The death of Kim Il-sung draped the mantle of power across Kim Jong-il's narrow shoulders. Now, with Kim Jong-il laid to rest, it is his son Kim Jong-un who carries the flame of communism's only family dynasty.
The local and international risks facing Kim Jong-un appear significantly steeper than those his father faced on his accession to power in 1994, but there are also good reasons for a smooth succession.
'Kim Jong-un faces the greater challenges,' said Dr Andrei Lankov, a North Korea expert at Seoul's Kookmin University. 'Kim Jong-il had about 20 years to prepare and could rely on the legacy of his father Kim Il-sung, who was quite popular.'
While state propaganda gushes that the Kim Jong-un is 'head of the army, the party and the state', his only official title is vice-chairman of the Korean Worker's Party's Central Defence Commission, a less powerful body than the National Defence Commission that his father chaired.
The younger Kim was revealed to the public only last year, and is believed to have been groomed for power only since 2008, when his father is thought to have suffered a stroke. And while North Koreans revered Kim Il-sung, the national founder, there is likely less respect for Kim Jong-il, under whose rule the economy plummeted and devastating famines killed an estimated 5 to 10 per cent of the population.
The economic inheritance is a poisoned chalice for Kim Jong-un.
'In 1994, the economy was much better,' said Kim Tae-woo, president of Seoul's Korea Institute of National Unification. 'But now the North is much more isolated, and its economy is really faltering.'