My wife and I just last month finished bingeing Succession (HBO, 2018–2023). One of the fun things about Succession is its little throwaway gags in the form of news chyrons on ATN, the Roy family’s Fox-alike news channel. Here’s all the joke chyrons I’ve noticed. If I missed one, please alert me and I’ll add it!

Note on notation: HBO Max makes it hard to get a reliable timestamp from the beginning of the episode, what with the ads and promos and HBO splash screen and the playback bar that shows only time left, not time elapsed. For example, HBO Max lists S1E1 at 64:20 total running time, but that counts an ad for AMC+ at the beginning and a two-minute “Inside the Episode” promo at the end. The HBO splash screen shows up at −63:44; the Succession opening credits start at −60:50. The first chyron appears at −60:12. I’ll record that as “S1E1+00:38,” measured from the start of the opening credits; but if you mouse over that span you’ll see “S1E1−60:12” conveniently indicating the time left in the streaming episode according to the HBO Max playback bar as of September 2023. The former should be pretty robust even if the latter rots.

Note on content: Some background chyrons are non-joke news, such as S1E4+2:10 Extended hurricane season threatens holiday travel; others are plot-relevant but still not jokes, such as S1E7−2:29 Logan Roy attacked with urine balloon. I’m taking a strict “just the jokes, ma’am” policy here.

Bits in [brackets] are guesses that seem safe to me; when I really can’t make out a key word I’ll use [???] and when part of the text is off-screen entirely I’ll use […].

Season 1

Opening credits:

• S1E1+00:38 Why are so many of our older celebrities dying?

The subchyron reads Plans to fund national park renovations announced by USDA health recall on eggs in over 2mil stores, which seems to be a newsroom mixup of the non-joke headlines seen 8 seconds later — S1E1+00:46 Waystar parks division expanding and (on the building ticker) S1E1+00:46 Massive eggs recall hits over 2 mil stores.

• S1E1+00:46 Illegal immigrant accused of dressing as neighbor and stealing her job (also S1E4+19:26 with the spelling neighbour)

S1E2 is a gold mine of Vaulter clickbait:

• S1E2+32:59 Shit Show at the Fuck Factory
• S1E2+32:59 Soylent Green Could Become a Delicious Reality (also S2E2+4:49)
• S1E2+32:59 We Gave Krokodil to a Crocodile and Played It EDM
• S1E2+32:59 Is the Art World the Solution to the Garbage Crisis?

Back to ATN:

• S1E4+2:10 […] movement accuses antiracist group of racism (also S1E7−2:29)
• S1E4+19:25 Women bosses treat women […]

Season 2

Opening credits:

• S2E1+0:38 Some local elections to be axed for “more democratic system”
• S2E1+0:38 Why are climate activists so alarmist?
• S2E1+1:01 Gender fluid illegals may be entering the country “twice”
• S2E1+1:01 Dem Senator wants to create “supremer” court
• S2E1+1:01 Is “sweetcheeks” hate speech now?
• S2E1+1:01 Retailers

(Yes, that last subchyron is just the one word “Retailers.”)

In S2E2 we get more Vaulter gold:

• S2E2+4:59 Meet the World’s Richest People Trafficker (He’s a Surprisingly Nice Guy)
• S2E2+5:11, S2E2+5:53 5 Reasons Why Drinking Milk On The Toilet Is Kind Of A Game-Changer
• S2E2+5:14 Is Every [Piece of] Taylor Swift [Musi]c Secretly Marxist?
• S2E2+5:25 […] Basically Illegal?

