If, like me, you’ve had a Succession-sized hole in your life since the HBO series concluded in 2023, then I come bearing good news. The streamer has just released an elegant, intoxicating eight-episode drama with all the hallmarks of the award-winning show: corporate espionage, billions of dollars on the line and, of course, well-dressed rich people strutting aggressively into glass boardrooms.
HBO’s War follows the high-profile, multi-million-dollar divorce between movie star Carla Duval (Sienna Miller) and tech magnate Morgan Henderson (Dominic West), and the two London-based law firms representing them, who will do just about anything to win the case. It has a stacked cast: alongside Miller and West, there’s Calendar Girls star Celia Imrie, Ted Lasso’s Nick Mohammed, The Brutalist actor Emma Laird and British drama stalwart Nina Sosanya. The ensemble alone will make this show an intergenerational hit beloved around the dinner table. And like Succession, it will surely get everyone talking at the water cooler during a Monday breaktime. Consider this my hard sell for making War your next binge-watch.
Here’s what you need to know about the plot: At the beginning, we learn that Carla and Morgan have been married for 10 years, but the distance between them has only made room for hatred. Carla is a well-known actor, though she’s struggling for those A-list roles (we meet her in the series promoting a middling war movie she doesn’t exactly seem enthused about). Morgan, meanwhile, is at the height of his career. He is giving aspirational keynote speeches about his ethical social media platform Zephyr, which has just received skyrocketing valuations. Without giving too much away, Carla makes the first move that breaks the stalemate by honeytrapping her husband to prove that he’s been unfaithful, and bringing hard evidence to her lawyers. Morgan enlists Cathcarts, a legacy firm with serious wood-paneled walls, while Carla signs up with Taylor & Byrne, a new-generation firm run by a husband-and-wife team (played by Phoebe Fox and James McArdle) with glassy interiors and trendy graduates.
This kickstarts a string of ugly, delicious and totally below-board legal proceedings, where the two firms go blow-for-blow, like a tense game of chess. A meticulous amount of world-building happens in the first episode, but very subtly. As a viewer, you may spend only around five minutes with each character separately to begin with, before the plot crescendos into a delightful web of interconnected characters and storylines.
It’s a big statement to compare any TV show to Succession. Just last week, the behemoth program placed fourth on The New York Times’ best TV shows of the 21st century, behind Mad Men, The Wire and the no.1 series Breaking Bad, respectively. Succession is undeniably historic TV; It won 19 Primetime Emmys and nine Golden Globes during its four-season run. I’m not saying that War will have the same meteoric success, but this show is still worth locking in for that weekly HBO dopamine, just like the good old days of Succession Sundays (I miss them dearly).
War, created by George Kay (the man behind Hijack and Lupin), is exceptionally good at establishing juicy lore behind each character in a short amount of time. The big-time lawyers handling Carla's side of the divorce have a subplot of their own. The married couple is hoping that by winning the Carla-Morgan divorce, their firm will rise to Cathcarts-level prestige. But behind the scenes, the pair are trying for their first baby, and it appears that this case will either make or break their careers (and their marriage).
And then there’s War’s underdog character: the cockney junior lawyer Johnny Warren (played by Archie Renaux), who is back in London after a mysterious career flop in New York. He occupies a similar role in this series to Succession’s Cousin Greg, though maybe not as unintentionally funny as Nicholas Braun’s character. Like Greg, Johnny wants to be accepted so badly in his career and by his rich girlfriend, even if it means breaking the rules. Renaux’s character also has hues of Harry Lawtey’s Robert Spearing, the state-school-educated boy trying to make it in a posh person’s world in the HBO banking drama Industry. Renaux gives an incredible breakout performance — he’s one to watch.
Beyond these excellent performances, War will also intrigue you if you’ve wondered what really happens during the messy, high-profile divorces that dominate tabloid headlines. There’s one scene that is eerily similar to the way Olivia Wilde was presented with custody papers from Jason Sudeikis while on the stage at CinemaCon in 2022, when Carla is served by Morgan’s lawyers on the red carpet. While the script isn’t based on any celebrity divorce in particular, it surely gives insight into what’s at stake: the prenups longer than War and Peace, the eye-popping settlement sums and just how ugly things can get.
And, if there’s anything else to take away from War, it’s that this show is enough to put unmarried people off tying the knot altogether. Because, in War, divorce is a dirty, dirty game.
War is streaming on HBO in the U.S. and Sky in the U.K.
