Succession Season 3 Finale Was The Show's Highest Viewed Yet
"Succession" season 3 came to an emotionally volatile conclusion with its ninth and final episode, "All the Bells Say," this past Sunday. The bitingly satirical HBO dramedy series made leaps and bounds with its viewership gains between its second and third seasons, thanks in no small part to viewers catching up on the painfully funny (and, just as often, merely painful) dysfunctional antics of the Roy family after Covid prolonged the break between installments. That trend continued with the season 3 finale, which drew the show's biggest crowd yet.
As reported by Variety, "All the Bells Say" attracted 1.7 million viewers across HBO's various platforms in same-day viewing, besting the previous series high (1.4 million) set by the "Succession" Season 3 premiere, "Secession." Those numbers also mark a 47% increase on the season 2 finale, with season 3 averaging just over 500,000 viewers in same-day viewings and 6.1 million viewers when including delayed viewings versus 5 million for "Succession" season 2.
However, it's worth pointing out the latter number includes those who watched "Succession" season 2 during the extended two-year wait for the series' return. Compared to season 2's initial viewership in 2019, season 3 was up a hefty 56%, which just goes to show how many people caught Roy fever over the last 24 months.
Warning: to get into the expectations for "Succession" season 4, we're going to have to talk SPOILERS for "All the Bells Say." If you've yet to watch the episode, now's the time to bail!
Expect the Unexpected in Season 4
The "Succession" season 3 finale was, in many ways, the Red Wedding to its "Game of Thrones" — an episode that flipped the show's premise on its head by having Logan (Brian Cox) sell Waystar to GoJo, making Lukas Matsson (Alexander Skarsgård) the new CEO, and leaving his kids out in the cold. The Roy patriarch's latest act of treachery and emotional abuse stung all the more coming on the heels of Kendall (Jeremy Strong), Shiv (Sarah Snook), and Roman (Kieran Culkin) teaming up after a gut-wrenching scene in which Kendall, at long last, broke down and confessed his culpability in the death of the waiter at Shiv's wedding in season 1.
If all that wasn't enough, "All the Bells Say" also saw Tom (Matthew Macfadyen) finally make his big move by tipping off Logan about his children's plan to use their veto power to stop him, as a shell-shocked Shiv realized in the episode's final moments. Where on Earth will "Succession" go from here? For now, all showrunner Jesse Armstrong will confirm is that the game has truly changed, telling Variety:
"I'd be bulls***ting you if I told you I knew exactly what was going to happen. We'll follow the truth, and the business of that. I think succession in one form or another is very much still on the table."
It's going to be a long wait for season 4.