The Audacity Review: Unhinged Silicon Valley Drama Is The Succession Replacement You've Been Waiting For

In 2018, Succession delivered a black comedy-drama satirizing the multi-billion-dollar American entertainment industry. The Roy family were perfect stand-ins for any number of suits who own massive media conglomerates that provide news and entertainment to the masses. Their constant interpersonal conflict while making decisions that could impact millions made Succession's characters both hilarious and frightening at the same time.

Writer and producer Jonathan Glatzer had a hand in the first two seasons, serving as a supervising producer and writing two episodes. This experience is built into the foundational DNA of The Audacity, for which Glatzer serves as creator and executive producer. The series is AMC's latest comedy-drama, focusing on a satirical, borderline diabolical Silicon Valley focused on printing money.

The series begins with self-aggrandizing tech CEO Duncan Park on the verge of public collapse. His tech company, Hypergnosis, acts as a data broker worth billions thanks to its (scarily legal) sale of consumer data. In the first minutes of the show, he's revealed to have leaked a potential buyout of his company to boost his stock prices ahead of the sale.

Of course, this, like many of Duncan's exploits, blows up in his face, his potential buyer backing out following the leak. His only anchor is his professional yet oftentimes paranoid therapist, Joanne Felder (Sarah Goldberg), whose positive reinforcement feeds into his ego. But once he discovers she's been using her rich tech clients' intel for insider trading, the true story begins.

The Audacity's Characters Are The Source Of Its Sustained Madness

The Silicon Valley-based TV show is driven forward by its abundant cast of characters, all of whom have their own quirks and angles pertaining to power in the tech world. Duncan acts as the core protagonist, blinded by hubris and an uncontrollable lust for power as he tries to make Hypergnosis an unstoppable force — often leading to self-induced setbacks and failures.

While his presence is the most commanding, he's not the only central focus. While Joanne serves a more background presence in the first episode, the eight-episode season very quickly reveals her own paranoia and affluent risk-taking decisions, all motivated by money and desperate self-preservation. She's just as selfish as Duncan, yet is continually at odds with him.

The rest of the cast flourishes out from the core pair. At first, they all seem scattered in their storylines, but slowly, the show ties its many threads closer together. This includes Zach Galifianakis as Carl Bardolph, a self-centered mogul with anger management problems, Duncan wants to invest in his company, and Tom Ruffage (Rob Coddy), an odd yet well-meaning veteran seeking funding for a related project.

Because of this blend of major characters in The Audacity, the series feels almost free-flowing in the way everyone's stories shape up. The dark comedy does a fantastic job at giving everyone layers of humanity — some more than others — that are juxtaposed by the endlessly cruel actions they'll take against one another to win.

This makes them the driving force of the overarching story, with each caught up in their own viewpoints of the world and how to employ them for the sake of winning. It makes for some compelling yet oftentimes distressing events, forced to watch as Duncan, Joanne, and everyone else dig a deeper ditch for themselves, entirely predicated on hubris and self-centered power struggles.

Yet this character focus is also where The Audacity falters somewhat. While the show eventually makes everyone important, it takes time for its ensemble to truly grab the spotlight. This includes Meaghan Rath's Anushka and her husband, Marty, played by Simon Helberg, the latter of whom is developing a sentient AI meant to help teens struggling with mental health issues.

Another example is Joanne's son, Orson, whose neglect by his mother leads to a rather awkward side story about toxic masculinity. While everything eventually — and I do mean eventually — connects, the show's insistence on giving everyone a large amount of screen time, no matter their centrality to the main plot, causes the middle episodes to slog.

Thankfully, this isn't a permanent problem, with the show's first three episodes and final two installments driving the story forward in a fast, snappy way that never pounds on the brakes. And, despite the overabundance of characters, The Audacity still manages to make even its least important faces feel like fully fleshed-out, complex people, even if it does cause the story to drag at times.

The Audacity Never Lets Up On The Chaos

But The Audacity's flawed storytelling method is balanced out by one crucial strength: it refuses to let anyone in the show rest. Even when the central story isn't moving along at a brisk pace, everyone else's side plots are in constant motion. From comedically stressful conversations over the phone to misunderstandings blown way out of proportion, the series never, ever lets its characters catch a break.

Despite constant events and very little downtime, this actually works to make the show more compelling. The character writing and performances do most of the legwork for their development, requiring little time needed for the show to sit people down in quiet corners to wax on about themselves. Instead, the story fires on all cylinders, allowing everyone to become active participants in their own madness.

The Audacity explores themes of technological oligarchy and greed, using a group of bumbling, self-destructive characters to do it. Much like Succession, the show is a terrifying glimpse into the notion that people with immense power really don't have any idea what to do with it, and are more likely to be self-serving over anything else.

And yet, despite this scary underlying message, The Audacity succeeds by leaning into the absurdity and comedy more often than not. There are scenes perfectly balancing the dramatic and comedic, which almost made me feel bad for laughing. It deftly avoids tonal clashing, instead letting the comedy and drama work in tandem to create a roller coaster of epic proportions.

It helps that, stylistically, The Audacity feels like an on-the-ground glimpse into big tech procedures, even with its obviously satirical approach. The cinematography is oftentimes raw and unencumbered, which made me feel like I was in the room with its core characters. Watching events unfold so closely only makes the story and comedy hit that much harder.

This perfect storm of characters with agency and a story entirely driven by their actions makes The Audacity a hilarious, biting commentary that refuses to play it safe. The Silicon Valley tale of hubris and self-centeredness makes the series that much more engrossing, and a fantastic new series for those missing a Succession-style flair in their TV diet.

The series premiere of The Audacity arrives Sunday, April 12 at 9 p.m. ET on AMC and AMC+. New episodes will be released each Sunday until the season finale on May 31.