Episode Guide
On Bonfire Night, many people gather around a big flame to enjoy the night. Unfortunately, smoke from the fire gets in people’s hands and can be quite harmful. This can lead to coughing and even asthma attacks. In order to avoid these problems, it is important to keep a safe distance from the bonfire and to avoid smoking cigarettes or cigars. Finally, don’t get too close to anyone else - it’s easy for someone with bad intentions to take advantage of a situation like this. ..
With that in mind, I was curious to see if the show had been renewed for a third season. After all, it’s been announced that the network is moving away from its traditional cop show format and may be looking for new programming to air during the summer months. So when Top Boy aired its latest episode last night, I decided to take a look at it and see if there were any new revelations or changes in store. First off, I have to say that I was disappointed with the way Top Boy ended its second season. In my opinion, it felt like there was too much of a rush to the finish line and not enough time given to explore the characters and their backgrounds. Additionally, some of the plot points were left unresolved which made it difficult to follow what was going on. Overall, this didn’t feel like an exciting or well-done finale.
Despite being unofficially labelled as Season 3, Top Boy is very much a show doing its own thing, and as Netflix informed me, this is not a third season but instead a sequel of sorts without the official title. Despite a more pacey second half and a dramatic close to the season, Top Boy doesn’t quite manage to hit the same heights the original series achieved with its frantic, scrappy pacing.
As the summer heat intensifies, the new boys at Summerhouse find themselves in a power struggle with a rival gang over control of the drug supply. With Brexit looming, the pressure is on these young men to find new ways to make money and stay safe.
Meanwhile, Dushane carves out a new life in Kingston, Jamaica. Leading a somewhat unremarkable life off the radar, an incident early on sees Dushane pulled back into the life he tried so hard to leave behind; the threat of certain death hanging over him if he doesn’t take this opportunity to head back to Summerhouse. With Sully nearing the end of his prison sentence, all of this builds slowly to the end of the fourth episode where Dushane finally gets his shipment ready to start doing business in his old hunting ground. ..
The series picks up right where it left off with Dushane and Sully teaming up to take on Jamie. This culminates in a climactic finale in which they risk everything to wrest control of Summerhouse from him once and for all.
Despite a much improved second half, Top Boy still struggles to emulate the great work done in the original series, with an abundance of long shots that drag out the length of the story unnecessarily. Whether it be a 25 second shot of Dushane walking with his cousin over his back or 45 seconds of Jamie picking up a photo and staring at it, Top Boy is not subtle about its use of long shots and this will either make or break the show for you.
Stylistically, Top Boy feels a lot more vibrant and colourful compared to its predecessors, but this glossy, polished feel loses some of the gritty edge that made the first two seasons so effective. While the extra use of colour does help to make the show more visually appealing, it also feels like a missed opportunity to rekindle that familiar muted, cold feel. It doesn’t help either that the new characters just don’t have the same allure as the original cast and even Jamie, who’s supposed to be the big antagonistic threat to Dushane and Sully, is actually pretty empathetic and feels much closer to that of an antihero than the outright big bad of the season. ..
The showrunners have done a great job of incorporating some of the classic elements into the new series while still feeling fresh and exciting. The old characters are well-drawn and provide a good amount of laughs, even if they are a little too familiar at times. Overall, I’m really enjoying this new series and can’t wait to see where it goes next.
Although Topboy does well to build the world up, its cookie-cutter characters fail to stand out. By comparison to the first and second season that had multiple plot threads running alongside its main narrative, Top Boy is particularly rigid by design, sticking closely to two stories early on before these converge into one as the rival groups clash over the Summerhouse turf.
Top Boy is a return to form for the show and does well to recapture the same mood and vibe that made it so popular in the first two seasons. Those looking for another frantically paced season full of action set pieces and sharp narrative work may find themselves disappointed, however. Much like the Hip-Hop scene, a lot of the good stuff is hidden underground while the face-value material is glossy, rigid and lacking a cutting edge. Top Boy is certainly not a bad series but it does require a fair amount of patience to get to the good stuff. It is a little overlong but if you make it through this early slump, Top Boy delivers in the best possible way.
