Sketchy Successor

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.
"Our son is a wastrel and a halfwit. We shudder to think of the throne in his hands."
—Queen Victoria, From Hell.

Having a Reasonable Authority Figure in charge is brilliant. Be it a good monarch, a superb CEO, a master swordsman with a knack for education in a dojo... whatever the position, it makes the lives of everyone under the title easier. But no one lives forever...

But it's OK! If it's a monarchy, the line of succession is safe, or the king has chosen an agreeable replacement beforehand; if not, there are proper democratic (or at least elective) mechanisms in place for selecting a new leader. The old makes way for the new...

...pity that the new sucks.

This trope is about when a superb or at least markedly superior leader passes away, retires or occasionally gets killed off, possibly by the guy or gal who gets the top spot, and is replaced by someone who is markedly inferior. Markedly inferior can range from just not being as competent to being akin to the worst excesses of insane leaders throughout history.

Reasons for this trope being deployed vary. Sometimes it simply showcases the problem of having an experienced leader suddenly get replaced by someone who hasn't got the hang of things yet; that leader may show Character Development and improve. Sometimes the new leader is fairly competent under normal circumstances, but his father was a genius at war, or intrigue, or even just keeping the wolves from the door, which applies especially to CEOs, and the circumstances are most assuredly NOT optimal. If this is the case, if the new ruler is The Hero, he again will eventually come up to the mark, albeit with a lot of problems and challenges along the way. Unless its a Downer Ending of course. If he is not the main character, then it will be up to The Hero to guide the new leader or at least ensure he doesn't screw up too badly... or maybe the new king will be the reason for the country/whatever collapsing, the villain winning initially, and the heroes will be La Résistance, stemming from a Prequel or Backstory. Sometimes something in the bloodline will hit the new ruler, leaving him Royally Screwed-Up. And, of course, there's always the chance the new ruler will be a bloodthirsty tyrant or just insane and will prove to be the villain of the piece, or an obstacle for the hero to overcome to defeat the real villain.

In the event of the old ruler trying to do something about the successor to ensure this doesn't happen, you have an Inadequate Inheritor.

This trope will probably have several subtropes eventually. Also, we need some examples which aren't just examples of the successor doing something horrible to the old ruler.

As a Death Trope, Spoilers ahead may be unmarked. Beware.

Examples of Sketchy Successor include:

Anime and Manga

  • Defied on The Twelve Kingdoms as the next ruler is not necessarilly the child of the previous king, but rather has to be chosen by the Kirin each time the previous one dies, as the fact that they are given nigh-immortality when they become kings/queens means that the king will live forever as long as they don't screw things up, so usually they don't have to worry about who'll be the successor for a few centuries. However, this part isn't always true. Youko's predecessor only ruled for about six years; in comparison, En-Ou has ruled for more than 500 years.

Film

Literature

  • The proverbially wise King Solomon in the Old Testament of The Bible was succeeded by his son Rehoboam. The first item on Rehoboam's agenda was to so piss off 10 of the 12 tribes he was governing that they rebelled against him and split the kingdom of Israel in two permanently. He subsequently allowed the Egyptians to capture Jerusalem and take all Solomon's treasure.
  • Robin Hood has King John standing in for Good King Richard.
  • Happens at the end of Oscar Wilde's short story "The Star-Child". The title character, who used to be cruel, has learned to be a good person, and found out that he is the king. Due to the lessons he has learned, he is a good king and brings peace and plenty to the kingdom, but the Happy Ending is mitigated by the last lines:

Yet ruled he not long, so great had been his suffering, and so bitter the fire of his testing, for after the space of three years he died. And he who came after him ruled evilly.

