Funny I find this enjoyable too but have heard people complain that it’s too repetitive. But I think the continual return to their traumas is what makes this an epic tragedy
HBO always takes a very humanistic approach to all their shows and Succession didn’t fall short in that regard. Thank you for a quick but complete essay.
It's the same with the Sopranos (a great series). You know Anthony Soprano is a bad guy, but you can't help but rooting for him, somehow. It's the trademark of greatly written shows.
@@DSLRguideeah, but I think Anthony Soprano was written even better than any character in BB (still an excellent show). You can really see Tony trying to get in contact with his human side, while constantly falling into his own hypocrisy. With Breaking Bad the situation is similar, but I feel Walter White kinda just becomes evil. Jessie Pinkman is the closest to Tony I can think of. Also the Sopranos showed us so many uncomfortable aspects of the ofthen "glamed up" mob style. Hypocrisy, Lack of trust, squallor, infidelity, and I think it was the best depiction of depression I ever saw in a show. Harrowing yet not stereotyped. I especially loved the character of Anthony Junior, and Carmela which could have easily be slotted into the "wife of the mobster" stereotype, instead of actually being a very complex charater. No wonder that series changed television forever.
@@jippalippahe didn’t say “Walter white is better than tony soprano” he just said breaking bad does and accomplished the same thing the sopranos did with having a villain protagonist
@@jippalippaNah, BB was a better written show then the sopranos imo. Sopranos didn’t change anything about tv, it was good but it wasn’t great.
I havent been seeing your videos alot recently but whe i do It brings me back to when i was younger and thinking about making flims as a living. I remember working hard to buy a Nikon D5300, I paid 300 dollars for it which in hindsight was a massive deal. While i didnt end up doing it started a long journey to loving films and taking pictures. every now and then I will take my DSLR on a walk and snap a few photos. I am deeply thankful for your guides and advice and so many other youtubers. Photography was a place where I could escape, I could be a person without having to think of who I was. Again thank you so much for everything, you really pushed me to go to a better place.
Beautiful analysis Simon. This will go down as one of the greatest produced shows of all time for me. The series finale was a brilliant, tragic, shakespearean end to all these characters that made perfect sense, and I can’t wait to rewatch it through it a second time.
What was tragic about it? Dramatic, cathartic, yes, but what was the tragedy? It's born into rich people not getting what they want. Objectively, they end up pretty good. Yeah, Kendall is broken, but he is broken in the sense that a kid not getting his toy is broken.
@@marius4iasi The biggest tragedy is that their relationship with each other (Shiv, Kendall, Roman) is damaged/broken in the end. Kendall’s dishonesty about murdering the kid undid the bond they achieved with each other by the end of s3. They could’ve been such a great trio (helping each other through their emotional traumas) but it was all shattered by the end for the episode. Shiv ultimately becomes her mother, ending up as the wife of a CEO that could potentially be an unhappy life where her husband will represent the life she could’ve had. Kendall is left with no purpose, kids are separated from him, siblings are done with him, doesn’t have his company, no true friends, and he was so close in finally getting the chance to prove he could carry his father’s legacy (but we all know he wasn’t fit for it). Roman may be the only one that is truly better off because he is finally free from Waystar and the burden of having to “make his father proud.” But he is also still emotionally damaged with so many things unprocessed.
@@HeroesFanProductions They were not going to be a great trio, they are terrible people. So in this show where you get "not real" people killed by these rich guys with no consequences, or people getting fired by the hundreds with pride and cynicism, or where they hijack democracy and basically annoint presidents , the "biggest" tragedy is that the siblings don't get along?
@@HeroesFanProductionsoh no question succession is a top ten show all time for me🤷♂️what would be your top ten? Mine is 1. The wire (hands down the best show ever) 2. Game of thrones 3. Mr robot 4. Dark 5. The boys 6. Breaking bad 7. Succession 8. Stranger things 9. Sopranos 10. Mad men/Better call Saul
THANK YOU for the effort you put behind making the sponsor of a video so seamless. In a time where ads often break de rhythm of a video, I really appreciate details like this and the thought behind it. Congrats, Simon! Great analysis of such a great show.
They are humans and I felt bad for them, but in the end they are horrible ppl. No wonder the world is so broken, if the ppl who run it are so damage themselves.
I only stayed to watch how Greg develops, as he always manage to turn up from nowhere and just be at the right time at the right place where important decisions were made.
I think the closest analog to the Roy’s are the Targaryens from HOD. Damaged at birth by their legacy, they’re all stuck in an eternal cycle of rivalry, neediness, shifting family dynamics and victims of their own entitlement. Take out the dragons ( and incest) and they’re the Roy’s.
