The Gentlemen Season 2 Review and Ratings
Cast: Theo James, Benjamin Clémentine, Tyler Conti, Jasmine Blackborow, Rocci-Boy, Michele Morrone
Director: Eran Creevy, Guy Ritchie, Nick Rowland
Streaming Platform: Netflix
Filmyhype.com Ratings: 4/5 (four stars)
More than two years later, the series continues with The Gentlemen Season 2, but shows no signs of stopping, because even before its debut on the platform, starting September 3rd on Netflix, a third season has already been confirmed. And so Theo James returns to the role of the protagonist Eddie alongside Kaya Scodelario, Ray Winstone, and Joely Richardson, but alongside them in this second season we also find some exponents of our audiovisual, from Sergio Castellitto to Benedetta Porcaroli and Michele Morrone. It was originally a film, dated 2019 and directed by Guy Ritchie. Then, in 2024, came the Gentlemen series: same author, same narrative world, but with the idea of expanding the story and taking it beyond the presuppositions of the film project from which it was born.
The first season of The Gentlemen had perfectly captured the soul of a cinematic work entirely signed by the formal verve of a director like Guy Ritchie. The idea of expanding the world underlying that story somehow managed to gain a segment of the audience, which, on Netflix, confirmed the interest in a serial work somewhere between elegant and excessive, with a handful of protagonists who were immediately iconic and certainly memorable for many things. The Gentlemen Season 2 will have reconfirmed all this; will it have succeeded in the feat of pushing even further a context like the one presented previously, between beauty, elegance, and unscrupulous human monstrosity?
The Gentlemen Season 2 Review: The Story Plot
The Gentlemen Season 2 opens up again on the life of Eddie (Theo James), very different from the first lines of the series, changed and determined to get increasingly dirty in the mud of a “work context” found first out of necessity and never abandoned. Everything moves quickly, in step with the gigantic ambition that Eddie himself harbors within himself. This is the fundamental trait at the heart of a story that once again projects home audiences into a tale of crime and monsters, with an always particular, if not unique, touch. Unlike the first steps in the first season, in The Gentlemen Season 2 everything gets bigger, and the pace of the story itself changes. No longer an introduction but growth, this time, transformation and “vision” in a big way, with the entry into the cast of faces that we Italians know very well: Benedetta Porcaroli, Sergio Castellitto and Michele Morrone, and the addition of many other talents that we do not anticipate. Between power, sex, and control, The Gentlemen Season 2 takes flight.
The Gentlemen Season 2 Review and Analysis
So does it make sense to see this second season? It depends. Some things work –photography, for example– and things that just don’t stand up. But before we get to the incredible paradox of the series, let’s move on to the pact of the beginning: the first episode. The Italian graft and the ‘ride on Lake Maggiore’ (why?), to be precise. A Film Commission addition peppered with Anglo-American stereotypes about Italy –wine, art, Campari– that should be forgotten. And with her, the tiger in CGI. So, clear agreements: the first episode does not exist. Too bad, the hunting scene works very well. And let’s move on. The great paradox. The series is written and directed by Guy Ritchie. Yes, the man who made rhythm and full-throttle editing his trademark. And what does The Gentlemen do? For ’85 percent of the time, it is slow and cumbersome and unnecessarily verbose. Lots of tell, little show (to paraphrase the golden rule of cinema).
And when it seems to start, it immediately nails itself. A writing and directing problem: who would have expected it from Guy Ritchie? But there is a but. The series has its high points. And also some well-placed shots. The outbursts of violence, the dark and very English humor, the incredible mini-plot of workers’ rights on marijuana plantations, the rising tension at times, and Vinnie Jones. And I repeat: Vinnie Jones. And then the spirit of the sauna that alone is worth the series. In short: The Gentlemen Season 2 is like The Gentlemen 1. And it has nothing to do with the film, at the end of the day. He does his part if this universe of lords dreaming of becoming gangsters has you hooked. If not, it’s not for you. We’ll see what The Gentlemen 3 looks like.
