Inspiring quite a few music edits, Tik Toks, and comedy sketches, HBO’s Succession intro credit took over its place within the cultural zeitgeist virtually instantly. Play that easy piano sequence in a room and there’s sure to be prompt recognition. Although the theme music and opening sequence to match has impressed a lot, Succession, really was closely influenced by an intro from a David Fincher movie that used the excessive grain movie B-roll and easy music lengthy earlier than Succession. That film is the 1997 psychological thriller The Game.
Written by John Brancanto and Michael Ferris and starring Micheal Douglas, the movie follows an especially rich enterprise government who will get gifted the chance to take part in a life-altering sport. Douglas’ character, Nicholas Van Orton, is thrust right into a collection of occasions that bends his notion of what’s actual and what’s a part of the sport he signed up for. Overshadowed by Fincher’s different works, the movie is greater than value a revisit if you happen to haven’t seen it. The intro sequence to the film might be straight in comparison with Succession’s in some ways.
‘The Game’ and ‘Succession’ Intros Are Presented Similarly
In phrases of how the intros are offered, the similarities are crystal clear. The aesthetic is aiming to appear to be the house movies that the characters in every of the tales have been part of. Seeing as each The Game and Succession contain the ultra-wealthy, neither the Roys nor Nick Van Orton’s mother and father are holding the digital camera. Both of the intros see a montage of B-roll footage surrounding a big property on a pleasing day and each use a movie grain excessive publicity digital camera look. These intros are designed to present context to the characters and occasions within the movie and collection, respectively. Whereas the Succession intro is interspersed with high-definition pictures of the New York City skyline and printing presses, The Game’s intro stays on a single day up to now of the primary character, specifically, Nick van Orton’s father’s birthday.
With each intros that includes a piano-heavy music within the background, the connection is additional cemented. Whereas Succession’s intro is arguably a bit extra upbeat than that of The Game, each are nonetheless daunting and ominous, making ready the viewers for what lies forward. When viewers of Fincher’s movie are given extra about Van Orton and his household all through the movie, the somber tone makes extra sense. If there’s one factor that’s apparent about each of the intros apart from the music and the look, it’s that the viewers is proven that the characters we’re about to see onscreen, have been born into wealth and affluence, as proven by the sprawling estates that the intro sequences happen at. The content material of every intro does reveal totally different clues to what lies forward for the viewers, nonetheless.
The Scenes Shown in Each Are Different in Important Ways
The objective of those intros are in step with the concept they wish to give the viewers a way of the primary characters relationships with their mother and father. In Fincher’s movie, there are actually clear pictures of a younger Nick Van Orton’s face, different presumable buddies and kinfolk, and Nicholas’ father all through. This is interspersed with pictures from the birthday celebration and later solo pictures of father Van Orton alone, smoking or strolling. This turns into vital as you discover out that Nick witnessed his father commit suicide on the very birthday that the house video was shot at, his forty eighth. The intro tells the viewers that Nick could have had an alright and even good relationship together with his father till that fateful day when the whole lot modified. In reality, the entire purpose Nick is presented the possibility to take part in The Game is as a birthday current on his personal forty eighth birthday.
In the Succession intro credit, there are some attention-grabbing content material variations to The Game. For one, the grainy dwelling video footage is minimize along with modern-looking cinematic footage of the New York City skyline, ATN headlining newscasts, and printing presses. Furthermore, the faces of youthful Logan Roy (Brian Cox) and his spouse on the time Caroline (Harriet Walter), are blurred and never proven very a lot compared to the Roy youngsters. The pictures of Logan we do get are from a distance and sometimes him strolling away as nicely. This is supposed to present the viewers a way of the disconnection and emotional neglect that was all the time very current within the Roy family and impacts them to this very day.
The alternative to make use of grainy movie footage is twin function in these instances as nicely. The impact it provides in presenting what’s on the display as a house film is the obvious use, however thematically it really works as nicely. Film footage typically sees hotter colours and that’s true of each Succession and The Game’s opening credit. What we see contained throughout the footage tells us that the heat of how the footage seems to be are in direct distinction to the emotional coldness of the households we see. This is extra obvious within the Succession intro than that of The Game however with the added context of what occurs with Nick’s father in Fincher’s movie, the understanding that it’s telling of who Nick Van Orton turns into in life that rather more obvious.
After watching the intro to The Game there may be not a doubt one can have about its affect on Succession. The key variations level to the variations within the character’s early relationships with their mother and father and provides us context as to why they’re the way in which they’re once we are watching them within the current. Hopefully, Succession conjures up future motion pictures or collection to make use of the intro equally and keep on the concept intro credit score sequences might be simply as vital to this system as different components.