Nice one Simon and an interesting take. For ages now I've been fascinated by the apparent mistake of thinking that people at the top don't have problems. In many ways their problems are amplified and rivalries felt all the more cutting. It might be fun to be Kendal Roy for a day and hop on the back of a fancy motorbike in a repulsive padded suit jacket, but I sure as shit would hate to live that life. It is a massive shame that wealth is so hoarded and mismanaged to an epic scale.
Damn, I wanted more of that narration. Lol. That ending made me feel the same way as I did from last night's episode. Satisfied, but wanting more. Cheers.
Do you draw? Or are you only a film maker? I saw drawing in your motivation video about artists. By the way, where can I watch your films? Just curious.
Makes me think of Jerry Springer, whose show covered the poor and the wretched. Some people cheer, others cringe, but the idea was that there are universal truths in all of us. We want the same things - love, respect, and success -no matter our status.
Yeah, one of the main takeaways is that they want you to humanize rich people. Many people in the present operate under a mindset that rich people are somehow super smart or better than other people, which is just very obviously not true lol. Shining a spotlight on the disgusting underbelly of our world that some people fantasize about is productive enough, let alone the near perfect writing and acting
Kendall is probably is not alive after the end of the show. Even in the podcast Jeremy Strong says he thinks that was it for him. And they were going to make it more clear but decided to leave it for interpretation. But it's hinted all throughout the last season that it's either CEO or RIP for him, everyone ignores this but it honestly makes it truly tragic
I watched the series differently. With each episode, I was deciding who I hated most. I felt no empathy for any of them. All they wanted was power. They're all so lame. Not a creative bone in all their bodies combined.
I know being raised by narcissistic parents that the children who take on the narcissistic traits survive better, & the the ones who don't become mentally ill &/or dysfunctional. My sister who was rhe most successful career-wise is the most psychopathic, my sister who was the nice one developed schizoprenia. Being too nice seen as weakness & punished harshly. I relate to the Roy children a lot, when you're raised under duress your personality becomes about survival or you fall apart. Being raised by narcissists is like what's supposed to be your family home being under enemy occupation.
It’s probably because despite their wealth and status they’re ultimately still just people like you, me, and the rest of us, and people by their nature are able to empathize with others though it may be harder in some cases such as for those who like the Roy’s are morally bankrupt because of the wealth and status they’ve been raised in.
This is often the conversation when I try to sell Succession to anyone. They only see it as spoiled rich white kids begging for daddy’s approval. So I just tell them it’s basically game of thrones without the dragons with really complex characters competing for the throne. The wealth is just surface level observation.
Some family are implicitly taught to be untrusting. Only show I’ve seen that showed the flavor of fucked I grew up with and more so validates me in my boundaries 🙃
What the ending showed me was that rich is not always the best power but it does come with the most arrogance. Kendall from the start was always about trying to be a leader. Roman from the start was always about bragging at how rich he is, and Shiv was always about being a rich kid living off daddy sulking at why she doesn't also have a piece of the business pie. Just look at Tom, stood on by the Roy kids for ages to only come out on top in the end. Wealth and their last name was their biggest downfall, because it's all they cared about.
Also just to add it makes me feel sorry for them, Logan built his business up. The kids know nothing of real struggle because they have always been rich. They don't know any different.
In some ways we should all feel sorry for the super rich, the real super Rich will laugh at notions like spirituality and moral compass but I feel sorry for any person who is in such a bubble that they can’t see how anything other physical possessions matter. I may well be wrong but I believe the very rich are likely doomed. The characters in succession are fascinating but there is no possibility for real happiness for any of them
Subtext is a great tool in filmmaking because the audience WANT to work for their food. I think that's the main problem with M.Night Shyamalan's movies is that he fears the audience won't pick up on details so he feels he has to spoon feed us them.
well, i'm from turkey and right after the pretty bad elections for an anti-erdoganist person, i couldn't sympathize with people who earned billions of dollars even though they lost their companies and power. the show is the best i've ever seen so far but because of my fucked up situation i couldn't get into it though.
I got hooked on this show, but the last season and especially the last episode did not stick the landing for me. Logan is never shown to be as smart as the show makes him out to be. He doesn’t ever actually really do anything except call in favors to screw over his kids and say “go f*{! Yourself”. I really think Kendal should have died on the pier of a heart attack while his siblings were joking about killing him. Nothing in the show really amounted to anything. It makes sense that none of them would be put in charge. A clumsy ham fisted trump storyline. The character formation really works up to a point, but they just kept rehashing the same tune. Everyone just kept being who they are(loyal to only themselves). I think Barry is PEAK HBO.
