On Sunday night, the hit drama/dark comedy Succession returned to the small screen for its brilliant, feel-bad finale. Throughout its five-year, 39-episode run, the series has woven together a compelling tale of power, family, and media manipulation that left no viewer unscathed. Delivered through the lens of the fictional Roy family, owners of the global media and hospitality conglomerate Waystar Royco, the show chronicles their ruthless power struggles, exposing the underbelly of their own media world. While the show’s characters and plot are fabulistic, the writers clearly drew inspiration from Rupert Murdoch and his family, resulting in an unflattering portrait of right-wing media and specifically the show’s Fox News equivalent, ATN. In part for this reason, the show has become the darling of the mainstream press.
However, despite its inherent trolling, we shouldn’t dismiss Succession as an oversimplified critique of conservatism in America. There was much more to this show. Take the story of Kendall Roy, the once-favorite son of family patriarch Logan Roy, a character whose journey is marked by ambition, hubris, and a tragic quest for validation. Kendall’s story — his struggle for power, eventual downfall, and embrace of an identity he could never truly claim — transcends the political. It is a Shakespearean tragedy of a man striving for a vision of success that will always elude him.
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