While it’s a no-brainer that HBO’s hottest (and right now best) show is returning, the question is, after a note perfect season three finale, should it?
Many faithful viewers of HBO’s blockbuster series Succession are still reeling the day after Season Three’s epic finale where we see embattled patriarch Logan Roy (Brian Cox) reduce his children to figurative ashes during an ill-fated coup attempt that left them on the outside looking in on the potential sale of family mega-business Waystar Royco.
Now that the smoke has cleared, the question that remains is whether or not the Season Three finale shouldn’t also serve as Series Finale as well. Of course, this is a question that already has an answer as HBO confirmed that Succession is indeed returning for a fourth season in 2022. The network made the announcement in October 2021, prior to the start of the show’s third season.
What brought this season’s proceedings to a close with a megaton thud was the revelation in the scene’s final moments that felt almost Shakespearean in its execution, showing the perceived betrayal by Tom Wambsgans (Matthew Macfadyen) that closed the door on the wedding day coup that can best be described as a reverse-reverse Red Wedding.
As the Roy children–minus actual eldest sibling Connor (Alan Ruck), who ended up having a “good” day–lay broken before all-father Logan, Tom saunters in effortlessly after receiving a pat on the shoulder, one generally reserved for co-conspirators, from Logan himself in full view of his defeated offspring. The look on Shiv Roy’s (Sarah Snook) face as she processes the true horror of betrayal practically says it all.
When we met Tom in Season One of Succession, he was, to put it mildly, a bit of a joke that the powerful Roy family never took too seriously. In an early episode of the series, Logan told his only daughter that her relationship with Tom was transparent at best, saying: “You’re marrying a man fathoms beneath you….because you don’t want to risk being betrayed.”
There’s a mildly bittersweet sense that after last night, it could be only downhill skiing from here, and that would be rather disappointing for a dramedy that is unlike anything else on TV today
That Logan was ultimately wrong ended up being to his benefit, as Tom’s betrayal looks to be the only thing that saved him from his own Ides of (insert month) at the hands of his children.
For his part, betraying his wife is clearly a move to solidify his own stake in the family as a whole, seemingly driven by the flippant nature of his wife’s attitude about Tom’s impending (but averted) sacrificial imprisonment. For Tom, it wasn’t enough to not end up in prison, he also wanted a seat at the table in a way that his marriage to Shiv simply hasn’t provided to this point.
It’s with that knowledge that this scene, from the finale, brings with it an even heavier weight, as Tom goes, as he usually does, to the one person he sees as beneath him, Roy family maladroit Greg Hirsch (Nicholas Braun), to convince him to do his bidding, something that unlike getting anything from his wife, is rather easy to do, even while grievously insulting him by calling him “Sporus,” an allusion to the eunuch lover of Roman emperor Nero.
Like many bullies, Tom’s treatment of those he perceives to be beneath him is reflective of the way he feels treated by others; something that presents him throughout the series at various highs and lows. By taking a rare “good” moment from Greg, and subsequently asking him to throw that away to follow him an epic quest without so much as a how or why is Tom’s way of working out what’s been done to him since the day he fully entered the family.
If, as viewers, we look at Tom’s journey from midwestern mediocrity to an upwardly mobile Machiavelli, as a through line of sorts, then the close of Season Three represents the close of a story arc that would serve the story best as an overall finale.
The difference between a good series and a legendary one is whether or not it finishes as strongly as it starts. Without question, by the time the screen goes black on this season of Succession, there is no question we are at the high water mark with this series. By ending the show on a betrayal no one saw coming, viewers are given a story to chew on that would be the topic of conversation for years to come.
It’s almost certain that Season Four will bring with it its own set of highs and lows, and for all we know, that season finale could be even better, throwing the show into a sort of rarified air that few programs get to enjoy. But we’re not there yet. Part of running any good show or telling any good story is to know when to bring things to a close.
While I’m sure the writers and showrunners of Succession absolutely know where they want to go, there’s a mildly bittersweet sense that after last night, it could be only downhill skiing from here, and that would be rather disappointing for a dramedy that is unlike anything else on TV today.
Of course watching Season Four is already a given, how could it not be? But one can only hope that subsequent seasons of Succession only enhances the overall experience of one of the best TV series we’ve seen in some time, and not treat audiences with an unwanted, if not mildly fitting, “fuck off!”
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Hashim R. Hathaway (Shimbo) is the host of the Never Daunted Radio Network, and deadbeat father to NeverDaunted.Net. You can’t reach him on Twitter anymore, so maybe Parler? (Dear God, no.)