How is there any drama in the show? "Oh no, daddy won't make me CEO and my buisness deals keep failing, I guess I'll retire with 50mil in my bank account instead of 500...woe is me"
youre exactly right! thats the entire point. none of them have any perspective. but also its not specifically the money they want since they already have loads of it, but the prestige and clout that comes with being in a high corporate position. With the way it ends, they'll be more than fine financially, but will be nobodies going forward, which is the exact opposite of what they wanted. The drama doesn't come from the material stakes as there are pretty much none (and the characters admit this) but moreso the push and pull of the personal relationships + dynamics that the characters maintain with each other.
How are you going to watch four seasons of that show and feel sorry for them lol It just explains why the world is the way it is with people like that trying to run it
I don’t get why so many people say succession is funny. I’ve almost never laugh while watching. The humor on the show seems like you need to be atleast 35 years old or not on social media to find funny. Some “friends” level humor
Because the writing is not juvenile. That’s why it’s funny. The higher class are so out of touch of reality that the lower and middle class find them hilarious.
Can’t make a Tomelette without breaking some Greggs
I appreciate how the show *begins* in the center of these cycles that each character is eternally stuck in. Very rewarding on rewatches.
Funny I find this enjoyable too but have heard people complain that it’s too repetitive. But I think the continual return to their traumas is what makes this an epic tragedy
I think it's realistic. @@00st307-m
HBO always takes a very humanistic approach to all their shows and Succession didn’t fall short in that regard. Thank you for a quick but complete essay.
I'm eternally greatful they didn't derail the quality of their content like Netflix did (with a few minor exceptions).
We can always trust hbo to make quality and great emotional human show
It's the same with the Sopranos (a great series).
You know Anthony Soprano is a bad guy, but you can't help but rooting for him, somehow.
It's the trademark of greatly written shows.
for sure, and Breaking Bad too
@@DSLRguideeah, but I think Anthony Soprano was written even better than any character in BB (still an excellent show).
You can really see Tony trying to get in contact with his human side, while constantly falling into his own hypocrisy.
With Breaking Bad the situation is similar, but I feel Walter White kinda just becomes evil.
Jessie Pinkman is the closest to Tony I can think of.
Also the Sopranos showed us so many uncomfortable aspects of the ofthen "glamed up" mob style.
Hypocrisy, Lack of trust, squallor, infidelity, and I think it was the best depiction of depression I ever saw in a show.
Harrowing yet not stereotyped.
I especially loved the character of Anthony Junior, and Carmela which could have easily be slotted into the "wife of the mobster" stereotype, instead of actually being a very complex charater.
No wonder that series changed television forever.
@@jippalippahe didn’t say “Walter white is better than tony soprano” he just said breaking bad does and accomplished the same thing the sopranos did with having a villain protagonist
@@jippalippaNah, BB was a better written show then the sopranos imo. Sopranos didn’t change anything about tv, it was good but it wasn’t great.
I havent been seeing your videos alot recently but whe i do It brings me back to when i was younger and thinking about making flims as a living. I remember working hard to buy a Nikon D5300, I paid 300 dollars for it which in hindsight was a massive deal.
While i didnt end up doing it started a long journey to loving films and taking pictures. every now and then I will take my DSLR on a walk and snap a few photos. I am deeply thankful for your guides and advice and so many other youtubers. Photography was a place where I could escape, I could be a person without having to think of who I was.
Again thank you so much for everything, you really pushed me to go to a better place.
this is so cool to hear, thanks for sharing :)
Beautiful analysis Simon. This will go down as one of the greatest produced shows of all time for me.
The series finale was a brilliant, tragic, shakespearean end to all these characters that made perfect sense, and I can’t wait to rewatch it through it a second time.
What was tragic about it? Dramatic, cathartic, yes, but what was the tragedy? It's born into rich people not getting what they want. Objectively, they end up pretty good. Yeah, Kendall is broken, but he is broken in the sense that a kid not getting his toy is broken.
@@marius4iasi The biggest tragedy is that their relationship with each other (Shiv, Kendall, Roman) is damaged/broken in the end. Kendall’s dishonesty about murdering the kid undid the bond they achieved with each other by the end of s3. They could’ve been such a great trio (helping each other through their emotional traumas) but it was all shattered by the end for the episode. Shiv ultimately becomes her mother, ending up as the wife of a CEO that could potentially be an unhappy life where her husband will represent the life she could’ve had. Kendall is left with no purpose, kids are separated from him, siblings are done with him, doesn’t have his company, no true friends, and he was so close in finally getting the chance to prove he could carry his father’s legacy (but we all know he wasn’t fit for it). Roman may be the only one that is truly better off because he is finally free from Waystar and the burden of having to “make his father proud.” But he is also still emotionally damaged with so many things unprocessed.
