What happens when a story loses a main character? 

Editor’s note: Beware spoilers in this article

LIKE Elvis, he conked out, bathetically, in a bathroom, only in Logan Roy’s case it was on a private plane, en route to haggle with a Swedish billionaire over the sale of his media conglomerate, Waystar Royco. He uttered no last-gasp curse, committed no climactic act of tyranny or deceit. He was just gone.

For three and a bit seasons of scatological insults and sociopathy, back-stabbing and joyless luxury, Logan (played by Brian Cox) was the dragon around whom the viperous cast of Succession slithered. Then Jesse Armstrong, its creator, bumped him off with seven episodes of the final series to go. Killing a kingpin early in this way is a risky narrative move, but sometimes, if storytellers pull it off, a profound one.