Hail to the Veep: the best and most brutal comedy of the century

As HBO’s Veep enters its seventh and final season, we should reflect on the maxim that all political careers end in failure. Selina Meyer’s career started with failure and she has been failing spectacularly ever since. When we first encountered her, in the series premiere in 2012, she had failed to secure her party’s presidential nomination after casually referring to one of her staffers as a “retard” at a fundraiser. Such a defeat would end a lesser woman, but Selina (played by Julia Louis-Dreyfus) buckles down to jump on the ticket of her opponent as his running mate and take on that most unloved of roles, the vice-presidency. Hail to that chief for doing so because that decision powered what, for the past seven years, has consistently been the funniest show on TV.

From Alexander to Obama, all great leaders must decide whether failure defines them or teaches them. Selina, who is not a great leader, is neither defined nor taught by failure – she just presses on regardless, eventually stumbling into the presidency itself. Perseverance is her standout quality. Enduring an avalanche of humiliations and indignities throughout the show’s run, Selina demonstrates a perfect mix of drive, ambition and venal self-preservation to survive the Washington bearpit, despite her gaffes and the limitations of the bozos around her.

Let us not downplay her achievements. Selina is a walking miracle. Not noticeably clever, rarely charming and unencumbered by anything you could call a political philosophy, she nonetheless rises to become leader of the free world. It’s not entirely clear what attracted her to politics, but proving her “pathological narcissist” mother wrong was part of it. A sense of patriotic duty? Unlikely. She calls the US “this cocksuck of a country” and suggests that the door to her office should be “half its height so that people can only approach me on their goddamn motherfucking knees”. Maybe it was the time her father told her as a child: “You know, a lot of people don’t like Nixon, but by God they respect him. And that’s you, peanut.” It’s not as if she particularly enjoys the demands of her job (“I feel like that porn star who had to do 200 men in one day”). It is true she has had a couple of political hobby horses in her time – who could forget the Clean Jobs Commission and the Families First Bill (pretty much everyone) – but overall she’s the kind of politician who doesn’t like to get bogged down in politics. Tenacity, though, she has in spades.

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While she is the centre of the Veep universe, those around her make for compelling viewing, too. Her crew of political cut-throats, chancers and deadbeats jostle for position, tidying her messes, somehow making everything worse in the process. Her chief of staff, Amy, is “a weird mix of lack of self-worth and narcissism”, and her sometime staffer Dan is a “massive and total shit”. Worst of all is her gaffe-magnet communications director, Mike, who sees his role as “the last guy in a human centipede”. They’re everything wrong with everything, yet together they work.

Kind of. Because in the Veep world, nothing ever really works because nothing ever really changes. Much as in Yes, Minister, the status quo will always prevail. No one wins; at best they survive. The show’s greatest triumph is its devastating portrayal of the lobbying, schmoozing and psychological terrorism of the political elite. That’s probably why Beltway insiders of both stripes adore it. It shows how easily idiots can thrive in a broken system, such as gangling imbecile Jonah Ryan, most notably through his wood-chopping campaign commercial. If The West Wing often felt like a homily from an out-of-touch pastor, Veep is the inside man who takes you to one side and gives it to you straight. Noble sentiment may bring comfort, but the truth sets you free.

It feels more needed than ever before. In the show’s run, we’ve gone from The Audacity of Hope of the Obama administration to the Fire and Fury of Trump. While Veep is praised for getting bipartisan support, it would be a mistake to call it apolitical. Its brutally accurate depiction of the idiocies and contradictions of the political culture has a crucial role in itself, if sunlight is indeed the best disinfectant. And whatever its value as sociopolitical commentary, its status as revered satire is unimpeachable. By raising insult to high art, with its Emmy-winning performances and often alarming reflection in real life, Veep has succeeded in its mission. It will be missed, but leaves behind a seven-season run as good as any comedy this century. As legacies go, that beats the hell out of a presidential library.

Veep’s final season starts in the UK on Wednesday at 10.10pm on Sky Atlantic