Gangi Londynu

Gareth Evans serves up a gangster Opus Magnum in nine hours and it's the event of the year, maybe even the century. Evans has evolved perhaps two levels as a director and has given us a powerful tale of fate with tight characters, a compelling story, amazing action where violence takes on an absolutely different and new dimension. The boss of a British mob family is shot dead and the son puts all business on hold to go to war in search of the perpetrator, aided by Sope Dirisu, an undercover cop and the protagonist. Evans has really made the best gangster drama since Scarface where every character looks like a real gangster, and a large group of families are reunited. British Gangsters, British Gypsies, Irishmen with flintlocks, Nigerians with machetes, trained Turks, Danish Special Forces and more. The fatalism splashes out in all directions and Evans entertains with interesting twists and turns. Once again, the aciton in the style of The Raid is awesome. There are fewer fights than one would expect, but when they do happen, they are among the best in the genre, and the shootouts are excellent, too, breathtaking in their realism. I'd say every single action scene already has an iconic feel to it. Apart from the classic action, there is also torture, and a lot of unpleasant ways to kill a person. The highlight for me is episode 5 with its 35-minute home invasion. It’s so awesome that I nearly blew my head off with excitement. A glorious heart attack filled nine hours where I sweated, screamed, cheered and more than once watched with my diaphragm open. I have only one criticism of the series, and that is that from episode 5 onwards Evans hands over the director's chair to Xavier Gens, who concentrates more on the story and character development. I hope this series will see a 2nd season. Story*****, Action*****, Humor>No, Violence*****, Entertainment*****, Music****, Visual****, Atmosphere*****, Suspense*****. 10/10: (04.05.2020)

The return of Gareth Evans's spectacular gangster drama is still a solid London gangster series, but sadly it doesn't have the same quality as the first season (perhaps due to Evans only supervising but not directing this time). Koba, a new mob boss, comes to town and wants to take over London with his own rough methods. He commands respect, is portrayed very convincingly and is definitely a great asset to the series, even if he doesn’t get as much screen time the second half of the season. Old friends return and a few new characters are added, with drugs, guns and investors all being dealt with again, and the whole sleaze and corruption of London is downright palpable. I was a bit annoyed by the main character Elliot, who spent the first four episodes searching, not knowing quite whose side to be on, deliberately avoiding the fight, but it gets better in the end. Each character has a strong scene to themselves. Luan has a great opening home invasion, Lela has a perfect survival and escape from the house, and Elliot excels in the Paris club. The action this time around isn't quite as much as I would have liked and the gunfights dominate. There's probably only three purely physical contact fights. Season 2 lacks anything in the style of episode 5 in the first season, which was a half hour action inferno that's already iconic; there's nothing as epic here. Fortunately in terms of violence, torture and gore, Gangs of London is once again wholesome and they don’t fuck around. The music is uncomfortably creepy, underscoring all the brutal sequences and busting your balls. The visuals are decent, the craftsmanship is superb, the acting is excellent, the story is well paced and there are a few twists and turns, so definitely a great return and let there be a third, it promises interesting things again. 8/10 (18.11.2022)