Summarize this content to 2000 words in 6 paragraphs in Arabic Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.It would have been easy to dismiss new London-set crime saga MobLand as a Guy Ritchie knock-off, were Guy Ritchie himself not heavily involved in making the show.The 10-part Paramount+ series is a collaboration between the mockney master (who serves as a producer and directs the first two episodes) and Top Boy creator Ronan Bennett. Yet while a fusion of the former’s stylised, swaggering approach with the latter’s gritty storytelling might have yielded something original, the actual result is another uninspired gangs-and-geezers thriller.The gangs in question are the Harrigans and the Stevensons: two notorious crime families who have carved up London’s drug trade between them. For years the patriarchs, Conrad Harrigan (Pierce Brosnan) and Richie Stevenson (Geoff Bell), have been sworn enemies; the former an Irish mobster living like an English gentleman in the Cotswolds, the latter an old-school gangster operating out of a boxing club. It seems, however, that the youngest scions of these rival dynasties have become secret friends. It’s all a bit Romeo and Juliet, but with more coked-up warehouse raves and immortal lines like “get that up your schnoz”.When Stevenson junior goes missing after a night out with Harrigan’s sociopathic grandson Eddie (Anson Boon), a war between the groups seems inevitable. Enter Harry Da Souza (the recently less-seen Tom Hardy), Harrigan’s spokesman, hitman and all-round fixer, who is tasked with keeping the peace. An unassuming yet intimidating enforcer, Harry does whatever it takes to protect “the family”, and in so doing, neglects his own.If Hardy seems barely invested in his role, a few in the ensemble are guilty of going too far the other way with overripe performances. Not that there’s much nuance to be mined from a clunky script that makes heavy use of clichés and another word beginning with “C”.Still, there is a certain enjoyment to be had watching the great Helen Mirren ham it up as Harrigan’s leopardprint-wearing wife-cum-adviser, Maeve, and a sense of tensions escalating by the end of the second episode (the rest was, perhaps tellingly, not available to preview). Things could yet improve, but for now MobLand is in need of a good fixer.★★☆☆☆Episode 1 on Paramount+ from March 30. New episodes released weekly
