“What’s wrong with indulging in a Big Mac every now and then?”
That’s what I constantly found myself thinking while I sat through Paramount+’s intellectually nutrition-less and overly self-serious MobLand.
The gritty crime drama, originally conceived as a Ray Donovan spin-off by credentialled show-runner Ronan Bennett (Top Boy, The Day of the Jackal), had all the key ingredients of a winner – from the toasted sesame bun of Bennett himself and the cheese & sauce that is beloved director Guy Ritchie; to the beef patties of a heavyweight cast led by Tom Hardy, Pierce Brosnan, and Helen Mirren.
But then came the realisation.
No matter how much you dress up McDonald’s, at the end of the day, it’s still just McDonald’s. And all the familiar flavours we’ve grown to enjoy across however many decades of screen consumption simply could not mask the bitter taste of disappointment. Stomachs empty, zero creative new ground has been broken; and the triumvirate of Hardy, Brosnan, and Mirren frankly deserve a better vehicle to ply their craft.
MobLand. More like Mo’ Bland.
The series follows the incongruently named fixer Harry Da Souza (Tom Hardy), who’s employed by the formidable Harrigan crime family. Specifically the ever-so-suave patriarch Conrad Harrigan (Pierce Brosnan) and Lady Macbeth analogue Maeve Harrigan (Helen Mirren) – nouveau aristocrats who are natural evolutions to Mickey & Rosalind Pearson from Ritchie’s feature-length run of The Gentlemen.
In the debut episode, Harry is charged with keeping the peace between the Harrigans and rival criminal enterprise the Stevensons; headed by Geoff Bell’s no-nonsense Richie Stevenson. Tensions reach a fever pitch when Richie’s son Tommy (Felix Edwards) goes missing after bendering with Conrad’s cartoonishly psychotic delinquent of a grandson Eddie (Anson Boon).
As it so happens, in a fit of cocaine-induced mania, the unruly Harrigan heir pre-emptively stabbed another clubgoer to avoid a similar fate. In the chaos of their escape is where the not-so-harmless night on the town goes proper pear-shaped, to borrow from the hokey London vernacular.
Stuck between a rock and a dumb place, Hardy’s talented Mr Da Souza seamlessly navigates both the moral and legal grey areas of keeping the heat off the Harrigans all while a turf war simmers beneath the surface.
It’s classic competency porn, which we have a well-documented weakness for here at B.H., annoyingly interrupted by the predictable trope of a troubled homelife (his wife Jan, portrayed by Joanne Froggatt, is pretty damn keen on couple’s counselling).
Whether you buy the whole man-at-odds-with-himself shtick, MobLand undeniably plays to Hardy’s onscreen strengths as a grizzled loner. There are visible shades of James Delaney from cult favourite drama Taboo, in addition to flashes of Peaky Blinders‘ Alfie Solomons. This is an operator who can get s**t done and we’re delighted to be a passenger along for the ride.
Unfortunately, that’s really all there is to the entertainment factor of MobLand, at least for the time being; and once the novelty of watching Tom Hardy menace everyone he openly deems a “c**t” (there’s admittedly an embarrassment of riches in this department) as well as the silky charms of Brosnan’s Irish brogue wears off, you’re not left with much else to chew on. We’ve seen this a hundred times before and we’re left wanting.
It’s to the point where the discerning audience member is left scratching their heads: how, indeed, did proven names like Ronan Bennett and Guy Ritchie fumble this? Had what ostensibly appears to be a rushed retooling of the Ray Donovan canon – complete with multiple last-minute title changes – leave the screenplay too thin? Or has the teats of this specific subgenre already been milked dry?
Beneath the tired Cockney-isms and retro cliches, there is a seedling of a genuinely compelling affair. The same seedling that sold us all on it to begin with. Though unless MobLand somehow unburdens itself of its lacklustre writing and cumbersome gangster posturing, I don’t remain optimistic about what’s to come. Tune in at your own discretion, I suppose.
By all accounts, you’re better off investing your time into BBC’s latest homerun colloquially dubbed “Scouse Sopranos”: This City Is Ours starring Sean Bean.
MobLand is now streaming in Australia via Paramount+.
Also read:
- At Long Last: ‘The Gentlemen’ Season 2 Confirmed By Netflix
- ‘Narcos’ Creator Has A New ‘Peaky Blinders’-Style Crime Drama Set During The 80s
- The Insane Logistics Behind Netflix’s One-Take ‘Adolescence’ Episodes
- ‘The Day Of The Jackal’ Season 2 Promises To Be Killer Television
- Another ‘Yellowstone’ Spin-Off About The Duttons Is In Development
