Love it or hate it – and plenty do – Peaky Blinders is one of the most commercially successful British dramas of the 21st century. Strange, considering it was broadcast on the BBC, but under the stewardship of creator Steven Knight there have been spin-off festivals, ballets, video games and soon, a movie. The ballad of Tommy Shelby came to an end in 2022, and Knight has struggled to emulate its popularity ever since – SAS: Rogue Heroes is fun enough, but lacks depth, and the less said about his version of Great Expectations the better.
But his latest series, the rollicking A Thousand Blows, is good enough to break the curse.
It follows Hezekiah Moscow (Malachi Kirby), a Jamaican man newly arrived in Victorian London, ready to make his name as a lion tamer. When that dream falls apart after he realises the zookeeper plans on having him as an exhibit (the first of many excruciating instances of overt racism), he follows his fellow countryman Alec (Francis Lovehall) into the murky underworld of the East End’s bare-knuckle boxing rings. He proves a natural and soon finds himself the mortal enemy of champion boxer Henry “Sugar” Goodson, played by a jacked-up, genuinely menacing Stephen Graham.
But Hezekiah also makes friends among the Forty Elephants, a gang of thieving women led by Mary Carr (Erin Doherty, excellent and a million miles from her role as Princess Anne in The Crown). She is preoccupied by her current plans to steal from the Queen herself, intercepting very expensive gifts from Her Maj to a visiting delegation from China.
A Thousand Blows has plenty in common with Peaky Blinders – the gangs of suspiciously eloquent ragamuffins, the subtle class commentary, the muddy Victorian streets, Stephen Graham. Even Sugar’s pub-cum-backroom boxing ring, the Blue Coat Boy, has remarkable similarities with Shelby’s Birmingham boozer. There’s some Oliver Twist in there too, Mary slipping between both Fagan and Artful Dodger against Graham’s glowering Bill Sykes-esque boxer. I don’t know if it’s an intentional reference, but it certainly works better than Knight’s previous attempt at Dickens.
Still, this six-parter stands on its own two feet and never feels derivative or unimaginative. As usual, Knight uses real historic people and stories from which to weave his own web and this version of 1880s London heaves with life (though the Disney mega-budget does give a certain unwelcome gloss to the otherwise meticulously designed sets). Each character, from the Chinese hotel proprietor to the Harrods shop assistant desperate to join the Elephants to the local communist agitator, gets their own inner worlds and storylines fleshed out, somehow without overcomplicating the plot.
A Thousand Blows would be nothing without its performances. Graham is always best in villain mode and Sugar’s uncontrollable fists make an excellent foil for the likeable – but certainly not meek – Hezekiah. Kirby finds the role of a lifetime in the Jamaican boxer, proving he has the range to be both an action hero and a romantic leading man. Peaky Blinders made Cillian Murphy a superstar – with a performance matching his, there’s no reason the same won’t happen to Kirby.
Indeed, a second series has already been made and there is a sense that these first episodes are just the preliminary building blocks to a greater story. As Hezekiah makes his way up the ranks of the international boxing world, Mary struggles to keep her grip on her marauding madams and Sugar’s anger spirals to new heights, there are plenty of ways this story can go. I can see A Thousand Blows being on our televisions for years to come.
‘A Thousand Blows’ is streaming on Disney+
Comments
Leave a Comment