The best show on television is called Succession.
By that simple definition of the word, viewers have known for three more seasons that Logan Roy – the patriarch of a polarizing, wealthy family who owns one of the world’s largest conglomerates – is likely to die.
But – SPOILER WARNING! – for that to happen in the third episode of this final season?
For Logan to just die of a heart attack on a private jet, away from his children, without viewers actually seeing his body?
No one could have seen this coming.
Including the actor who played Logan since the premiere of the series.
“He called me, and he said, ‘Logan is going to die,’” Cox said in an interview with the New York Times about receiving the news from the show’s creator, Jesse Armstrong.
“I thought, ‘Oh, that’s okay.’ I thought he was going to die around Episode 7 or 8, but Episode 3, I thought… ‘Well, it’s too early.’”
Succession now has seven episodes to depict how Logan’s four children have responded to his death—and who, if anything, will become his actual successors.
Armstrong’s decision to kill Roy early in the final season was seen as “brave” by Cox, who said the creators understood how to “leave a party when it’s high, not when it’s down”.
The battle for control of Waystar Royco will dominate the ending of this drama.
Meanwhile, Cox said he legitimately did not know who would emerge victorious.
“I think next week will be difficult for a lot of the audience because they will miss Logan.
“And I don’t think that’s a bad thing — I think that’s actually a pretty good thing,” Cox told The New York Times.
“The audience may be angry; they might miss Logan and be like, ‘Oh, what did you do when you killed one of the most interesting characters?’
“But that’s fine with me,” he added, revealing that he has plans to make his directorial debut and return to the stage to star in “A Journey All Day Into Night” in London.
Cox has been in the world of acting for decades.
He ends this interview by putting his portrayal of Logan into perspective.
“Someone like Logan, he has become a cultural icon. But it’s a bit of a matter of which way you go: I’ve been an actor for 60 odd years. I’ve done a lot of great work.
“[Succession] is a very special job that I have done, and it gives me so much, and I am eternally grateful for that. But it just stops on the way. That’s not the goal, as far as I’m concerned.