Gaslight, Gatekeep, Girlboss: Succession’s Shiv Roy Put The Final Nail In The Girlboss Coffin

The Roy family is a family bred on varying degrees of immorality, narcissism, opportunism, and nepotism. However, one character in particular stands out as incredibly insufferable – Shiv Roy. 

The Complicated Layers of the Shiv Roy Onion

Succession thoughtfully critiques a series of issues it identifies as the rot of American society, like nepotism, wealth inequality, and crony capitalism, but it also examines toxic family dynamics and abuse. One of the show's most brilliant plot devices is a sophisticated characterization of how just empty the moral posturing about social justice is among disingenuous elites.

I want to clarify that Shiv cannot merely be written off as a girlboss. She is that, of course, but we get glimpses underneath the facade of something much more – of a scared little girl who fears vulnerability. It becomes clear early on that Shiv's hardened persona, her above-it-all attitude, and her superiority complex are copes for having all signs of weakness beaten out of her early in life. 

As a woman, it's more important than ever for her to put on a strong face – to the detriment of her personal relationships, where she finds herself unable to let it slip, even there. She's disagreeable and masculine, speaks in a deep tone of voice, and emasculates her husband at every turn, but she's also deeply insecure underneath her confident front. This makes her a delightfully complicated character to watch.

Aptly named for her chronic disloyalty and backstabbing, Shiv is certified in girlbossology. From her temperament and style to her business tactics and interpersonal relationships, Shiv has certainly traded all her feminine energy for the masculine, and with increasing effort as the series progresses. When we're first introduced to Shiv, she boasts a strikingly different image. She dons long, wavy locks and an autumnal wardrobe that features oversized knit sweaters, statement patterns, and relaxed blouses. 

At her wedding rehearsal, she pins up her hair and wears Hollywood glamor makeup with a striking red lip and a feminine cream dress that hugs her figure. Early in the series, Shiv's style signals a relaxed, cozy, personalized, and at least marginally more feminine appearance. This is during a time when she is an outsider to the family business, working in politics for progressive politicians and seemingly more concerned about "making a difference."

However, this all changes when Logan offers her the CEO position on a whim during a visit to the family's summer home, prompting her to cut off her long locks to a short asymmetrical bob and ditch her cozier, feminine wardrobe for colorless pantsuits. One look at the new Shiv Roy, and you can tell you're dealing with an entirely different situation. It conveys "I mean business" and leaves you wondering if her stint in politics was orchestrated to get her into this very position, knowing she would need a way to edge out her more experienced brothers.

How the Roy Family Dynamics Cultivated Shiv Roy's Inner Girlboss

Shiv bases her self-worth, whether she allows others to see it or not, on external validation. She’s desperate for her father’s approval, allowing herself to be manipulated by him and settling for a relationship with a man she doesn’t love or respect. This goes back to her childhood upbringing with a dismissive father and an absent mother. 

Her relationship with Tom Wambsgans, which is one of the most uncomfortable displays of power imbalance in recent TV history, is all about safety and stability for her. Tom is a sure thing. He adores her, is subservient to her, is willing to be the fall-man for Waystar’s screw-ups and go to prison, and genuinely loves her. Tom, however, is not Shiv’s type in the slightest. Shiv is adventurous, high in openness, assertive, and likes dominant, adventurous men, like Nate, who tells her she should be with a more “interesting bastard” like him. 

Why, then, would she settle for a man she looks down on? It’s a mixture of insecurity, control issues, narcissism, and avoidant attachment. She would rather hedge her bets on someone she knows won’t abandon her and who will give her the illusion of control. So, she abuses his loyalty, tells him she doesn’t love him, that he doesn’t deserve her, throws him under the bus, puts him down in front of other people, doesn’t stand up for him when other people do the same, literally refers to him as her “meat puppet,” traps Tom in an open relationship that causes him emotional pain and flaunts it, dismisses his feelings, and always makes his career ambitions subservient to hers, even if it means hurting his position (or throwing him in jail). 

