TV critics have called HBO and Sky’s hit drama Succession the perfect show for the Trump era, with its morally bankrupt characters summing up a period where the super rich rule and appear to operate with impunity.

Lucy Prebble, a writer and executive co-producer on the show, whose second season finale airs on Monday, says its appeal lies in how it chimes with the solipsistic and frustrating politics caused by Brexit and the Trump administration.

“We’re living at a time where we feel in stasis,” she said. “And that overlaps rather neatly with Succession, where characters are unable to escape their family dynamic. People may not have responded to it as much in another period.”

But Jesse Armstrong, Succession’s showrunner, was stumped as to why it had struck a chord on both sides of the Atlantic. “I honestly don’t know,” he said. “God only knows why that happens.”

Succession, a melodrama about a media clan, the Roys, who jostle for position as their father’s health falters, has become a pop culture darling, inspiring thinkpieces on everything from its Greek and Roman references to its incredible array of knitwear. It won Armstrong an Emmy for best writing for a drama series.

The show lacks any obviously redeemable character. “I wouldn’t say I like any of them,” said Prebble, adding that Shiv Roy, the duplicitous daughter and political adviser, was the most fun to write. “I wouldn’t want to be friends with any of them.”

Succession writer Lucy Prebble says Shiv Roy was the most fun character to create. Photograph: HBO

Prebble and Armstrong say the Roys were inspired by “corporate or dynastic families all over the world” rather than any one particular family. Armstrong encourages everyone in the writers’ room to read the Financial Times, Vanity Fair and New York Magazine to look out for stories about certain families.

“The Redstones, the Murdochs, the Roberts [who own Comcast], the Smiths [who own the Sinclair Group of conservative TV stations in the US], and obviously the Trumps,” he said. “We take from everywhere and then put it through the lens of our particular characters.”

One figure from the Trump clan did fascinate them, said Prebble. “We always talked a lot about Donald Trump Jr and his childhood. Quite a lot of it is heartbreaking, but even knowing what they’ve been through it’s still very difficult to feel pity for these people.”

Another clear inspiration is the Murdoch clan, who aren’t the show’s biggest fans. “I don’t watch Succession … why would I?” James Murdoch, who is thought to have inspired Jeremy Strong’s character, Kendall Roy, told the New Yorker.

Brian Cox, who plays the bellicose, power-hungry patriarch, Logan Roy, said he was stopped in the street in London by a man who told him he was enjoying the show but his wife found it hard to watch. When Cox asked why, the man – Keith Tyson, the Turner prize winning artist – explained he was married to Elisabeth Murdoch, the daughter of Rupert and sister of the Fox Corporation CEO, Lachlan Murdoch.

For Prebble, any denials from the Murdochs are a positive signal. “If something is genuinely biting and satirical then the subjects pretend they haven’t seen it,” she said. “I don’t think Trump has the attention span to watch a whole episode.”

The Washington Post TV critic Alyssa Rosenberg says the appeal of Succession is rooted in schadenfreude, as viewers who feel powerless to stop abuses of power in the real world can enjoy some recompense via their TV. “It’s weirdly reassuring in that it tells you over and over again that these people might act with impunity but it’s OK because eventually they will destroy themselves,” she said.

Miles Surrey, who has written about Succession for the Ringer, thinks its message of privileged misery has landed with an audience that is looking for clear condemnation of the 1% and its lifestyle. “The Roy kids are raised with a silver spoon that can lead to cool things like helicopter rides and private jets,” he said. “But their wealth comes at the expense of being psychologically tormented by a father who is incapable of loving his own children.”

According to Prebble, when wealthy consultants came in to give them guidance on the super rich, they would never be able to answer the question: what happens when you’ve earned enough money? “Every time they would look at us blankly and say that really doesn’t happen. People who are driven to be that wealthy, there isn’t an amount at which they stop.”

Succession follow the lives of super-rich media clan, the Roys. Photograph: HBO

Armstrong said: “I go away from those meetings with this buzzing sense that you’ve unlocked this world, then I look at my notes and it says something like ‘rich people like lobster’. Meeting these people is important but actually if you read the books about Maxwell or Murdoch they’re full of amazing stories.”

Viewing figures for Succession are not remarkable – it debuted with 1.2 million in the US for its second season premiere, compared with the record-breaking 19.3 million viewers who tuned in for the Game of Thrones finale.

But when compared to similarly critically adored shows such as Mad Men, which pulled in 3.3 million viewers for its finale in the US, Succession has done enough to convince HBO to greenlight a third season. HBO praised the show’s exploration of wealth, power and family and said it had “resonated powerfully with audiences”.

Rosenberg believes it is too early to say if the show can emulate previous prestige dramas such as Mad Men and The Sopranos, which influenced everything from fashion to other TV. “I have read about a dozen posts about Shiv’s style but I’m not sure we’re going to have a Succession line of clothes in Banana Republic any time soon,” she said. “The old-fashioned has an inherent sexiness, and Mad Men revived that, but the cable knit sweater is a little bit of a harder sell.”