Taboo Pilot Review
When a name as big as Tom Hardy is involved, there is always the worry that upon viewing the connection with a show will be lost in a familiar face. Do not worry about that, rather worry about finding your way out once you get started; this is a show you quickly get vested in. Taboo gripped me by the arm and I was held captive from the pre-credits scene to the next episode previews. Welcome to our Taboo pilot review.
We meet James Keziah Delaney (Hardy), a walking question mark carved of sharp metal with a wicked hook and a shadowy crook and resting on a mystical eye rather than a dot.
CR: Robert Viglasky/FX
He comes from ten years exile in Africa to bear witness to his father’s funeral in crowded London.
Many are not pleased by this.
Strike that.
No one is pleased by this.
He has his own ritual over his father’s casket while the preacher performs his.
What role does the mystical play in James’s future, if at all? There seems to be an aura of the preternatural about him, and it seems the series is headed gleefully that way.
At the post funeral collations, we learn more of the churlishness of his brother in law, and the odd relationship with his half sister, a relationship that she may or may not wish to continue.
Oona Chaplin as Zilpha. CR: Robert Viglasky/FX
The N word is bandied about, cringeworthy to hear. It shows the crudity of these people who believe themselves above James and the people he has been living among for the past decade.
James navigates London, gathering pieces to a puzzle that makes sense only to him for now.
And he will know your secrets, but be damned if you know all of his.
The man is a conundrum. He treats highborn and low alike, with a gruffness and frankness and lack of tolerance for B.S.
Delaney has no filter, and almost seems to be unable to lie. He certainly seems to have a way with words, sometimes merely grunting, other times being devilishly eloquent. At one point he speaks to guilt-caused hallucinations brought by a sinking slave ship which seems like a sure sign of madness. Delaney then outwits a room of greedy men entrusted to distribute his father’s will. He pays for a boy’s upbringing which shows responsibility, but plans to stay away from him because he isn’t “fit” to be around children. Indeed, he plans never to see him again. He has a temper, one that does not threaten but tells it’s intended receiver that violence is a certainty, because James Keziah Delaney is a man of his word.
So many questions are brought to light by the things he says and does and also said about him. Is he mad like his Bedlam borne mother, as so many whisper? Many hope so, for there is a fortune to be bilked if he is.
Why does the prostitute say girls won’t return if sent to him?
Why does he keep hinting he shouldn’t be around others?
Who is the ten year old boy?
What does he know about the dead?
How did he deduce murder?
What is the relationship between the half siblings?
How did he know the things his father said a continent away?
How does he know the political secrets he knows?
I can’t wait to find out.
The actors here are all superb, playing their parts with the right amounts of enigmatic or greedy stares and pursed lips.
There is a nod to Ridley Scott’s trademark, if you look.
This show is very well researched for staying in keeping with the time period. One of the best I have seen on television or in a theater.
The crier that leads the funeral procession, the muck in the streets, the filth under the fingernails of even the highest born show that, while pomp and propriety ruled, this was still a time when baths and hygiene were not important.
This show does not romanticize the era it is set in, and I applaud this. It is so well done that I believed I could smell the breath from decaying, unbrushed teeth filled mouths, the unwashed bodies in the makeshift brothel, the crowded streets a foot thick with dung, and the bloated bodies in the morgue.
Let me give a great example of keeping with the era. The crack James makes about hearing piss on leather may be confusing to some. Urine was used to remove fat, hair, etc. from hides and to soften leather. From antiquity, tanner’s pots would be set out for passerby to relieve themselves. A small touch, maybe-but telling of the care put into this show.
The costumes are worth a mention. Only the well-to-do look put together. The street people are wearing homespun and rags, as a result they look as though they are gleaning what they can, where they can.
There are so many of these touches and they are treated so organically, ingrained by the actors to their characters.
A good show entertains, a great show entertains, enlightens and puts you in withdrawal when each episode ends.
This show is already curling like a hook and crook and dot in my veins.
I have questions and I want more.
Taboo airs Tuesdays at 10:00 on FX
