Succession: Ranking the members of the Roy Family

HBO’s Succession may feature a bunch of cut-throat characters, but some are less hateful than others. Let’s rank them from nicest to meanest!

Succession returns to HBO this Sunday so we can spend more time with the cutthroat Roy family and their inner circle. The dark comedy stood out last year by exploring the complex dynamics between the hard-to-please patriarch and his kids desperate to prove their own worth. Of course, in the business world, not everyone can play nice and we rank the characters based on their overall goodness.

1. Greg Hirsch

Wonderfully played by Nicholas Braun, Greg Hirsch is the grandnephew of Logan Roy (Brian Cox), grandson of Ewan Roy (James Cromwell) and awkward protégé of the borderline sinister Tom Wamsgans (Matthew Macfadyen). Despite hanging around these wretched, conniving billionaires, Greg manages at least an air of incorruptibility. In fact, when Tom convinces him to swallow endangered songbirds (called ortolans) as a dinner time treat, he is noticeably disgusted by the process.

While he’s capable of blackmailing Tom about sex scandals on a cruise line, it seems like he’s only just defending himself. Plus, let’s face it, it was foolhardy for Tom to put Greg in charge of the cover-up. Greg may be relatively innocent, but power wrangling itself has a way of corrupting someone, and his prior innocence may only inform him on his way up. Does only scum rise to the top? We’ll find out more in season 2 of Succession!