After a frankly ridiculous two-and-a-half-year wait, Netflix’s mob series The Gentlemen has returned for season 2 this week. The well-received original was not renewed until five months after it aired, and then creator Guy Ritchie was busy with a bunch of different film and TV projects, delaying production. But it’s here, critics are chiming in, and it has a Rotten Tomatoes review score live.
ThoughThe Gentlemen season 2 opened with a pure 100% score, it now has a still-solid 81% Rotten Tomatoes review score, nearly matching a 78% audience score. That’s up a little bit from season 1’s 75% score, while the audience score was an 84%. But it’s still early, and there’s still time for fluctuation. These numbers, in the context of the industry, paint a picture of a season that’s pretty good, albeit not something that will blow you away.
If you haven’t seen the show, here’s the synopsis:
“When aristocratic Eddie inherits the family estate, he discovers that it’s home to an enormous weed empire, and its proprietors aren’t going anywhere.”
Season 2 finds Eddie in a different position with more power, and things get even wilder as criminal enterprises ramp up. Eddie is played by Theo James opposite Kaya Scodelario. It also stars Breaking Bad’s Giancarlo Esposito, A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms’ Daniel Ings and frequent Guy Ritchie collaborator Vinnie Jones.
Will The Gentlemen end up being renewed for season 3? Yes, it will. Italready has been. However, viewership tracking forThe Gentlemen season 2 so far has been a bit off, where it debuted in third place on Netflix’s top 10 list after its first day of release, behind the true crime series Death of a Pastor’s Wife, which has been #1 for over a week now. It’s also behind Tyler Perry’s Beauty in Black, which came out a little while ago.
I think Netflix may run into a common situation here. They have a good show, people want to see more, they renew it (late), and then it takes two-and-a-half years to get here. There is enormous viewership loss when that happens to even a powerhouse show like Wednesday, so a medium-sized show like The Gentlemen is likely even more vulnerable. The quality of the season seems the same or better than season 1, but if the viewership is not there, that’s trouble. But it’s lucky that The Gentlemenwas renewed for a third season already, given that if it seems like the show needs to wrap it up, it has the ability to do that and not end on a dreaded cliffhanger after cancellation. But we don’t know if season 3 is meant to be its last. It is, however, attempting to slim down the lengthy gap between seasons where filming is meant to begin soon.
We’ll see if The Gentlemen moves up and if it can retain more of its audience than it otherwise might. Then we’ll know more.
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This article was originally published onForbes.com
