CJWar

Gangs of London quickly became one of my favourite opening seasons of a show. The violence, drama, characters and twists were superb. Even when it appeared the cast would potentially be changing in the second season, I was excited for its release.

Unfortunately, the second season did not meet my expectations. The story is incredibly far-fetched at this point. Secondary and tertiary characters with nothing to offer are suddenly influencing big players or calling shots, we have assassins and multiple conspiracies, people surviving fatal wounds, people fighting like they've spent decades training under James Bond, gangsters shown to have no remorse walking away from traitors simply so the traitor can survive another episode and so much more. The entire thing is an entertaining mess.

The action scenes are amazing. Luan, Lale and Elliot are fantastic during these scenes, but their sheer competence and almost superhuman fighting ability are also part of the problem.

Season 1: 9/10 Season 2: 6/10.

I've held off watching this due to the poor reviews from Tolkien fans. I'm not against making changes for an adaptation, but they sounded like changes that would have a negative effect on the story. Unfortunately, that seems to be the case. The changes and the original characters needing backstory to be filled in make the show slow, boring and lacking any sort of urgency. It feels like there is no real threat in the world, and by the time we see there is, I was too exhausted by the other nonsense to care.

The costumes and sets look good, though more in line with the later Harry Potter films than what's capable in the 2020s with a big budget. The sound is impeccable, creating a feel similar to the LotR movies. The acting is fair. The story really is what drags it down. Which is a real shame as it looks like there was some care put into creating the show.

Amazon's budget, the production crew and the actors could have created something spectacular with an original script, rather than something trying to cling to a vision they don't have the rights to and missing the mark.

This is a throwback to the simple action movies of the nineties, and it does it fairly well. The characters are a bit one dimensional, but we don't need too much backstory to enjoy the action.

The film is dragged down a bit by the inclusion of the main character's girlfriend. It would have been easy to cut most of her scenes entirely without changing the film. That's not a slight against the actress, but the writing. There's a longer scene involving her towards the end that just completely destroys any sense of realism the film had. I won't spoil it, but it involves a fair amount of running in a packed airport full of extraordinary blind security.

It's not Die Hard, and there won't be any calls for a sequel but it's worth a (single) watch.