The Press and Journal (Inverness, Highlands, and Islands)
Armstrong pulls off touch of magic with Succession
COMEDY OR TRAGEDY
There’s some debate about whether Succession should be treated as a comedy or a drama, but after watching the finale, it’s probably most accurate to call it a tragedy.
By the end of the nearperfect closing episode, the power-hungry Roy siblings have lost their presumed birthright and the successor to the family business is none other than Tom, who seems to have got the job by convincing new Waystar owner Lukas Matsson that he’s the best “pain sponge”.
The magic trick that creator Jesse Armstrong pulled off was to take these reprehensible characters and make us care about them.
PERIOD DRAMA
As the creator of some of modern television’s greatest dramas, any new work by Shane Meadows is essential viewing.
After charting the 1980s in the This Is England trilogy and then historic child abuse in The Virtues, Meadows has made the first proper period drama of his career.
What’s fascinating about The Gallows Pole: This Valley Will Rise (BBC2) is how incredibly modern it all feels.
As with his previous productions, much of it is actors improvising – including regulars Michael Socha and Thomas Turgoose.
That means it looks and sounds like no period drama you’ve seen before.
OFF THE BOIL
Barry, on Sky Comedy – aired its last-ever episode this week and the results were less than satisfying.
At its best, the crime comedy starring Bill Hader as a hitman with a conscience was as tightly plotted and dense as Breaking Bad, but it went off the boil in the fourth and final season.
The difference with Breaking Bad was that when the creators wrote themselves into a corner, they always had a clever solution to keep the plot moving. In the final season of Barry, the plot contrivances became too much and I lost interest.
I’m still glad I watched – seasons one to three are classics – but they just couldn’t stick the landing.