"Dad TV Fall is here": From Billions to Succession to Yellowstone

The Ringer

Billions, which resumes Season 5 on Sunday, "falls into the category of Dad Wish Fulfillment," says Andrew Gruttadaro. "It provides an avatar for dads through which they can fantasize about eating disgustingly decadent food without worrying about the price; about wearing vests with impunity; about having f*ck-you money and actually being able to tell people 'f*ck you'; about how boss it’d be to show up to your kid’s Little League game in a helicopter. There are, of course, elements of Billions that a dad might find unseemly—he’ll always pretend like the BDSM stuff isn’t a part of the show when you’re talking about it with him on the phone—but at the same time, it’s those things that make it such a compelling watch. It feeds the Dad Id, so that he may mow the lawn in peace the following Saturday. The dad appeals of Succession and Yellowstone are, like Succession and Yellowstone, both similar and different. Each also contains elements of wish fulfillment. And at their cores, both series are stories about two fatherly notions: the question of legacy, and the realization that your kids can be really annoying, even if you’ll never acknowledge that you’re the one who made them so. But Succession and Yellowstone also unlock disparate pleasures for a patriarch. The former allows a dad to bemoan the American media complex in ways that’ll make you think, I’m not so sure I want to continue this conversation. Its center of gravity, Logan Roy, is a canvas upon which they can assert their superior skills as a dad and as a working professional. Simultaneously, other characters, from Kendall to Connor to Roman to Tom, allow them to consider their own, surely complex relationships with their fathers."