If there’s one series that’s doing it “the old-fashioned way” -that is, without the need for big special effects, dystopias or action, and focusing on spectacular scripts and performances- it’s Succession. HBO Max‘s fiction that follows a family that inherits a multinational company is a hit all over the world, and no wonder.
With three seasons behind it, Jesse Armstrong’s production has managed to win over audiences through the repeated Eat The Rich trope. Now, Season 4 is about to premiere, arriving next March 27, so it seems like an ideal time to look back on the series’ best moments.
Here we leave you with the 10 best episodes -in our opinion, no offense to anyone- of Succession. Knowing that the fourth season will be the last, we think it’s a great idea to recover them before seeing how it will end.
3×07 – Too Much Birthday
Turning a rich people’s birthday party into something depressing and sad is no easy task, and even less so if it is also integrated into a hilarious and full of rhythm episode. However, HBO Max succeeds with this episode in which we see a taciturn Kendall Roy (Jeremy Strong) with a charisma that catches anyone.
2×08 – Dundee
There is no doubt that the last chapters of each season of Succession are the best; the icing on an already delicious cake. But we mustn’t lose sight of how we get to those final moments, and Dundee is the best episode to prove it. The penultimate episode of the second season has a spectacular and funny number that reflects very well what can happen when you give freedom to the screenwriters of this series.
:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/65352869/4d5f2cf34a7c115b3b3e725389af53f2f916be741d3d710239b0f233973fabc9008bdb97de7b76c34a31b178bbc857d6.0.jpg)
3×05 – The Retired Janitors of Idaho
The middle of the third season is fascinating for how it turns one of the most anticipated moments of the series, the meeting with the shareholders, into a place of tension in which you don’t know what might happen next. This episode marks a before and after in the season, and makes it clear that nothing is what it seems in Succession.
2×04 – Safe Room
This episode may go unnoticed by most, but it hides the secret behind the mastery of the series. In this episode we see many subplots that bring us closer to characters like Kieran Culkin and Gerri Kellman – with their unresolved sexual attraction – and we have plenty of fun with Tom and Greg locked in a back room.
1×06 – Which Side Are You On?
You only have to take a look at the list to realize that the first season is the weakest of all. The series struggled to find the right tone and rhythm, and then it hit its stride in a very good second season and a memorable third one. However, it did leave us some very interesting gems, like this episode in which Kendall desperately tries to oust his father as CEO from his cell phone.
3×08 – Chiantishire
The penultimate episode of the third season was a master class on how to create a climactic finale. The Roy’s are in Italy for most of the episode, but the finale features two key scenes (which we won’t reveal here, but if you’ve seen it you’ll remember well) that make this episode unforgettable. It also features a terrifying cliffhanger at the end of the credits: Kendall floats in the pool, and the audience doesn’t know if she committed suicide or not before the climax. The tension was palpable in the atmosphere.
2×03 – Hunting
As if it were an episode of Game of Thrones, the series takes Shakespearean references to reach one of its most memorable moments. A coexistence meeting to decide whether or not to acquire Pierce’s company ends in a macabre game during dinner and a surprising metaphor of the boar to the ground as the protagonist. Memorable.
1×10 – Nobody is ever missing
With a spectacular mastery of the cliffhanger, Succession proved early on that endings are its thing. At the conclusion of the first season, it puts the main characters in unique predicaments that will follow them for the rest of the episodes. Special mention to Kendall, who is once again at the center of the hurricane.
2×10 – This Is Not for Tears
The second season finale satirizes with the ways in which large corporations can get rid of any of their employees in the blink of an eye. Logan decides that Kendall should take responsibility for the sexual misconduct allegations against the Roy’s, but Kendall stabs her father in the back in the final scene by blaming Logan for everything that happened. This chapter marks a before and after in the fiction, which as we know reached its peak in the third season.
3×09 – All the Bells Say
The latest episode to be released so far of Succession is also the best. Kendall finally admits her dark secret, the Roy’s finally unite, and Logan wins the war against his sons for the umpteenth time. It’s certainly a memorable finale, but one that also leaves the doors open for a fourth season that may yet be even better. We’ll be watching to see what happens.
