SummaryDushane (Ashley Walters) and his friend Sully (Kane Robinson aka Kano) deal drugs from their East London housing estate in this crime drama series written and created by Ronan Bennett.
[The first two season are called Top Boy: Summerhouse on Netflix]
SummaryDushane (Ashley Walters) and his friend Sully (Kane Robinson aka Kano) deal drugs from their East London housing estate in this crime drama series written and created by Ronan Bennett.
[The first two season are called Top Boy: Summerhouse on Netflix]
Perhaps a storyline inspired by the Windrush Scandal feels a bit behind the curve. Not so a script that entraps a fresh generation of children and even babies. While this addictive saga will exit with a satisfying bang, that’s the real story that never ends.
It is violent, with some intense scenes that can stick with you, even episodes after watching. Still, Top Boy is a distinct example of when great writing meets great acting; overlook it at your own peril.
Top Boy has rarely taken a wrong step. The only risk you take here is becoming like me—a hopeless evangelist who knows the futility of his cause, but is so taken with the quality of this singular show in its sunset moment that I can’t stop shouting into the void.
If the biggest criticism you can level at a TV show is that it leaves you wanting more, that's hardly a harsh condemnation – this final Top Boy could have easily justified a couple more episodes, but what we get remains a powerful send-off for an important series with a stellar ensemble cast who are at the very top of their game.
Top Boy can be bleak and violent, with dialogue so naturalistic that it verges on the impenetrable, but in telling stories that rarely get heard, it asks us to think differently about the city we live in. Drake has done British viewers a favour. We can thank him later.
This concluding chapter of the Top Boy saga pulls none of its punches – if anything it makes too many of them, like a rabbit-punching flyweight – and demonstrates that a big American streamer can be trusted to tell Black, British stories.