Not only does he know all about the East India Company’s political machinations, but he is somehow aware that his deceased mother was Native American and bought by his father when he procured the land from her people. Omniscient, always one step ahead and seemingly invincible. There’s a hint of Bruce Wayne about Delaney, not just the brooding darkness, gruff voice and the fact he has his own Alfred style butler, but he has the infallibility of a superhero. He freaks out his dad’s former servant Brace (David Hayman), kicks Helga the brothel madame (Franka Potente) out of his family offices, and digs up his father’s body so that a surgeon can perform an illegal autopsy. Delaney himself has no intent on selling the land instead, he spends the first episode skulking around the city like the Grim Reaper, adorned in a top hat and rather fetching overcoat, meeting former acquaintances, settling old debts and threatening to chop off men’s testicles. Their Lannister-style love affair may have also bore a secret love-child, introduced as a third sibling, but given Delaney’s reluctance to see the boy it seems he may be one of the “secrets of the past” that Zilpha wants her brother to “keep buried.” Chaplin isn’t given a great deal to do here but she does a commendable job with her limited lines.Įqually disgruntled by Delaney’s comeback is Zilpha’s husband Thorne (Jefferson Hall), who was expecting his wife to inherit Nootka Sound with intentions to sell it to the East India Company. “One thing Africa did not cure, is that I still love you,” he mutters in her ear, and in spite of her declarations of being happily married, it is evident Zilpha harbors similar feelings for Delaney. Most surprised by Delaney’s reappearance is his half-sister Zilpha (Oona Chaplin), who it’s heavily implied shares an incestuous past with her returning brother. Pryce brings the same menacing arrogance to Strange as he did in his recent role as the High Sparrow in Game of Thrones, only now he’s prone to fits of f-bomb filled tirades. The East India Company, led by Stuart Strange (Jonathan Pryce), is set up as the season’s “big bad.” Strange presides over a group of nefarious individuals who regale him with rumors of Delaney’s past, including how he set ablaze a navy boat, broke the necks of his army officers, and fought with a bear in Chancery Lane (did that bear follow Hardy from The Revenant?). There’s also the matter of his inheritance, a piece of land on the coast of Vancouver called Nootka Sound clearly a sought after commodity in the war between Britain and America, regardless of the East India Company’s unconvincing claims of its “worthlessness.” He arrives in London in 1814 to attend his father’s funeral and investigate the circumstances surrounding his death (which he discovers was arsenic poisoning).
Hardy, an actor obsessed with playing mumbling madmen, stars as the aforementioned Delaney, a brooding mystery man who returns from Africa after been presumed dead for over a decade. In comparison, this first hour of Taboo is ultra-serious and somewhat of a drag despite how stunning it all looks The Killing director Kristoffer Nyholm brilliantly highlights the grotesque beauty of Regency England. Taboo lacks the urgency of Blinders, which injects its hyper-reality version of post-WW1 Britain with a sense of fun, using flashes of humor and a modern soundtrack to offset its more over-the-top elements. Knight is best known for creating Peaky Blinders, another pulpy period piece set in 1920s Birmingham.
This eight-part BBC/FX miniseries is a passion project devised by Hardy and his dad “Chips,” and brought to life with the help of writer Steven Knight, a frequent Hardy collaborator.
It’s the kind of show that requires a deep cleanse immediately after watching. Taboo is Dickensian-fuelled gloomy England littered with sunken-eyed prostitutes, backstreet butchers, and toothless drunks.
As a period drama, it’s a far cry from the lavish parlors and summery cloche hats of Downton Abbey.
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It’s an image that perfectly encapsulates the tone of Taboo: grubby, dark and full of secrets. When we first meet James Keziah Delaney (Tom Hardy) he’s knee deep in mud, his face covered in dirt, hurriedly burying something in the ground. Warning: this recap of the “Shovels and Keys” episode of Taboo contains spoilers.
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