The Top 10 Estate Planning Shows & Movies: Succession, Inheritance, and Conflict

This week’s post is just for fun.

People sometimes tell me that estate planning sounds kinda boring. It’s all paperwork, documents and conversations we’d rather avoid. However, if that was true, we wouldn’t keep seeing the issues underlying estate planning continue to show up in our stories. 

Every great story, whether it’s a novel, a movie, a TV series, or a tale told around a campfire, is built on basic human conflict. Love. Greed. Rivalry. Power. Identity. Fear. Mortality.

Inheritance and succession often sit in the eye of the human conflict storm.

When someone dies, money, power, property, and meaning don’t disappear. They shift. And whenever something valuable moves from one generation to the next, conflict can follow.

That’s why so many unforgettable movies and shows are, at their core, estate-planning stories—even if they never use that phrase.

Strip away the costumes, accents, and dramatic music, and what’s left are familiar questions:

• Who’s in charge now?

• Who gets what?

• Who decides?

• And what happens when no one planned clearly?

So, with that context, here are my Top 10 Estate Planning Movies & TV Shows (in no particular order)

All of these stories are driven directly or indirectly by inheritance, succession, and the absence (or mishandling) of a plan - and all really fun to watch.

1. Succession (HBO) The modern gold standard and one of my favorite shows. Foul mouthed Logan Roy (pictured below) is an aging media king. He refuses to clearly hand over control of his empire, pitting his children against one another while wealth, power, and approval are used as weapons. Every episode is a case study in what happens when succession planning is emotional instead of intentional. This is the worst case scenario combined with big stakes.

2. Arrested Development Estate planning as farce—but uncomfortably accurate. Incapacity, unqualified heirs, family businesses, and trusts gone wrong. The theme of wealth making people lazy and selfish is front and center. Somehow this show gets better the more I watch it.

3. The Godfather Not just a crime story, but a family succession story. Who is worthy to inherit power? What happens when leadership passes by implication instead of design? Unfortunately, when it comes to money and power, families can turn on each other. Maybe the best movie series ever too.

4. Rain Man The entire set up for Rain Man is based on estate planning. Tom Cruise plays a self-centered salesman who discovers he has been largely cut out of his father’s estate in favor of an institutionalized older brother he never knew existed. What begins as an inheritance dispute becomes a story about entitlement, responsibility, and the unexpected emotional consequences of estate planning decisions. Also, it’s really funny…Judge Wapner

5. Downton Abbey Inheritance law is the plot. Entails, gender rules, marriages driven by asset preservation, and what happens when tradition collides with modern reality.

6. Game of Thrones Take away the dragons and this is pure succession chaos. No clear plan, no agreed rules, and a massive power vacuum. Estate litigation using power and betrayal. Also, no shortage of undeserving heirs.

7. Dallas Oil, money, favoritism, betrayal, and control. A long-running reminder that family wealth without clear succession planning leads to conflict.

8. Citizen Kane A quieter, more reflective take on legacy. A story that asks whether wealth and possessions actually explain a life—or obscure it. Rosebud!

9. Parasite Inheritance and class, viewed from the outside. Who has access, who doesn’t, and how wealth quietly transfers power across generations. This movie has really stuck with me.

10. House of Gucci Family business, marriages, manipulation, and disastrous succession decisions. Proof that bad planning can unravel even iconic brands. Family businesses of all sizes can get messy.

Why This Matters in Real Life

These stories work because they tap into something universal.

Death removes the referee. Money amplifies emotion. Old family dynamics resurface fast. I like to say “you see the nicest people behaving like selfish idiots” in this context. 

Estate planning doesn’t eliminate conflict—but it shapes how that conflict unfolds. It can turn chaos into process, guessing into guidance, and silence into clarity. Good planning can literally maintain peace through the generations. 

In other words, estate planning doesn’t avoid the story.It helps decide how the story ends.