I am very sorry, but if you still have not watched Succession on HBO, I clearly have a suggestion for you. And no, what you are reading is not part of a commercial or advertising, it is my honest opinion about an impressive audiovisual work like this series. Adam McKay, director of The Big Short, and Jesse Armstrong, writer, screenwriter and director on multiple episodes, are some of the minds that made possible this beauty of four solid, impressive and at times sublime seasons.
Succession is a title that immediately gives meaning to the premise of the series. It is not too complicated or pretentious to understand what all the threads within the plot are about. A media owner, with businesses in hospitality and entertainment, a magnate in the style of Warren Buffett or Carlos Slim, is in his retirement years, close to 80, and in the line of succession are his four children. Each of them with a different worldview, a different idea of how the company should be run, and above all, with a relentless hunger for power and absolute control.
Although Succession handles the resource of dark or black comedy properly and masterfully, with camera movements in the style of The Office, it is not at all a show of family laughs like a sitcom. In fact, it balances family drama, political thriller, and a kind of comedy reminiscent of Stanley Kubrick. Performances by actors like Brian Cox or Kieran Culkin are dazzling. Their characters are not exactly easy to digest or absorb. And not to mention the tone of the series. In an era of family friendly and mainstream content in Hollywood, Succession dares to be original and, at times, brutally raw.
However, the plots to gain power, the manipulation of Logan Roy, head of the Waystar Royco empire and founder of the entire monopoly, make what you witness on screen at times unpleasant, even abhorrent, and deeply frustrating. I personally admire the natural way Armstrong, its creator and main visionary, has portrayed the world in which billionaires live. If we already feel some rejection when a celebrity becomes detached from reality, in Succession you will feel something far more intense than that.
Politics, entertainment, controversy, corporate dominance, the pursuit of power at any cost, and a rotten family story, without values, or rather full of anti values, are some of the elements we see in this series. There is absolutely nothing I can criticize about it. With Breaking Bad, its creators made characters like Skyler White and Tuco Salamanca iconic and unforgettable. With Succession, you will never forget the following names if you have watched the series: Logan, Roman and Kendall Roy, as well as Shiv and Greg Roy. The opulence, the occasional indifference, and the cynicism we are forced to endure while witnessing how the threads that control the world are connected is truly striking. Oops, I almost forgot, if you made it this far, and even though asking for more of your time might be too much, watch Succession, you will thank me for it.