  • Defied in Heralds of Valdemar series, where King Valdemar prayed to every God for a way to ensure that his successors would always be worthy people, and then two white horses jumped out of the grove on the palace grounds, chose him and his son and from then on the Heralds were created, all chosen by Companions which ensured that they were capable and good o heart, and only a chosen person could inherit the throne.
    • Even with the above safeguards, the 'not quite as competent' variant comes into play during the Last Herald Mage trilogy. Elspeth the Peacemaker managed to use diplomacy and marriage alliances to avoid major problems with neighboring realms. However her son predeceased her in a freak accident, and when the crown fell to her young grandson everything started going south
    • Played straight though with the King of Hardorn who was a pretty good king and ally of Valdemar, until his son Ancar killed him and took over, started oppressing and pretty much enslaving his people and began a war with Valdemar AND Karse.
  • Morte D'Arthur by Thomas Mallory had as King Arthur's successor a relative nobody named Constantine, the son of one of the lesser knights, no less. Given that, whether historical or legendary, Arthur's Britain was quickly supplanted by the Saxons he opposed, his successor may have had no footprint at all.
  • This trope starts off the action in Harald, with the death of the king who forged the alliance that kept The Empire at bay and his replacement's incompetence.
  • Though it varies a bit based on the book, the eponymous Wizard of The Wizard of Oz series is depicted as an incompetent charlatan who sent Oz backwards under his leadership, which he usurped from the previous monarchy. The theme is expanded in greater detail in the Wicked books.

Theatre

  • The late King Hamlet (from Hamlet) is considered a ruler among rulers. King Claudius assassinated him to get the job and spends his reign doing nothing but trying to keep people from becoming suspicious.
    • Also inverted at the end of Hamlet, after everyone has died. The Danish crown is passed down to King Fortinbras, monarch of Norway. Throughout the story, it is mentioned that Denmark and Norway are having conflicts, but by the end, the entire Danish royal family is dead and Fortinbras is implied to be an improvement over Claudius.

Video Games

  • In Dragon Age: Origins, Maric Theirin is remembered as a lot better King of Ferelden than his son Cailan. Subverted with Alistair if you "harden" his personality and make him King: in that case, he becomes a ruler much better than everyone expected, perhaps on par with his dad.

