves to be found out/punished for it in the season three finale.
• Taking You with Me: Downplayed. By Season 4, his main goal is to screw over his father and business, even if means he's gonna be affected by it.
• Tantrum Throwing: The moment he learns he will not be named CEO of Waystar, he locks himself in his father's bathroom and proceeds to thoroughly trash it (before calming down and tidying up after himself).
• Tech Bro: Kendall, who is vying to lead media conglomerate Waystar-Royco, tries and fails to cultivate this image: he dresses much more business casually than the clean-cut old guard like his father, stays in shape, and tries to be "hip". Unfortunately, despite his position and money, he doesn't really have ideas; he (and the Roys) manage other people's for them.
• Then Let Me Be Evil: Seems to be the case in “Austerlitz”, as Kendall has been in recovery for three years, but goes back to alcohol after Logan has put out a hit-piece about him using again, he can’t even see his kids because of it and the waitress tells him a story of Connor paying someone to give a sick dog a good life, and it gets shot anyway.
• Thinks Like a Romance Novel: With both Naomi and Jennifer, he makes random overblown plans to go buy an island or something, and it’s made very clear it’s just the hypomania talking.
• Thousand-Yard Stare: Almost his default mode, even his younger self in the credits is sitting dissociating while the rest of the family talk at the table.
• Throw the Dog a Bone: It’s only when Kendall admits personal responsibility for killing the waiter and, in the words of Strong, "actually supporting his siblings instead of being some self-loathing martyr," does he get a win in unconditional love and support.
• Token Good Teammate: For a very limited value of "good", but he seems to be the only Roy child with something roughly resembling an active conscience and a willingness to try and act on it, his bungled execution notwithstanding.
• Too Dumb to Live: Kendall seems to like walking into situations where everyone but him knows he’s not safe, he hears about a meth-head taking his brother’s money and still killing his dog, and instantly leaves to do drugs with the dude and his friends who know this new guy is rich and don’t like it. Roman has to go rescue him. Then there’s being almost turned on by the waiter offering to kidnap him and keep him in a shed, getting so drunk that he can barely stand up right and looking for a fuck, and All There in the Manual has him turning to drugs because he wanted a “reason” to feel weak.
• Tragic Dream: It’s made clear that Kendall would be happier doing anything other than becoming CEO, up to and including being kidnapped and held in a cow shed, but he’s been groomed (with plenty of subtext of the other kind of grooming) his whole life into thinking this means he’s worth literally anything to his dad.
• Tragic Hero: Kendall Roy has the potential to be a good person; hell, he even has the potential to be a good CEO. Unfortunately, his immaturity, excessive pride, and total lack of self-worth ruin anything he attempts to do, leaving him in a constant cycle of being broken and alone.
• Tragic Mistake: In the Season 1 finale, his Fatal Flaw of drug addiction finally catches up to him as he drives off with a drugged-up waiter for a quick fix, accidentally driving off the road into deep water, and leaving the waiter to drown (though he does attempt to dive and save him more than once).
• Tragic Villain: While everyone is ultimately pitiful, even Logan, a lot of the show’s emotional weight is down to just how many times Kendall can cry, or try to reinvent himself as a better person only to self-destruct.
• Trapped in Villainy: He attempts to leave Waystar and escape his father's influence at the end of season 3… only for Logan to refuse to buy him out simply because he wants to keep his "number one boy" under his control. This leads to Kendall being Driven to Suicide, and he's never quite the same after surviving the attempt.
• Trauma Button: All There in the Manual scenes had Rava complain to Kendall that their nanny is being shitty, which gives him the choicely worded “fire ants in my brain” and he assumedly business-kills her, so Roman brings up (in the context of Kendall’s sex addiction/self-destruction) next episode that Kendall tried to fuck his own nanny.
• Trauma Conga Line: Starting with the end of Season 1, he is put through a wringer and ends up being completely under Logan's control, becoming nothing more than a defeated puppet for his father. When confronted about one of his actions, he can only summon a miserable, pathetic, "My Dad told me to." It still reverberates through season three, as partly why Kendall is doing all the shit he does (battling his family while still missing them, appropriating sexual abuse victims) is he doesn’t want to be seen as the fragile puppet he was before, but cracks peep through and it all falls apart at his birthday party.
