Succession is Secretly the Best Show on Television
Succession is the best hour-long drama on television right now, and may be the best show overall.
If you cancelled your HBO subscription after Game of Thrones wrapped, then you missed a summer dominated by the channel’s Euphoria and Big Little Lies and now Succession is carrying us well into fall.
In just its second season, Succession hasn’t missed a beat from its first. Season one was a rare season of television that gets better as the story goes along, episode by episode. That’s in part because of two things:
The first is that these are terrible people. The characters are great and the Roys might end up in the pantheon of all-time great TV show families, but their moral integrity is almost non-existent. And it’s hard to grow an emotional attachment to characters that are mostly devoid of likable personality traits.
These aren’t people you’d consider your friends and you find it hard to root for any individual not named Cousin Greg. As you go along watching each episode, though, Succession does a sneaky thing in that it conditions you to focus entirely on the plot and not worry about a “favorite.”
Succession is a show about money and power, yes, but it doesn’t put a spotlight on the glamour of being uber rich and famous or how “hard” these people may work to be rich. It puts a spotlight on the dark underbelly of the incredibly wealthy once they have power. There’s no real backstory for how Logan Roy and family obtained their immense wealth. You jump right in to a story of nepotism, political influence, and casual helicopter rides.
Second is the unleashing of the aforementioned patriarch of the Roy family, Logan, played by the incomparable Brian Cox. Throughout season one — slight spoilers here — Logan is a sickly, old man who plays a King Lear-like game of, ehem, succession. When/if he dies, someone has to run Waystar Royco — the multi-billion dollar conglomerate of “hate speech and rollercoasters.”
But Logan doesn’t die. He (may have?) beaten the illness and goes on a heater to tell everyone from his sons to his untimely demise to “fuck off.”
A viewer feels these elements in the second season. Kendall Roy is grappling with demons that make you question whether you should pity him or despise him. Siobhan “Shiv” Roy is both inspiring and heartless. Connor is Connor. Roman Roy fires off hilarious quips with breakneck speed, but seems to hate anything and everyone. And Logan is the worst of them all.
The Roy-adjacent characters aren’t the angels on the other shoulder, either. Tom Wamsgans is a humble, Midwestern guy, but essentially a conniving fool. And you’re not quite sure if the slow corruption of Cousin Greg will be a detriment or if he’ll turn out to be the true protagonist. Hell, even Gerri’s trying to get that leverage any way she can and is cunning enough to not get her hands too dirty in anything.
If there’s a negative about the show, it’s that it’s very white, but there’s a Tarantino-like quality of depicting exactly what these types of people should look and act like.
Two seasons in and so far, there is no protagonist. No one here is traditionally “good.” There’s no pure-of-heart Jon Snow. No Eleanor Shellstrop who’s a terrible human being, but tries to be better. No hard-on-the-outside-soft-on-the-inside Renata Klein.
There’s no one here trying to be better. Yet, the show still enraptures you through smart story telling, incredible dialogue, and so many what-the-fuck-Boar-on-the-Floor moments that you can’t possibly look away.
The ruthless nature of the show, emphasized by Logan Roy, isn’t unlike other genres. Breaking Bad and The Sopranos are similarly merciless, and like many HBO shows — they’re not afraid to “go there.” And in a world with hundreds of scripted television shows — both streaming and network television — pushing the boundaries of traditional storytelling is how you make your mark.
Succession is doing just that and with a theme song that absolutely slaps.