Even when the two speak about potentially having babies, Shiv is remarkably unromantic about it, shifting the conversation to “freezing eggs” and the conditions of rights over the eggs should they get divorced or end up in a coma. You get the picture: the domineering, masculine woman in a pantsuit who’s married to her career. It’s a total girlboss meme.

Growing up in a household where your mother viewed you as a threat and your father dangled opportunities in front of you just to unpredictably take them away from you created a monster who has to, above all else, keep her options open. And boy, does Shiv keep her options open. She does so in her marriage – cornering Tom on their wedding night that she needs to have an open marriage; in her career – flip-flopping with ease between a political career that puts the pressure on ATN to switch sides to run her father’s company; with her family – when Logan ices her out, she goes crawling to Kendall. When her brothers are making a deal with Mattson, she plays both sides, making a secret deal with Mattson behind their backs.

The Girlboss Is Not Immune to Sociopathy

While I've read countless op-eds on how Shiv Roy may be a terrible person for being a domineering, power-hungry, manipulative, backstabbing, deceitful wife, daughter, sister, and employee, they all insist that she's somehow "hardly the worst of the Roy children." I have a hard time finding any logical reasoning behind this other than a tribalistic loyalty to the sympathetic female archetype, even when she is, by design, irredeemably cruel, calculating, self-serving, and immoral. 

In real-life girlboss pioneer Sheryl Sandberg's book Lean In, she says, "We need women at all levels, including the top, to change the dynamic, reshape the conversation, to make sure women's voices are heard and heeded, not overlooked and ignored." But once we ushered in the era of the girlboss, this isn't what happened. Not at all. Instead, female executives proved that the psychopathy inherent in being attracted to such a position rings no less true than it has for men in the same positions. We saw girlboss after girlboss not only run companies into the ground but exploit workers, lie, manipulate, and commit illegal acts to reach the pinnacle of female success in the business world. Gaslight, gatekeep, girlboss.

Shiv is no different. She constantly volunteers herself as the token woman to clean up Waystar Royco's mess, whether it's silencing an abuse victim to prevent her from testifying with damning evidence against the company's cover-up of rampant sexual abuses in its cruising industry, or parading herself out as a female voice to do PR for the company's many scandals, or victim-blaming Gerri when she discovers Roman has been sending her pics of his disco stick during work meetings. By reaching out to Gerri under the guise of making sure she's okay and working in a safe workplace environment, she's less than subtle about the underlying tone of the exchange being threatening. 

She pressures Gerri, insisting she "shouldn't keep quiet" about the texts – hardly an altruistic move when it's a strategic angle to eliminate Roman as a contender for CEO. The conversation is ended, but not before Shiv victim-blames Gerri, suggesting that failing to report her own sexual harassment as general counsel in the wake of a company sex scandal could give the impression she was "welcoming them" and "undermines her position." Shiv holds no moral high ground, often selling out other women in the seediest of ways.

Toward the end of the series, we see Shiv proselytizing about what a grave mistake it would be to elect Jeryd Mencken, a pseudo-fascist whom ATN prematurely declares as the winner of the U.S. election. However, it turns out to be just another case of moral posturing motivated by self-interest. If Mencken wins, he'll block the GoJo deal Shiv has cooking with Mattson. As Kendall told Shiv earlier in the series, "You tell yourself you're a good person, but you're not a good person." Shiv likes to feign moral goodness to achieve her own ends. 

What Succession Reveals About the Girlboss

There are a lot of parallels between Shiv Roy and real-world girlbosses like Elizabeth Holmes. Both employ a "fake it 'til you make it" philosophy, putting on a stern face, deep voice, and black turtlenecks to convey serious CEO energy, but ultimately, they're merely imitating the men they want to embody. This was Steve Jobs for Holmes, but for Shiv, it's her father. They have a chip on their shoulder, and as much as the other Roys are empty pantsuits blithely ill-equipped to fill their father's shoes, Shiv cannot make up for her blatant lack of experience or incoherent ideas. Her vision for the company is laughable to her father, brothers, and temporary CEO Raya, who declares that Shiv thinks she's smarter than she is while looking over her business proposal. Both Holmes and Shiv even end up pregnant, but Shiv doesn't miss a beat, declaring she'll be "one of those hard b****es who takes 36 hours of maternity leave, emailing through her vanity cesarean.”