• Troubled Abuser: Rava heavily implies that he’s lost his temper with the kids several times, and while he tries to be nicer than his father, Ruck and Snook sum it up with “he’s fragile but volatile”, especially coked up and in mania.
• Undiscriminating Addict: Kendall's lapses back into substance abuse compel him to consume any drug he can, whether that's meth at a house in New Mexico or ketamine at a secret party in New York.
• Useless Bystander Parent: Aside from yelling and protecting Iverson when Logan actually hits him, anything else he’s too much of an Extreme Doormat for, something that contributed to Rava wanting a divorce.
• The Unfavorite: Logan is abusive towards all his children, but his attitude towards Kendall — whom he repeatedly humiliates, belittles, blackmails and undermines — is most consistently vicious. Paradoxically, this might mean Kendall is in fact his favorite child, as Logan is trying to mold him into "a killer" who can step up as CEO of the company. All of Logan's other children partly resent how much attention Kendall gets, as they've all been raised with the thought that "any attention is good enough".
• Verbal Tic: Says "dude" a lot which fits his immaturity. Also says "uh" a lot, especially when his Speech Impediment rears its head.
• Villainous Parental Instinct: Kendall is, at best, an Anti-Hero and at worst an oblivious Villain Protagonist. He does Logan's bidding most of the time, but after much back and forth in Season 1, he finally defies him at the stockbrokers' meeting. He draws this line because Logan hit his son, Iverson. It also doesn't go well for him.
• Villainous Widow's Peak: He has this hairstyle, and whether you consider him a Villain Protagonist or an Anti-Hero, he's not a virtuous person.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: Kendall and Stewy are old friends and often hang out together, despite Kendall seeing Stewy as nothing more than a parasite.
• Wardrobe Flaw of Characterization: The entire Roy family are lacking in taste, but Kendall is the most try-hard of the lot and is thus often the victim of misguided fashion choices, such as an inexplicable affinity for the color brown and the belief that a straw trilby is an acceptable type of hat. Other examples:
  • He wears a puffy jacket (with actual lapels) over a puffy vest to a tech conference, thus out-broing all the tech bros present.
  • He dons brown Lanvin sneakers to impress a gaggle of businessmen, who promptly fail to be impressed. He also wears a t-shirt called “bathroom orgy” which is a mess on two fronts, naked women that he thinks will endear him to a liberal art set-up, and it’s full of suicide references, including a man who’s hanged himself.
  • He wears a very unbecoming brown tux — over a baseball jersey, no less — to the 50th anniversary of Waystar-Royco.
  • Strong intentionally had Kendall’s suits tailored too tight for him, so they look like the only thing holding him together when he’s having a breakdown.
• "Well Done, Son" Guy: He's desperate for his father's approval, even when he's in the middle of actively working against him. Even in season three when he was trying to take down his dad for the scandals, his instinct is to still defend the man in private, and "The Reason You Suck" Speech when he just wants quietly out makes him try and kill himself.
  Strong: There’s still a sense of, “Look at me, Pop. Aren’t you proud of me? Do you love me now?” because this kind of violence and abuse is the way in which we connect.
• What You Are in the Dark: Zig-zagged with his car accident. When trapped in a sinking car, he manages to escape and surface, but immediately dives down again and makes several efforts to save the car's passenger before relenting due to exhaustion. There was no one to witness what happened, so he could have worried only about himself. However, once on land, Kendall immediately begins to cover his tracks to avoid responsibility for the accident.
• When She Smiles: On the very rare occasions when Kendall is happy and his face deviates from his usual look of misery, it's a truly wonderful sight.
• White Sheep: Subverted, as he desperately wants to be the Good One in his family, and in some ways, he has the most self-awareness out of all of them that something is rotten there, but he always slides back to old habits.
• Wrong Genre Savvy: As shitty and cowardly as he is, he wants punishment and consequences for his actions and Logan’s, in a world where no real person is ever involved, and the only punishment of any consequence is what your father hands out.
• Wrong Line of Work: Kendall really isn't at all suited to business or at least not the kind his dad and others in his family excel at, a fact even Logan is aware of despite having groomed him for it since birth and clearly resents Kendall for. He'd probably have been much happier pursuing just about anything else but he believes that becoming CEO is the only way he will ever get Logan's approval, however miserable Kendall is in such a position.

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