The acclaimed Emmy-winning HBO drama “Succession” is coming to an end. The show’s creator and showrunner Jesse Armstrong told The New Yorker that the show’s fourth season would be its last, explaining that he wanted viewers to have a heads up before the season premiere that the series would be concluding.
“I feel a responsibility to the viewership, and I personally wouldn’t like the feeling of, ‘Oh, that’s it, guys. That was the end,'” Armstrong told the magazine in an interview published Thursday.
Another reason? It’s not reasonable for the cast and crew, in their interviews, to have to conceal that the show is ending, Armstrong said.
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“It’s pretty definitively the end, so then it just might be uncomfortable having to sort of dissemble like a politician for ages about it,” Armstrong said.
Prior to writing the fourth season, Armstrong said he and the writers weighed the pros and cons of keeping the show going, or ending it. And while his preference was to go with the latter, Armstrong said he never completely closed the door on continuing the show until much later into season four’s development.
“I like operating the writing room by coming in with a sort of proposition, and then being genuinely open to alternative ways of going,” he explained. “And the decision to end solidified through the writing and even when we started filming: I said to the cast, ‘I’m not a hundred percent sure, but I think this is it.'”
Armstrong added that it was hard to completely close the door to future seasons because he wanted “to stop being sad about stopping doing something which I really, really enjoyed.” And while he eventually decided to end the show, he still feels “deeply conflicted.”
“It’s been a difficult decision, because the collaborations—with the cast, with my fellow-writers, with Nick Britell and Mark Mylod and the other directors— they’ve just been so good,” Armstrong said. “I have the circus-has-left-town feeling that everyone gets who works on a production that’s good, and this one particularly so.”
“Succession” tells the story of the Roy family, owners of a mega media conglomerate, all fighting for control of the company as the patriarch, played by Brian Cox, faces health issues.
The new season will premiere March 26. “Succession” has so far received a staggering 48 Emmy nominations, with 13 wins.