@@HeroesFanProductions They were not going to be a great trio, they are terrible people. So in this show where you get "not real" people killed by these rich guys with no consequences, or people getting fired by the hundreds with pride and cynicism, or where they hijack democracy and basically annoint presidents , the "biggest" tragedy is that the siblings don't get along?
@@HeroesFanProductionsoh no question succession is a top ten show all time for me🤷♂️what would be your top ten? Mine is
1. The wire (hands down the best show ever)
2. Game of thrones
3. Mr robot
4. Dark
5. The boys
6. Breaking bad
7. Succession
8. Stranger things
9. Sopranos
10. Mad men/Better call Saul
THANK YOU for the effort you put behind making the sponsor of a video so seamless. In a time where ads often break de rhythm of a video, I really appreciate details like this and the thought behind it. Congrats, Simon! Great analysis of such a great show.
They are humans and I felt bad for them, but in the end they are horrible ppl.
No wonder the world is so broken, if the ppl who run it are so damage themselves.
I only stayed to watch how Greg develops, as he always manage to turn up from nowhere and just be at the right time at the right place where important decisions were made.
I think the closest analog to the Roy’s are the Targaryens from HOD. Damaged at birth by their legacy, they’re all stuck in an eternal cycle of rivalry, neediness, shifting family dynamics and victims of their own entitlement. Take out the dragons ( and incest) and they’re the Roy’s.
Nice one Simon and an interesting take. For ages now I've been fascinated by the apparent mistake of thinking that people at the top don't have problems. In many ways their problems are amplified and rivalries felt all the more cutting. It might be fun to be Kendal Roy for a day and hop on the back of a fancy motorbike in a repulsive padded suit jacket, but I sure as shit would hate to live that life. It is a massive shame that wealth is so hoarded and mismanaged to an epic scale.
nah...they ARE monsters and not fictional...this type of characters are all around us
great essay. so concise, but thoughtful. well done!
Damn, I wanted more of that narration. Lol. That ending made me feel the same way as I did from last night's episode. Satisfied, but wanting more. Cheers.
Beautiful analysis. Thank you.
so good. such an excellent commentary
Do you draw? Or are you only a film maker? I saw drawing in your motivation video about artists.
By the way, where can I watch your films? Just curious.
Makes me think of Jerry Springer, whose show covered the poor and the wretched. Some people cheer, others cringe, but the idea was that there are universal truths in all of us. We want the same things - love, respect, and success -no matter our status.
Yeah, one of the main takeaways is that they want you to humanize rich people. Many people in the present operate under a mindset that rich people are somehow super smart or better than other people, which is just very obviously not true lol. Shining a spotlight on the disgusting underbelly of our world that some people fantasize about is productive enough, let alone the near perfect writing and acting
Kendall is probably is not alive after the end of the show. Even in the podcast Jeremy Strong says he thinks that was it for him. And they were going to make it more clear but decided to leave it for interpretation. But it's hinted all throughout the last season that it's either CEO or RIP for him, everyone ignores this but it honestly makes it truly tragic
I watched the series differently. With each episode, I was deciding who I hated most. I felt no empathy for any of them. All they wanted was power. They're all so lame. Not a creative bone in all their bodies combined.
Care is easy. What shows good writing to me is how frustrating some characters are.
I know being raised by narcissistic parents that the children who take on the narcissistic traits survive better, & the the ones who don't become mentally ill &/or dysfunctional. My sister who was rhe most successful career-wise is the most psychopathic, my sister who was the nice one developed schizoprenia. Being too nice seen as weakness & punished harshly. I relate to the Roy children a lot, when you're raised under duress your personality becomes about survival or you fall apart. Being raised by narcissists is like what's supposed to be your family home being under enemy occupation.
some ppl talk more shit about the siblings than their parents its so crazy to me like yeah "they are not serious people" quoted by their abusive dad
The only characters I liked by the end were Tom and Greg.
It’s probably because despite their wealth and status they’re ultimately still just people like you, me, and the rest of us, and people by their nature are able to empathize with others though it may be harder in some cases such as for those who like the Roy’s are morally bankrupt because of the wealth and status they’ve been raised in.
I always found pity for them but not don't know about pure care because they were horrible people. Towards others and themselves
I mean, I think we all need to recognize that everyone has problems. Money doesn't solve anything.