And back to ATN:

• S2E2+18:15 Heavens open up: First openly gay married couple in space
• S2E2+18:51 Drones could even be used to bring down military or commercial aircraft
• S2E2+19:24 Children should not be vaccinated says doctor
• S2E2+20:08 “How Guns Make Us Safe” New documentary airing on ATN tonight
• S2E2+20:08 (subchyron) Bulgarian pop star wanted for questioning in connection to Paris bank robbery (also S1E7−2:29, S2E2+19:24, S2E9+52:33)
• S2E2+20:23 Stewart Johnson, MD defends family rights against dangerous vaccine

PGN gets in on the action during Shiv’s chat with Gerri:

• S2E4+12:24 Secretary of Education “can’t count” says unnamed aide (also S2E4+20:36)
• S2E4+12:49 Experts: It’s time to let coal die
• S2E4+13:05 Fake news “both real and fake” says report (also S2E4+33:14)
• S2E4+13:16 WWF: All animals now in danger, even humans (also S2E4+33:37)

In the background of Tom’s interrogation of Ravenhead, a near-repeat of the opening-credits gag:

• S2E4+20:36 Gender fluid migrants may be entering the country twice

Behind Shiv in the Capitol Hill green room:

• S2E9+27:10 Sawyer: Have the language police gone too far?
• S2E9+27:17 Is sweetcheeks hate speech now?

On PGN in Eavis’ office, not really a gag headline but I’ll allow it:

• S2E9+27:56 ATN exec struggles to explain cruise scandal, employee ‘footstooling’

Season 3

Opening credits:

• S3E1+0:33 Equality activist caught with child porn “bonanza”
• S3E1+0:33 [???] now says she isn’t racist but her brain could be
• S3E1+0:33 Yacht ownership is skyrocketing among tech […]
• S3E1+0:33 Plans to fund national park renovations announced by USDA health recall on eggs in over 2mil stores
• S3E1+0:33 (building ticker) Hollywood boss sneers: ‘If the poor are so poor why aren’t they thinner?’
• S3E1+0:59 “I smiled at her by the photocopier – now I’m facing chemical castration”
• S3E1+0:59 Tech giants plan to force America to eat lab-grown ‘human meat’
• S3E1+0:59 Summer now the pe[…]

Elsewhere:

• S3E3+7:46 Do we really need to worry about robots being body shamed?
• S3E3+34:08 Hollywood could soon ‘sue the rest […]

The subchyrons on this next one look like real winners, but sadly aren’t fully visible.

• S3E3+37:33 Wind farm makes ‘satanic’ sound heard for miles
• S3E3+37:33 […] to have Medicare For All
• S3E3+37:33 Astronomist: Aliens would find Black Lives Matter […]
• S3E4−1:40 (PGN) Times Square smells “worse than ever” according to study
• S3E4+7:24 Report: North Korea is trying to weaponize moths
• S3E4+15:00 Mencken: Time to order the military to get off the fence and police [???]
• S3E6+5:39 Is white privilege in fact a deadly sin?

Season 4

Opening credits:

• S4E1+0:20 China hack could see 40M Americans entombed in their electric cars
• S4E1+0:20 Men’s rights group wins battle to show sad elephant rhino porn
• S4E1+0:20 Could more air pollution be [better]?
• S4E1+0:33 Deep state blunder: classified documents displayed on NBA Jumbotron
• S4E1+0:33 Gun attack: Woke mob smashes vulnerable man’s rifles with hammers
• S4E1+0:33 (building ticker) Man with bird flu can’t stop thinking of ducks

Right after the first batch of opening-credits headlines, there’s a really quick flash of a digital ticker reading S4E1+0:22 Ivy league college bans Eve […]. The next word isn’t visible; it might be “Ensler,” “Online,” or anything in between.

At the start of S4E2, we get more PGN chyrons:

• S4E2−2:05 […] Garments in High School Sports
• S4E2−1:25 FDA: “Bathing in Palm Oil Not Advised”
• S4E2−1:19 Dems Attack Shaw Family Investments in Saudi Arabia

This last one suggests a chyron subplot that I’ve been unable to figure out. It might relate to a fictional version of real-life Canadian cable tycoon J.R. Shaw, who died in 2020 and whose Shaw Communications was acquired by Rogers Communications in a Succession-esque comedy of errors (2021–2023). The other chyron in this subplot is only partly visible as Logan surprises Hugo at S4E2+14:22: Amanda Shaw […] work full-time […].

