(TV SERIES) The Gentlemen Season 1 - An Entertaining Spin Off from the Well Executed Movie by Guy Ritchie

This series was shown in the coming soon section in Netflix for quite a while and I was intrigued as it reminded me of a movie that I had seen few years ago. Apparently it was indeed based on that film, which made me interested in giving it a try. So I started watching the series few days after its release and managed to finish it last night. All right, here's more on the series.

Brief Story Line

Edward Horniman (Theo James - The Time Traveler's Wife TV series, Divergent movies etc) was called back home due to the poor health condition of his father, Duke Archibald Horniman (Edward Fox - The Day of the Jackal etc). He reunited with his older brother Frederick (Daniel Ings - Instinct TV series etc), younger sister Charlotte (Jasmine Blackborrow - Marie Antoinette TV series etc), their mother Lady Sabrina (Joely Richardson - The Sandman TV series, Endless Love 2014 remake etc) and the groundskeeper Geoffrey (Vinnie Jones - Snatch, X-Men: The Last Stand etc). When the Duke ultimately passed away and the will was read, to everyone's surprise, the whole estate and title was given to Edward which did not go well with Frederick. 

It turned out though that the estate had been used by criminal organization led by Susie Glass (Kaya Scodelario - Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City, The Maze Runner trilogy etc) to grow illegal weeds underground. And they insisted to continue their operation with the new Duke. As he tried his best to keep everything under control, including his erratic brother and the criminal activity related to the Glass family, Edward must find ways to get them out of their home peacefully. Things gotten more complicated when the wealthy & mysterious Stanley Johnston (Giancarlo Esposito - Kaleidoscope mini series, Line of Duty etc) pushing hard for Edward to sell the estate to him.

So what would happen to Edward and would he be able to safe guard his family? You could find out in this series.

End of Brief Story Line

As I said above, this series was inspired/based on a movie of the same title  which I quite enjoyed. And when I started to watch this, I immediately felt the distinct Guy Ritchie style of story telling. It was full of dark comedy moments, especially involving Frederick and the various problematic situation because of his non-thinking action. After finishing the first episode that I really liked, I noticed that it was directed by Ritchie who also did for second episode and served as Executive Producer. The good thing about him directing the first two episodes as it really set the tone for the whole season, even though the subsequent episodes were directed by other people. 

Throughout the whole 8 episodes, we would see the sharpness of Edward in dealing with the situation and the coldness and ruthlessness of Susie Glass, combined with the antics of Frederick which made the series very enjoyable. Theo James, Kaya Scodelario and Daniel Ings were just awesome. Aside from those names I mentioned above, there were plenty of recurring cast and guest stars like Ray Winstone (Damsel, Beowulf etc) as Susie's father Bobby Glass, Michael Vu as Jimmy the weed grower, Gaia Weiss (Overdrive etc) as princess Rosanne, Channel Creswell (This Is England etc) as Frederick's wife Tammy and many others. I thought that all the cast were amazing here. Every one seemed perfectly suited for their roles. 

Another factor that I liked about the series were the dialogues which were absolutely wonderful. I really enjoyed watching their sophisticated kind of conversation that not only sounded intelligent but also witty. I must applaud the writing team of the series for managing this feat. However, I do think that there was a lack of action here compared to the movie (although that one was not a full action movie either). And there was no mystery and only one mildly surprising revelation towards the end. But I did like the ending of the series where it opened up to the possibility of stories in the future, should they decided to renew it. 

Overall this is an entertaining series if you like Guy Ritchie's style. I thought the story telling was great, the premise was interesting, the characters were quite captivating and the dark comedy was very strong. Aside from the lack of action (despite categorized as action comedy) and the mystery or masterfully crafted twists like the movie, this one was still very enjoyable. Btw, I do not think that you would have difficulty understanding the series even if you have not seen the movie it was based on, cause there was no heavy reference to it (except the weed growing business on estates). So if you like the attributes I mentioned, then most probably you would like this series as well. 

Mike's movie moments rating: 4 out of 5 stars