Ayn Rand

There are few American shows more acclaimed and successful in the past decade than Succession, Jesse Armstrong’s peerless study of the corrupting influence of money and power, as illustrated through a Murdoch-esque media dynasty led by Brian Cox’s bull-like Logan Roy. The series was magnificent because it blended hysterical, unexpected black humor (step forward the excellent Matthew Macfadyen as Tom Wambsgans, who is hilarious virtually every moment he’s onscreen) with the serious thespian pyrotechnics of a starry cast including Cox, Kieran Culkin and the great Jeremy Strong, who, rumor has it, did not believe that he was making a comedy but a serious study of moral decay.

It was once the case that, if a planned film in a two- or three-movie series came out and wasn’t very good, the remaining films would be scrapped. The world has changed with the advent of streaming, and even though Zack Snyder’s Rebel Moon — Part One: A Child of Fire was greeted with critical contempt, its sequel Part Two: The Scargiver has slid onto Netflix, only to be met with, you guessed it, yet more dismay and horror.