• S4E2+11:19 Report: Illegal immigrants used as consultants by border patrol
• S4E2+14:36 Michelin-star chef opens community soup kitchen supplied by roof garden
• S4E2+14:36 Concerns raised over new “growin’ kid” booster seat range
• S4E2+14:56 Ivy league school considering intimacy coordinators for first dates
• S4E2+15:17 PETA claims Halloween costume competition for dogs is ‘cruel’
• S4E2+39:00 [???] plan for post-election [???] of all sexually active males

In S4E4, we get a whole stack of fictional newspapers: first the “NY Globe” (a Post lookalike) with cover lines

• S4E4+16:53 Logan Gets the Last Laugh: Dems fume as world pays tribute
• S4E4+16:53 ‘Generous with your taxes, selfish in the sack’: Jiménez ex tells all
• S4E4+16:53 Cannabis café franchise strikes gold

and then at S4E4+18:03 “The Correspondent,” which isn’t De Correspondent but does have a Dutch flag in its nameplate. The Correspondent’s top stories besides “Media visionary Logan Roy dies” are “Germany hit by extreme floods” (dating Logan’s death to July/August 2021) and “U.S. Supreme Court strikes down Maryland free-speech legislation” (dating it to an alternate-universe May 2022 in which SCOTUS decided to hear Clear Channel v Baltimore after all).

We see the Globe again in S4E8, with these cover lines:

• S4E8+18:30 Jimenyet! Republicans say vote ‘no’ to Dems to avoid Soviet-Era/Socialist state
• S4E8+18:30 Galactic Jet-Setting: How Silicon Valley plans to make Mars “VIP Earth”

The series ends with a whimper, chyron-wise, as the last few episodes grow increasingly more serious. Some of the chyrons are cynically amusing in context, but none are jokes per se. Selected examples:

• S4E8+32:15 Ravenhead: We should count the real votes, not rely on elite politicos
• S4E8+61:49 (PGN) DNC accuses ATN head Tom Wambsgans of undermining democracy
• S4E9+3:12 Pres-elect Mencken: Appointments will be held to ‘highest ethical standards in history’
• S4E9+9:21 Mencken blasts Wisconsin revote debate as ‘unAmerican’

Non-headlines

Go to the trouble of freeze-framing all these chyrons and you’ll catch other remarkably trivial tidbits, such as:

• S1E7−0:48, a phony New York magazine with cover lines that seem spot-on to this New York reader: “The Traffic Problem: It’s Not Going to Get Better,” “How Pantone Picks the Color of the Year,” “The Best Ethiopian Restaurants,” “People Who Love Small Things,” “Leave Streaming and Go Back to Cable,” “Who Doesn’t Love a Parade?”
• S2E8+1:34, the tag line for Willa’s play Sands: “One woman’s harrowing confinement in a land ruled by a mad king and escape into total expression.”
• S3E1+12:53, a typo at the Croatian airport: “Wi-Fi Zranca_Luka_FREE” (airport in Croatian being zračna luka, not zranca).
• S3E3+46:00, all the quotes on ATN’s motivational video cart: “Women are completely supported by men in the newsroom and vice versa” —Avery Baker, Writer, Rise & Shine America. “As a strong woman, I don’t come to work to feel comfortable. I come to work to be challenged.” —Tanya Yarmak, Senior Vice President, Gourmando.
• S3E5−1:53, the check-in iPad at the shareholders’ meeting involving a completely unsorted list of names
• S3E8+38:16, another typo in a CNCEB subchyron: Cyrpto currency app gains 1 million sign-ups on launch day
• S4E5+41:03, in the rough cut of Kalispitron: Hibernation (“Property of Waystar Studios - Do Not Duplicate”): a placeholder textbox reading “Insert Kalispitron Hand Holding Car”