Western Animation

Real Life

  • Marcus Aurelius was the last in the line of Five Good Emperors of The Roman Empire's golden century. Lacking a good successor (like the four emperors before him, who always adopted theirs), he let his son Commodus take the throne, starting off a long chain of events that led to Rome's fall.
  • King John of England is frequently described as a poor replacement for King Richard the Lionhearted. The truth is, arguably, that neither was much good; King John may have lost disastrously in France and sparked a (noble, not peasant) revolt in his own lands due to exorbitant taxes, but King Richards punitively expensive crusading was the reason why King John had to raise those taxes in the first place. And couldn't have done much for John's French campaigns either. John wasn't a good king by any means, but Richard was arguably just as bad.
    • Probably a straighter example, then, would be both Richard and John playing this trope straight in regards to Henry II.
  • The King of Thailand, Bhumibol Adulyadej, is tremendously popular, to the point of having shrines erected in his honor. Though Thailand has many protests, sometimes violent, the king himself is very very popular. Whoever replaces the king will be far less idealized, whether it's the government at large or a blood successor.
  • Takeda Katsuyori was the type whose father Shingen was a genius at war. Sadly, Katsuyori could not hold Oda Nobunaga and Tokugawa Ieyasu at bay, and he and his immediate family committed harakiri upon his defeat.
  • Richard Cromwell, heir to Oliver Cromwell. The English deposed him and restored the Monarchy.
    • Which gives the impression that they thought, "At least HE was a Badass whatever else he was. Richard is not. And if we must have Nepotism we might as well have a king and be done with it."
  • The Byzantine Empire had this as a regular issue, no surprise given the many incompetent Emperors its predecessor Rome had, but the Heraclian dynasty was a particularly major one, running the gauntlet from excellent to utter disaster.
    • The first emperor, Heraclius, is widely acknowledged as one of Byzantium's best emperors. He overthrew the usurper, Phocas, who had caused a massive Persian invasion due to his overthrow of Emperor Maurice, who was close the Persian king Khosrow, managed to rebuild the Imperial armies from scratch, waged a six year successful campaign against Persia, leading from the front, and managed to win the war, when it seemed the Empire was doomed to fall, resulting in the Empire being briefly restored. However, the Rashidun Caliphate erupted out of the Arabian Peninsula and proceeded to undo all of Heraclius's efforts, costing the Empire Syria, Egypt, and Armenia in his lifetime. Byzantine historians noted that Heraclius, had he died before the Arab invasion, would have been remembered as one of the best emperors Byzantium had seen, but was now seen as one of the worst. Modern historians were more kinder, still acknowledging him as one of the best emperors, noting he saved the Empire from the Persians, and the disaster was not his fault, as he was stricken with terminal edema when the invasion began, and therefore could not lead against the invasion personally. Furthermore, Heraclius was pragmatic enough to use the Taurus Mountains of Anatolia as a buffer zone, which played a major role in preventing the Caliphate from invading the Anatolian plateau, even if it tacitly acknowledged Syria, Armenia, and to a lesser degree, Egypt and North Africa would have to be sacrificed and most of the disasters against the Caliphate were due to incompetent generals, with Heraclius escaping the blame and being widely praised until his death in 641.
    • Heraclius's successor, Constans II, had inherited a terrible situation, but it was made worse both by his age, (he was only 10 when he ascended to the throne), and the circumstances by which it occurred. When Heraclius died in February 641, the throne passed to his son Heraclius Constantine, or Constantine III, but since he was the son of Heraclius's niece Martina (the marriage was incestous, and this was a massive scandal, and was blamed for the loss of Syria), but when Constantine III tied of tuberculosis three months later, it set off a round of Byzantine intrigue, where the army forced Martina and Constantine's brother Heraclonas to accept him as a co-emperor, before ultimately deposing Heraclonas and Martina and banishing them in the fall of 641, making Constans the sole emperor. This infighting cost the Empire the province of Egypt, and Constans was never able to get over the circumstances over how he got the throne. Further making matters worse was the violent schism between Monthelitistic[please verify] Christians and the Orthodox Christian Church the Byzantines were experiencing, not helped by Heraclius's religious persecutions, which further divided the Empire. Constans's attempt to retake Egypt ended in failure thanks to incompetent leadership, and his attempt at compromise in the religious split caused a revolt in North Africa led by Gregory the Patrician, which allowed the Arabs to invade North Africa, kill Gregory and put the province under vassal status, the only reason it was not lost permanently was due to the Arabs not having the manpower or the equipment to besiege Carthage or hold the province, and even after the vassal status was relieved, the Byzantine hold was always shaky at best. The following years saw Constans face a naval threat as the Caliphate built a navy and capture several islands, and his attempt to destroy this new fleet in person ended in disaster at the Battle of the Masts in 655, with Constans barely escaping with his life. The eruption of the First Fitna in the Caliphate did buy Constans some time, allowing him to win some victories in the Balkans and Italy, but he was severely criticized for not making at least some attempt to retake the lost provinces (barring North Africa, which was formally restored to the Byzantine Empire), or explicitly taking a side the Caliphate's civil war in hopes of getting more favorable concessions. By far the most severe decision Constans made was to make a massive tax hike for everyone to both compensate for the loss of the Empire's wealthiest and richest provinces, and to fund all the military campaigning and defenses. Not surprisingly, this outraged everyone, and Constans decided to flee Constantinople to avoid a coup to Syracuse, making him the only Byzantine Emperor to make a city other than Constantinople the capital of the Byzantine Empire (other Emperors, from Justinian I to Constans's grandfather Heraclius had considered fleeing, but they ultimately stood their ground), to the point that for five years, Sicily was the heart of the Empire, and Constans seemed more concerned about religious matters in Rome than