NOTHING SUCCEEDS LIKE "SUCCESSION"

Prelude to the Third Season

Succession is like a wart -- it grows on you. Entertained at first by the pu-pu platter of ambivalent characters infused with ambition and apathy, confidence and insecurity, intelligence and stupidity, dipped in quippy lines, pop-culture references and carefully crafted awkward dialog, I eventually became overwhelmed by the implausibility of any of the three caricatures being taken seriously as contenders for succession. Cocooned in their sharply drawn personas, none of the heirs demonstrates the slightest qualities of leadership required to run a corporate empire. Kendall, brooding and battered awaits daddy Logan’s orders; Shiv, ruthless and rash thinks only of how to stick it to rivals; Roman, insufferable cynic, does little more than shoot from the quip. So by the end of the first season, I reached for the silver nitrate.

The second season slipped by unobserved until headlines trumpeted the approaching third season. Very Serious People were taking the show very seriously. A quick Google search revealed an amazing slew of award nominations and wins. What was I missing? Resolved to give the series another try, I found myself binging on the second season, along the way garnering renewed appreciation for the relentless intelligence and dramatic tension driving the show.

Succession toes the fine line along the razor’s edge, like Brando’s snail in Apocalypse Now. Committed to keeping viewers in a permanent state of cognitive dissonance, the show tests for first-rate minds in the vast wasteland. Conflict, contrast, dilemma, and tasty ambiguity suffuse the atmosphere in the writers’ room. I am both fascinated and repulsed as the show caroms between reality and satire, tragedy and comedy, De Niro and Durante, relevance and fantasy, King Lear and Much Ado About Nothing, constantly probing the line between poor taste and high art.

In his commentary after the “Dundee” episode, showrunner Jesse Armstrong makes the point, describing Kendall’s turn as the billionaire rapper, “the sort of toe-curling thing you might see on Instagram. . . pretty embarrassing. It’s also kinda’ good,” he adds, with a mischievous smile.

The “Panic Room” episode introduces the idea of suicide, comically, of course, in a Keystone Cops evacuation panic after an employee fires a shot, only later revealed as fatal to himself. The camera then follows a despondent Kendall to the rooftop of the company’s headquarters. He slowly approaches the edge of the building and stares into the abyss, then leans his forehead to the glass wall separating the building from the void below to the majestic accompaniment of orchestral strings executing a circle of minor fifths. The view from the side reveals the two opposed symmetrical images of Kendall’s head pressed together, one full of color, the other a grey reflection. Cut!

The third season begins in a week, warts and all.