Shiv's biological predicament is hardly more oppressive than her brothers'. Sure, Shiv is taken less seriously as a viable option for CEO, partly because she's a woman – something Logan affirms when Shiv quips that being a woman is a minus as a contender for CEO, to which he responds, "Well, of course, it's a f***ing minus. I didn't make the world." But this isn't the only reason why Shiv is a ridiculous choice for CEO. As much as her arrogance could fool you otherwise, Shiv overestimates her intelligence and is the least experienced in the family, save for Connor, who's trying to break 1% in the presidential polls.

Shiv is not entitled to become CEO as if it were some human right, and it's curious that anyone would even want her to, considering she lacks any moral principles or loyalty, even to her own husband. Likewise, women don't have a human right to make up 50% of CEOs, as if that will magically fix all of the world's problems. Shiv certainly doesn't fix any women's problems. She exacerbates them, using her womanhood to distract the public from the villainy taking place.

There Are Worse Predicaments Than Being a Woman

Are we supposed to root for Shiv? Yes and no. Is she a victim of her circumstances? Sure, but she's no more oppressed by her biological predicament than her brothers are. All four Roy children are victims of their malignant, narcissistic father's abuse. From a very young age, Logan has pitted his children against each other, oscillating between love bombing and devaluation to manipulate them. 

Shiv has a unique female perspective as the only daughter in the family, and people find ways to exploit this, just as they would with any other weakness. She certainly receives a lot of what leftists would regard as "microaggressions," which are underhand comments about her being a woman.

In a heated exchange with Kendall, he declares, "Girls count double now, didn't you know? It's only your teats that give you any value." 

Video essayists had a field day with this one, demonstrating as always that they would not have survived a Call of Duty lobby, let alone a contentious battle to acquire one of the world's largest and most powerful media conglomerates. Sure, it's disrespectful and venomous, but so was Shiv's low blow of a letter which she released to the press – the same press that refers to Kendall as "Oedipussy," declaring him a mentally ill drug addict with a problematic relationship with women, as well as a deadbeat father and a serial liar to save face for the company after he blew the whistle that Logan knew about the cover-up of the sexual abuse scandal. Getting hung up on a few immature sexist remarks between siblings is missing the point. Shiv is not uniquely victimized; she's done far worse things to Kendall and is straight-up a villain in her marriage. She's also spared many other forms of suffering that her male siblings are burdened with, like physical abuse.

Though Succession refers to barriers for women in business in a tongue-in-cheek manner, they hardly hold Shiv Roy back. In an interview with Glamour Magazine UK, actress Sarah Snook, who plays Shiv, said, "If there's a glass ceiling, for her, it doesn't really exist because she's beyond privilege and beyond money and power that she could afford to buy the building," and that's really what Succession is saying. The Roys, much like their real-world parallels, are a bunch of privileged nepo babies appropriating woke language (save for Roman, who's a walking HR nightmare) to feign struggle. But what do any of them know about struggle? They're all too incompetent to be CEO, yet believe they're entitled to it.

Closing Thoughts

While Shiv Roy makes for a fascinating character study who can't be summed up as a one-dimensional girlboss, she does nothing to paint the heroic millennial feminist infatuation as aspirational or ethical. Nothing unique about her suffering can be isolated from the experiences of the rest of the family, and she proves that representation in itself is insufficient to bring about a more ethical work environment. She proves to be bad at business optics, incredibly unhappy, and a nuisance to everyone around her. We declare the girlboss trope officially dead. 

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