the other provinces of the Empire, which to accusations of cowardice. Constans was assassinated in 668 by his chamberlain while he was bathing, at the behest of the army of Sicily. While everyone is in agreement Constans was not his grandfather, more charitable interpretations depict Constans as a Well-Intentioned Extremist who was frequently blamed for events out of his control (the tax hike especially, as that was acknowledged by every one as necessary) and who did try to keep the Empire intact with his fleeing to Sicily as necessary to avoid a civil war, but was hampered by bad decisions or incompetent administrators, while more negative depictions see him as a General Failure who threw away multiple opportunities to reverse some of the losses experienced previously (the failure to take a side in the First Fitna is especially cited, as it was common Byzantine practice before and after in these situations to take a side in exchange for significant concessions should that side win) and a Dirty Coward who left the Empire to face the Arabs for five years which could have resulted in the Empire's collapse.
    • Constantine IV, who took the throne after Constans, immediately proved he would be a much more competent Emperor than his father. He had already ruled the rest of the Empire defacto when Constans moved the capital to Syracuse, and one of his first decisions was to move the capital back to Constantinople. In addition, he largely put an end to the civil strife which had plagued the Empire since his dynasty's founding, squashing the rebellions that had erupted under his father, and managing to successfully bring an end to the Monotheistic schism that had plagued the Empire since the days of his great grandfather. By far the biggest asset for him was the renewal of Arab aggression, as Muawiyah I had overthrown the Rashidun Caliphate at the end of the First Fitna, and he now planned to finish the conquest of the Empire. Muawiyah's strategy of slow attrition alerted Constantine to the fact that a siege of Constantinople would be very likely and he immediately began to prepare the Byzantine capital for a siege. When it came to military matters, Constantine kept strictly to the defensive, avoiding large battles with the Arabs and using raiding and guerilla tactics, keeping the armies and navies intact so they could be used at a decisive moment. When Constantinople was besieged by the Arabs in 674, Constantine made sure that the newly invented Greek fire guaranteed that the siege was nothing more than a loose blockade, rather than a genuine attempt to take the city. Barring an initial assault, the Arab armies never tried to assault the city, while the loose blockade meant Constantinople could be easily resupplied. Finally, after a four year blockade, in the autumn of 678, Constantine led the Byzantine fleet against the Arabs with Greek fire. The result was a decisive Byzantine victory, as the Arab fleet suffered serious losses and they had to evacuate the land army. This victory was the first major defeat the Arabs had suffered in 50 years of expansion, and the survival of Constantinople meant the Byzantines now had time to stabilize after four decades of devastating reversals. Constantine made peace with Muawiyah and managed to secure a sizable tribute along with joint rule of Cyprus. The outbreak of the Second Fitna following the death of Muawiyah allowed Constantine to move against the Bulgars and the Slavs, but suffered a serious defeat resulting in the creation of the First Bulgarian Empire. Constantine died in 685, having managed to briefly stabilize the Empire and allowed the Byzantines to enjoy a brief period of respite from constant war. While all historians agree he was a good emperor who managed to turn the Byzantine position around, how good he was often varies. Positive depictions often praise him as a Four-Star Badass who managed to rescue the Empire from certain collapse and managed to ensure that the Byzantine Empire would still be strong enough to fight their adversaries on equal footing, with the emergence of Greek Fire giving the Byzantines overwhelming naval control of the Hellespont and the Sea of Mamara, with several stating that had he lived longer, the Byzantines could have had a more permanent peace with the Caliphate, or conquered back some of their more lost provinces. More negative historians, while acknowledging his military decisions to stay strictly on defense did save the Empire at the siege of Constantinople, paved the way for the permanent loss of North Africa and the creation of the First Bulgarian Empire, meaning the Empire now faced a two front war, something it did not face when he took the throne.
    • Justinian II was nothing like his father. Justinian had ambitions to reclaim all of the Empire, but his horrible treatment of his servants and soldiers proved to be his downfall. Initially, Justinian's attempts to take back the Empire did work well, increasing the tribute the Umayyads had to pay and taking back Armenia during the Second Fitna. Unfortunately, Justinian picked the worst time to openly declare war in 692, as the rebellion was effectively over with the final stand of the rebels occurring in Mecca and the Umayyads now having considerable reserves of men. The year 692 was a disaster, with Armenia permanently lost, and the Battle of Sebastapolis being a total rout. The defeat was sealed by the betrayal of the Slavic soldiers, who were bribed by the Arabs to change sides. Justinian's response was to imprison the general Leontios, and order the massacre of the remaining Slavic soldiers who had stayed loyal with their wives and children sold into slavery. This was the final straw, and in 695, Leontios was liberated from prison, overthrew Justinian and cut off his nose, and then exiled, starting the Twenty Years Anarchy, a 22 year period of civil war, which saw the Arabs bring a permanent end to the Byzantine holdings in North Africa, make several major incursions into Anatolia, and gain naval supremacy in the Mediterranean. Justinian took back the throne in 705 and his second reign was even more of a disaster, with a brutal purge of the army of competent leaders that completely undermined the Empire's military, famously costing the Byzantines the city of Tyana, and culminating in his second overthrow in 711 when he was blinded and then murdered. Historians are in near unanimous agreement that he was the worst Byzantine Emperor since Phocas, as his two reigns undid all the gains his father had won, deprived the Empire of the last rich province it had left on the southern Mediterranean coast and caused a 22 year civil war that almost led to the Empire's collapse, until the rise of the Isaurian dynasty managed to bring an end to the threat of the Empire being conquered.
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