The Gentlemen Season 2 Review: An Empire of Bruised Boys Learns to Bleed

The Gentlemen season 2 finds Guy Ritchie leaning harder into his enduring theme: men who mistake owning something with being someone. This season, Eddie (Theo James) leans into this even harder than ever. Among other things, he spends this run muscling into Italian mafia territory, even as he is chasing a seat in the House of Lords. And at the same time, the Netflix series, which is a spinoff of 2019’s action comedy movie of the same name, drops the zany energy that made season 1 so much fun.

It’s a riskier season than the first. It is also colder and darker and, for my money, it is a better one, even when its reach outpaces its grip.

What is The Gentlemen Season 2 about?

We find Eddie a year into running things alongside Susie Glass (Kaya Scodelario). Susie’s father Bobby (Ray Winstone) is still calling the shots from prison. Eddie is not satisfied with maintenance mode anymore. He wants, among other things, a peerage that would let him push a bill through Parliament and a foothold in Italy. In Italy, the “boss of bosses” Marco Moretti (Sergio Castellitto) isn’t exactly rolling out the welcome mat, though.

Such ambition does not go well with the Glasses. Bobby does not want to expand purely for expansion’s sake. Susie finds herself torn between them. Add to that a wine-lover American billionaire who is massaging Eddie’s ego (played by Giancarlo Esposito, seemingly having a whale of a time as Stanley Johnston), a peer whose vote can be bought with nothing more than a night out with the right person (Hugh Bonneville’s Lord Hawthorne), and some odd elements of Slavic folklore underpinning everything, and what you have is a season that is reaching for something much more than “gangsters, but posh.”

The Gentlemen Season 2 review

Theo James returns as Eddie Horniman in The Gentlemen season 2 | Credits: Netflix

I found James’ interpretation of Eddie somewhat flat in season one. But that flatness fits his season 2 arc like a glove. Clearly, a man hides behind this mask, running out of arguments with his conscience. Scodelario and Winstone remain impressive. The former’s scenes with James do not read as romance, exactly. But for a laddish franchise like this, they seem almost intimate. Bobby’s spiritual turn came out of left field. I am certain it must have sounded on paper as though the show lost its nerve about being a straightforward crime drama. And yet, it mostly works on screen.

The humor of season 1 is missing here. The biggest reason is the tone the show is going for. Also, Ings’ Freddy is barely around this time. I find that a real loss — he was the funniest thing about season 1. Bonneville picks up some of the slack. But it must be said that the show as a whole is remarkably less interested in being funny in season 2 to the point that I am not sure if we can call it an action comedy anymore.

I liked the new additions. Marco Moretti (Sergio Castellitto), for example, is interesting enough not to be a stock mobster from an 80s gangster picture. Michele Morrone is electrifying as Moretti’s enforcer and genuinely unpredictable in a way the show could frankly use more of.

Is The Gentlemen Season 2 worth watching?

Theo James and Kaya Scodelario stand on a balcony with a tiger in The Gentlemen Season 2 key art | Credits: Netflix

The pacing was one thing where the season showed its strain. The plot had to serve two countries and an ever-widening web of factions tangled together. Some stretches drag in a way the first season never did. Season 1 too had a similar problem, but the sophomore season inherited it at a larger scale.

Even so, I enjoyed watching The Gentlemen season 2. It took a real risk instead of rehashing what worked before. For the most part, it pays off. Some will miss the breezy fun, but in return you get a darker, more compelling protagonist and a firmer sense of what all this ambition is meant to cost. I don’t know about you, but I’d call it a fair trade. I can’t wait for season 3.

The Gentlemen season 2 is streaming in its entirety on Netflix.

The Gentlemen Season 2 Review: An Empire of Bruised Boys Learns to Bleed