Expansion and criminal consolidation go hand in hand with narrative expansion, with new faces ready to integrate into the activities of the protagonists: Hugh Bonneville, Benjamin Clementine, Amra Mallassi, and Tyler Conti, but also, and above all, for us Italians, Sergio Castellitto, Benedetta Porcaroli, and Michele Morrone, who add a local branch to Eddie and Susie’s criminal interests. Not everyone has the same space, and one flaw is that it adds more than can be explored in the episodes, with the risk of some hasty and superficial passages, but mostly these are additions that aim to give the protagonists a greater scope of action and the viewer greater variety.
At the same time, the new season’s locations also expand, moving from the elegance of English country estates to the shores of Lake Maggiore in Italy, which the director knows how to enhance in the story segments in which they appear. This increased variety helps make the story of season 2 of The Gentlemen livelier and more engaging, starting more intriguingly than the previous one, which had to take the time to define the narrative context, only to have a slight decline in the middle phase and recover towards the end. In general, however, we would talk about a confirmation of a season that will appeal to those who have already appreciated the first cycle of episodes, but does not offer anything so different as to win over those who did not already appreciate the series.
It’s both Guy Ritchie’s strength and his limitations: when an author has such a well-defined stylistic signature, both admirers and detractors rarely change sides, and The Gentlemen Season 2 confirms this feeling because it confirms how good the author has shown he can do very well, but it also falls into the vices that many viewers dislike. But if you’re on the side of fans of the author and this narrative world in particular, these new 8 episodes will give you some moments that will captivate you. As anticipated, one of the most interesting features of The Gentlemen Season 2 lies precisely in Eddie’s current path. Pride in his family lineage and a good dose of ego will push him towards certain fundamental choices and a change that not everyone would be willing to embrace serenely and lightly.
His gaze, while reminiscent of that of the first season, is in this case very different, determined and somehow dark. Dark as the world of “silhouettes” we see it moving in. The Gentlemen Season 2 raises the bar and puts at its center not only crime and money, but also politics and social reflection. The narrative tangle built in the first season gets bigger, with the series’ gaze aiming further. Thus, The Gentlemen Season 2 becomes a work with a broad international scope and, between familiar faces and fascinating returns, slowly finds its own square between clichés and writing devices that are not too new, but still interesting in their narrative modes.
In more formal terms, the value of The Gentlemen Season 2 remains virtually unharmed. Between elegance and decadence, the style of a series that feeds on its own dust under the carpets oscillates, building its richness through the composition of the shots and the study of an aesthetic that looks to the most unattainable English models (between endless mansions in the British countryside, hunting trips with centuries-old rifles, lunches and fairytale events). The sophistication of some moments almost seems to cite a certain “ancient” cinema of ancient but always magnetic icons. Looking at the entirety of this new season.
The Gentlemen Season 2 manages to entertain and captivate again, playing some cards that we know well, and then increases its scope by risking falling into the most classic and cloying clichés of the case, and remaining balanced most of the time. Keeping it all going is the story, always intriguing and interesting, even where one prefers to embrace mere simplism in its writing and in the characterization of some central characters, and the performances of a cast that works and leaves something behind. Swaying between constructed elegance and a style always on the edge of excess, The Gentlemen Season 2 remains consistent with itself and chooses “the way of the game” to tell a tangled yet captivating story.
The Gentlemen Season 2 Review: The Last Words
The Gentlemen Season 2 somehow manages to pick up everything that worked in the first season, expanding its world and leading Eddie into a transformation that becomes the center of a story once again made of crime, power, and control. The story grows, becomes larger and more international, adding politics and social reflection to a narrative tangle that finds one of its strengths in its own form. Between elegance and decadence, The Gentlemen Season 2 retains that charm that manages to make Guy Ritchie’s work particular, supported by a once again intriguing story and the performances of a cast that works. However, not everything maintains the same strength, especially when the writing prefers to rely on clichés and devices that are not too new, but the series remains consistent with itself and continues to have fun through an exaggerated construction capable of leaving something on, in the end.
