Warning: This article contains spoilers.
It’s been a while since we last saw the Roy family on our screens. But after the season 3 premiere of HBO’s Succession on Sunday night it’s clear that the stakes have never been higher.
The episode takes place in the aftermath of Kendall Roy’s bombshell press conference. Looking to escape scrutiny and legal retaliation, Logan, Roman, Shiv and the team head to an airport in Croatia, where they await a private plane. Meanwhile, Kendall is joined by Cousin Greg in New York, who’s soon tasked with monitoring social media as the “anti-Waystar” campaign continues.
With Kendall by now a persona non grata at company headquarters, he sets up a temporary office at the home of his estranged wife, Rava. Things quickly become as awkward as that sounds, especially after Greg makes a characteristic blunder with a bottle of wine — and not just any old wine.
It soon transpires that the bottle Greg opened — which was handed to him by Kendall’s current girlfriend, Naomi — was a gift from Rava’s godfather. Arguments ensued, as did apologies, and finally Rava gave up altogether. “It’s like when someone breaks something beautiful, it reminds you that nothing lasts,” she says, before leaving the room.
So what wine could have created such a scene in the first place? Turns out, Greg had opened a very rare and practically priceless bottle of Pingus. Specifically, the bottle appears to be a 1996 magnum from the Ribera del Duero producer, which only started making wine in 1995.
While the winery’s first vintage was almost entirely lost in the North Atlantic after a cargo accident, the 1996 vintage went on to gain legendary status. Following an en-primeur tasting of the wine, the now-retired wine critic Robert Parker awarded it 96 points, and described it as
“one of the greatest young red wines” he’d ever tasted, according to the importer Rare Wine Co.
Suffice it to say, it’s almost impossible to find Pingus 1996 these days, especially in magnum format. Later vintages range in price from $795 for a 750-milliliter bottle of the 2011 vintage to $2,200 for a magnum of Pingus 2016.
Then again, money’s never been the issue with the Roys and anyone associated with them.
