MobLand

The series Mobland starts off strong and is carried by Tom Hardy. The other actors range from decent to completely over-the-top - especially Pierce Brosnan and Helen Mirren, who are genuinely hard to watch.

The show lacks an overarching storyline, instead stringing together one narrative fragment after another, often feeling more like a soap opera than an actual mafia series. Many scenes are marked by illogical decisions. All in all, it's nowhere near masterpieces like The Sopranos.

It's a show you can easily binge in one or two days, have a good time with, and completely forget about four weeks later. Without Tom Hardy, it would be a 5 out of 10.

This show is one of those shows, that if never existed, people would still feel as if they have seen it. That is how many times a thing such as this has already been seen, and truth to be told, previously done in quite better ways and versions of itself..

Not an awful show, other than dreadful irish accents and some quite lousy, convenient writing, especially near and by the end, it is not bad, only issue, that is becoming bigger and bigger issue lately, is that it is generic, in instances painfully, borderline slop.

Pierce Brosnan more and more looks and sounds, shortly said resembles, that hypothetical "thing" where good old Jean-Luc Picard, in his old days 'Picard' starts a gangster organisation in his vineyard back in France, while also pretending to be Irish (most funny part is that Pierce was born in Ireland), and Tom Hardy is way better "Data" than that (maybe Taboo should be renewed)..

Shows like this are the product of those who don't know when the time to stop has come, we have seen this pattern past decade over and over again with creators who peaked in their creativity and skill a long time ago, now attempting to reach those peaks again, while continuing Faded Creativity Circus..

Most people I've spoken to regards this drama have always said to me, ''oh it's brilliant, 10/10." Now don't get me wrong I did enjoy it and it is rather good, but perfect? No, not at all, and here is for why. I feel Pierce Brosnan is over acting. It feels like he's trying too hard to be the scary 'Godfather.' Less is more I say. To a lesser degree ditto goes to Helen Mirren also. And finally, there are certain scenes where Tom Hardy is mumbling his lines, in order to come across as sinister as possible. All well and good, but it's bloody annoying, because when he does deliver his lines like that, I can't tell what he's saying! In my opinion, GEOFF BELL, is the standout actor in this. He is on top form and probably this is the best role he's ever played. Oh and if you do want perfection, I suggest you watch THIS CITY IS OURS, trust me on this.

Show did an excellent job of establishing characters and what their individual idiosyncrasies are. A mob story but character driven. It reminded me of the Sopranos that way. The characters are just as interesting as the plot lines. What happened in the last few episodes was what happens to a lot of shows that start strong, the writers just start throwing too much on top of the characters. They become inconsistent with the exception of Harry. The writers amp up the brutality to wear the violence becomes disproportionately too much. It is not lost on me that a mob story will have violence. What sometimes happens and I think what happened with this show, is that the characters become more erratic and more violent but at the same time they're asked to plot and think and connive their way towards their own ends. In a 10 episode season, some characters are not even recognizable from where they were built to where they wind up. That's not necessarily character evolution. It felt like a lot of the characters were lobotomized. Plot devices are inserted in a heavy-handed way to make this one a good guy and this one a bad guy. I don't feel like we were treated very intelligently as the season moved along. There was a lot of potential here, and as some reviewers have written, the show really lost its way.

I'm Irish and have lived in Ireland all my 52 years. Why is Pierce Brosnan not able to do a convincing accent in this, when he's also, you know, Irish? It is so cringeworthy to hear. They've obviously asked him to go full mob Irish and he can't do it justice AT ALL. His scenes with Helen Mirren - also delivering a terrible Irish accent - come across like comic relief plonked in the middle of some genuinely interesting and exciting work from the rest of the cast.

Thankfully they only take up about a quarter of screen time, so my high rating is all for Tom Hardy, who yet again, serves up a nuanced and believable character. He's mesmerising to watch. He almost underplays it (which makes Brosnan's overacting even more jarring). I'm intrigued to see where this goes.