Netflix has billed its new four-part docu-series as an “engrossing” look at the “cut-throat succession battle” for Rupert Murdoch’s multimedia empire.

Quickly rocketing into the streamer’s top-10 television shows in the United States after its debut on March 13, Dynasty: The Murdochs was sitting at No. 3 in Australia by Tuesday – behind new seasons of romantic drama Virgin River and the live-action adaptation of manga hit One Piece.

While the streaming charts may say much about our eclectic viewing habits, they also show people are suckers for a real-life family drama, especially when it involves the rich and powerful.

“It’s like Hunger Games, Murdoch-style,” is how journalist Sarah Ellison describes the dynamic between Murdoch and his adult children in the series, while another interviewee refers to the succession battle as “a family squabble on steroids that has a huge effect on our politics and lives”.

Dynasty – which shares its name with the 1980s soap opera – is directed primarily by Liz Garbus, whose previous credits include the Oscar-nominated and Emmy-winning Nina Simone documentary What Happened, Miss Simone? and Netflix’s Harry & Meghan.

The numerous interviewees include journalists who have covered the family for decades and ex-employees of Murdoch’s companies, as well Paddy Manning, author of The Successor: The High-Stakes Life of Lachlan Murdoch, and Australian writer Walter Marsh, who penned Young Rupert: The Making of the Murdoch Empire.

There are no fresh interviews with Murdoch family members, although Netflix says the series delves into “private communications between the feuding family members which have never been televised before”.

“Ultimately, over time, we were able to get voices to help us have that inside look in the story from every building block in the empire, from his (Rupert Murdoch’s) days in Australia through England through America,” Garbus told The Hollywood Reporter.

Early reviews have been mixed, with Screen Rant website rating Dynasty: The Murdochs as “one of the best new shows to binge-watch in just one night on Netflix”, Salon dubbing it “queasily diverting” and UK newspaper The Independent describing it as “slickly produced and gleefully told”.

The Guardian, on the other hand, found it “an exhausting if exhaustive rundown of all things Murdoch” in which the siblings’ manoeuvrings were “overshadowed” by those of their father.

The fact that no members of the Murdoch family agreed to be interviewed is considered problematic by some critics, although The Sydney Morning Herald has noted the series does include interesting archival footage – including of a young Rupert with his parents Keith and Elisabeth, and a Ray Martin interview from the 1980s with his then wife Anna Murdoch.

So what are some of the key insights and takeaways from Dynasty: The Murdochs?

‘Ruthless patriarch’

As well as showing how Murdoch built his multibillion-dollar global media empire – which today includes Fox Corporation and News Corp – the docu-series also explores how he raised his eldest children, Prudence, Elisabeth, Lachlan and James.

“He wasn’t raising children, he was raising possible successors,” Jim Rutenberg, the New York Times writer-at-large, says in one episode.

The Murdoch children were allegedly pitted against each other. Photo: Netflix

Other interviewees claimed Rupert pitted his children against each other, and that Lachlan ­– who Rupert decided to make sole successor – was “being groomed” from the beginning and was “the mini Rupert”. Younger brother James was “very bright” but seen as “kind of the problem son”.

“Thousands of pages of documents, emails and text messages… paint a portrait of a ruthless patriarch – recently turned 95 – who raised his four eldest children less as a family than as gladiators, pitting them against each other for his affection and his empire,” The Independent concluded after watching Dynasty: The Murdochs.

Garbus and co-director Sara Enright use a Monopoly board game as an analogy to illustrate the power play between the children as adults. Garbus told The Hollywood Reporter the device also draws attention to the fact that it is “actually a little sad for those who are… having to play that game, as opposed to having a family life”.

Succession scares

Documents obtained by The New York Times during the Murdochs’ court battle in Nevada in 2024 revealed how an episode of the HBO drama Succession – said to be inspired by the family – prompted Elisabeth Murdoch’s representative on the family trust to write a “Succession memo”.

In the TV episode, fictional media patriarch Logan Roy (Brian Cox) died without having named a successor, and the memo sought to avoid a real-life repeat of the chaos that ensued in the show.

In Dynasty: The Murdochs, New York Times journalist Jonathan Mahler says the memo circulated among Rupert’s children, who wanted to begin a conversation – “if not with their father, then at least on the margins around their father”.

But Mahler and others interviewed for the series claim the siblings had already had a reality check over the lack of succession plans several years earlier. In 2018 their father had to have emergency surgery after suffering a serious back injury while yachting with ex-wife Jerry Hall.

Murdoch and wife Elena Zhukova Murdoch arrive at the 2024 succession court hearing in Nevada. Photo: AP

‘Super-aggressive’

When the succession battle did get to court in Nevada, it was James – considered more liberal in his views than brother Lachlan – who came in for perhaps the toughest grilling during his deposition.

“Why don’t you ever take responsibility for the things that go wrong in your life?” his father’s lawyer reportedly asked, along with: “Why were you too busy to call your dad on his 90th birthday?”

McKay Coppins, a staff writer for The Atlantic, claims in the series that a shaken James realised the “super aggressive, mean-spirited personal questions” were actually coming from Rupert, who was also present for the deposition.

“I remember talking to James weeks later and he was still sort of reeling from the experience,” Coppins said. “He couldn’t quite believe what had happened.”

Happier times: Lachlan, Rupert and James Murdoch. Photo: AAP

In the end …

Ultimately, in what some saw as a loss for public-interest journalism, the Murdochs’ bitter battle over succession was resolved last year when Rupert’s chosen successor Lachlan – who heads both New Corp and Fox Corp – secured control of the family companies and reportedly paid his siblings US$1.1 billion (A$1.7 billion) each for all their shares.

In the process, the family was torn apart. But the other three siblings involved revealed little of their feelings in a statement provided to the makers of Dynasty: The Murdochs and shared on Netflix’s Tudum website.

“Prudence MacLeod, Elisabeth Murdoch, and James Murdoch are happy to have reached an agreement to settle the litigation initiated by their father, Rupert Murdoch, and brother, Lachlan, in 2023,” the trio said.

“Prudence, Elisabeth, and James are pleased that the matter is now behind them.”