Money solves a lot of things. Just not everything.
This is often the conversation when I try to sell Succession to anyone. They only see it as spoiled rich white kids begging for daddy’s approval. So I just tell them it’s basically game of thrones without the dragons with really complex characters competing for the throne. The wealth is just surface level observation.
Especially after Logan died
The wealth and power are the main motivators in the show, nothing second level about it.
Some family are implicitly taught to be untrusting. Only show I’ve seen that showed the flavor of fucked I grew up with and more so validates me in my boundaries 🙃
They can feel sorry for themselves
What the ending showed me was that rich is not always the best power but it does come with the most arrogance. Kendall from the start was always about trying to be a leader. Roman from the start was always about bragging at how rich he is, and Shiv was always about being a rich kid living off daddy sulking at why she doesn't also have a piece of the business pie. Just look at Tom, stood on by the Roy kids for ages to only come out on top in the end. Wealth and their last name was their biggest downfall, because it's all they cared about.
Also just to add it makes me feel sorry for them, Logan built his business up. The kids know nothing of real struggle because they have always been rich. They don't know any different.
In some ways we should all feel sorry for the super rich, the real super Rich will laugh at notions like spirituality and moral compass but I feel sorry for any person who is in such a bubble that they can’t see how anything other physical possessions matter. I may well be wrong but I believe the very rich are likely doomed. The characters in succession are fascinating but there is no possibility for real happiness for any of them
it’s called subtext
Subtext is a great tool in filmmaking because the audience WANT to work for their food. I think that's the main problem with M.Night Shyamalan's movies is that he fears the audience won't pick up on details so he feels he has to spoon feed us them.
@@rufusgreenleaf2466 can’t really blame Shamalyn as atleast 80% of audiences are really dumb and do need to be spoon fed info
weird intro speech. so you're saying one should not care about a person if they are wealthy?
Didnt know you're a succession head lol. What do you think about the finale?
It's almost as if billionaires are fellow humans too...
Money changes everything, while at the same time changing nothing.
Before or after eating them?
which one would you eat?
@@yt_energy Kendall gets eaten first, he's definitely the worst
Connor is still the oldest son!😁
well, i'm from turkey and right after the pretty bad elections for an anti-erdoganist person, i couldn't sympathize with people who earned billions of dollars even though they lost their companies and power. the show is the best i've ever seen so far but because of my fucked up situation i couldn't get into it though.
I got hooked on this show, but the last season and especially the last episode did not stick the landing for me. Logan is never shown to be as smart as the show makes him out to be. He doesn’t ever actually really do anything except call in favors to screw over his kids and say “go f*{! Yourself”. I really think Kendal should have died on the pier of a heart attack
while his siblings were joking about killing him. Nothing in the show really amounted to anything. It makes sense that none of them would be put in charge. A clumsy ham fisted trump storyline. The character formation really works up to a point, but they just kept rehashing the same tune. Everyone just kept being who they are(loyal to only themselves).
I think Barry is PEAK HBO.
How is there any drama in the show? "Oh no, daddy won't make me CEO and my buisness deals keep failing, I guess I'll retire with 50mil in my bank account instead of 500...woe is me"
I’m certain you’re still in middle school. Come back and watch it when you’re more matured
@@Keji839 so you're saying I'm right on the money and you don't like it?
A sense of purpose and reciprocated love is more important for these characters than what they see on their bank account
youre exactly right! thats the entire point. none of them have any perspective. but also its not specifically the money they want since they already have loads of it, but the prestige and clout that comes with being in a high corporate position. With the way it ends, they'll be more than fine financially, but will be nobodies going forward, which is the exact opposite of what they wanted. The drama doesn't come from the material stakes as there are pretty much none (and the characters admit this) but moreso the push and pull of the personal relationships + dynamics that the characters maintain with each other.
2 billion
💀
How are you going to watch four seasons of that show and feel sorry for them lol It just explains why the world is the way it is with people like that trying to run it
True, but also people like that, created entire civilizations.
These are what are left of those people. They’re not people like Logan, they’re Logan’s kids. Huge difference but I get what you mean.
Your cadence is super distracting!
I don’t get why so many people say succession is funny. I’ve almost never laugh while watching. The humor on the show seems like you need to be atleast 35 years old or not on social media to find funny. Some “friends” level humor
I suspect people say it's funny because it makes them laugh.
Because the writing is not juvenile. That’s why it’s funny. The higher class are so out of touch of reality that the lower and middle class find them hilarious.
im a teenager who spend most of my time on social media, and i find the show funny. each to their own i guess