Well, it was the unexpected TV death of the year, for starters. Just as Logan Roy – the media mogul who for three seasons had refused to let go of his billion-dollar company Waystar Royco – dominated his jostling adult children, Succession had always revolved around the vulpine snarl of the man who played Logan, Brian Cox. The big man had to be killed off so Succession could actually feature a succession, but without him, wouldn’t it be Lear without the king? Surely Cox would be kept on screen as long as possible?
Not so. The ruthless drama binned Cox after just three episodes of the fourth and final season. Hours of Coxless fare beckoned. Of course, showrunner Jesse Armstrong knew exactly what he was doing. He knew that while the cruel, profane, profoundly intimidating Logan had been a powerful avatar for an examination of how the richest 0.1% of corporate America act and think, his finest creations were those grownup kids: Kendall (Jeremy Strong), Roman (Kieran Culkin) and Shiv (Sarah Snook). Taking them out of Logan’s shadow meant Armstrong and his writers could slowly take them apart.
