WARNING: This article contains spoilers about the most recent episode of Succession which some readers may prefer to avoid.
Succession's executive producer Mark Mylod has admitted that his team had "a lot of trepidation" about going ahead with the game-changing twist in the most recent episode.
In shock scenes, the show's patriarch Logan Roy (Brian Cox) was killed off abruptly after collapsing during a transatlantic flight, with much of the episode focusing on three of his children - Shiv (Sarah Snook), Kendall (Jeremy Strong) and Ronan (Kieran Culkin) - desperately trying to get updates over the phone amid futile attempts to resuscitate their father.
Mylod, who also directed the episode, told Variety that show creator Jesse Armstrong had envisaged the twist during pre-production of season three around two years ago.
"There was a lot of trepidation," he conceded. "Brian is an incredible actor, and this is an incredibly powerful character in modern television drama.
"Not to over-aggrandise ourselves, but he's got a lot of heft. So it's a huge and scary choice to actually kill off that character."
Logan's collapse happened off screen, while he was mostly only shown in the background during the CPR attempts, with one brief shot of his face as a phone was placed to his ear.
"I'm sure when Jesse was imagining it, he went through a number of scenarios," Mylod continued. "But once it landed on this idea of the inconvenience of it - the lack of drama, if you like - it just felt so real.
"With a sudden death in the modern age, it's a phone call or a text, or even an email. It isn't a Shakespearean death scene.
"In terms of the structure of how we handle and tell the story of this huge character's death, it just seems so interesting and fresh to focus on the frustration of trying to get the information.
"Our story revolves around a media empire; it revolves around information and eyeballs. And this idea of the irony of not being able to get that information, apart from the wonderful device of putting the audience somewhat into the heads of the characters and their frustration of, 'Is this really happening? What's happening, what's happening?'"
Succession continues Sunday night at 9pm ET on HBO and Monday at 2am/9pm UK on Sky Atlantic.
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