‘The Righteous Gemstones’ Is the Perfect Replacement for ‘Succession’ in Your Life
Succession may be over, but thanks to The Righteous Gemstones, HBO isn’t quite finished with conniving cutthroat relatives intent on bickering and backstabbing their way to the top of the family empire. Danny McBride’s riotous religious comedy is the network’s remedy for viewers’ post-Roy blues, and in its third season (which premieres June 18), it’s as gloriously ridiculous as ever: a cocktail of holy hypocrisy, profane nastiness, and juvenile machismo that’s as unhinged as the psycho tantrums its evangelical preachers habitually throw.
“Flying off the handle won’t help,” admonishes Gemstones patriarch Eli (John Goodman) to his adult children Jesse (McBride), Judy (Edi Patterson), and Kelvin (Adam DeVine), and rarely has advice been more appropriate—or gone less heeded. The Righteous Gemstones is a show about megachurch maniacs losing their minds at the drop of a hat while striving to keep what’s theirs by any inane means possible, and that hasn’t changed one iota in its return engagement.
Though they’re now the proud owners of Florida’s pious-themed resort Zion’s Landing—where their uncle Baby Billy (Walton Goggins) performs daily by the pool to an indifferent vacation crowd—the Gemstones are far from content. Central to their problems: Jesse, Judy, and Kelvin took the reins of the business from Eli, but can’t figure out how to work together, thanks to their individual desires to be king of the hill (or, as Jesse puts it, the “main decider”).