Home Entertainment: ‘Gangs of London’ Blu-ray Review

If you missed Gangs of London when it aired in March on Sky Atlantic, now is the perfect time to catch up with it as it arrives on Blu-ray and DVD from Monday 27th July. Set in London’s criminal underbelly, the show follows the power struggle that ensues between various criminal factions after the Kingpin that held them all together – Finn Wallace – is murdered. Stepping into his shadow is his eldest son Sean (Joe Cole), a young man out for vengeance no matter the cost to peace between clans. As battle lines are drawn up and power plays made, Sean finds himself struggling to know who he can and can’t trust. Add into the mix that his newest confidant Elliott (Sope Dirisu) is actually an uncover police officer intent on bringing Sean down, and you have all the ingredients for an explosive crime thriller.

Gangs of London is unlike anything we’ve ever seen before on British television. The production values are through the roof and the show looks super sleek and stylish. Rather than sticking to the gritty and grimy London streets that we’ve become accustomed to in other British made crime dramas, we instead get to see the fancy side, the side full of high-rise glass laden city buildings. The costumes reinforce the extravagant opulence and everyone is super-smart and business like. But what really makes this show stand apart from its peers, is the action design. Each episode is jam packed full every type of action under the sun. Over the course of the series, to name just a few of the set pieces, we get a pub brawl, an axe battle, a sniper attack, a gun siege, and all-out massacre. This action is genuinely winch-inducing, eye watering, and excessively violent; it should come as no surprise then that Gareth Evans of The Raid fame is one of the masterminds of the series. Given how integral the fight and action sequences are to the plot, the stunt teams deserve to be recognised for all their hard work. Jude Poyer, whom previously worked with Evans on Apostle, heads up the action design for seven of the ten episodes and the pair clearly work exceptionally well together.

Evans isn’t on his own in the directors seat though. He shares that role with both Xavier Gens (Hitman) and Corin Hardy (The Hallow). Despite the ten episode story arc being told via three different directors, the show always feels coherent with no obvious break in the style of the story-telling. Of course each director has their own little flourishes that definitely shine through in their episodes. Hardy for example, fully displays his horror roots in episode three, with nods to The Shining and a snippet of Shaun of the Dead being broadcast on one of the televisions. But these little moments don’t detract from the overall look, tone, and feel of the series.

In terms of narrative, there’s more than enough story to last the distance, and with so many twist, turns, and deaths, it’s easy to see why it’s been compared to as a real-world Game of Thrones. It’s been so intricately layered that, although the Wallace’s and Elliott’s stories form the core of the plot, you could easily create another entire series around any of the other factions. The stand-out episode of the series, episode five directed by Evans, doesn’t even feature these characters, it instead focuses in on one of the other factions and is a true masterclass in, not only action, but suspense.

Our cast of characters is diverse and super talented. Sope Dirisu is brilliant as Elliott, the bullish detective whom finds himself fighting, not only to maintain his cover, but also to keep himself alive. Given his role, he has the brunt of the action to perform and he showcases a flair for fighting that is sure to set him up for a career in action features should he want it. Joe Cole makes some interesting choices with Sean, the conflicted heir to the throne, which works for majority, though anyone familiar with Joseph Morgan’s portrayal of the character Klaus in The Originals may notice some idiosyncratic similarities. What makes Gangs of London really special is that its female characters aren’t the typical gangster’s molls or femme fatale’s that usually populate the genre. Each woman, from Michelle Fairley’s matriarch, to Elliott’s love interest Shannon (Pippa Bennett-Warner), Elliott’s handler (Jing Lusi) and faction head Lale (Narges Rashidi), all have their own identity and agendas. More importantly, they are all given the time to develop their roles. As Lale, Rashidi in particular almost steals the show out from under everybody; Lale is spurred on by a traumatic event in her past and following her journey makes for compelling viewing. She’s also one of the female characters that gets the most opportunity to get stuck into the action.

Rather than judge Gangs of London as a sequence of ten episodes, it would be more appropriate to judge it as ten interconnecting feature films. The standard and quality really is that good. A welcome breath of fresh-air to British television, Gangs of London is an action fanatics dream come true. We cannot wait to delve back into this world with the recently commissioned second series.

Gangs of London arrives on Blu-ray and DVD from Monday 27th July.