Erin Doherty’s presence dominates A Thousand Blows season two

Erin Doherty’s magnetic performance dominates the second season of Steven Knight’s late‑Victorian thriller A Thousand Blows, making it hard to separate her presence from an overall judgement of the show. Series one mixed heavy‑handed exposition with a propulsive rivalry between an East End boxer (played by Stephen Graham) and a smart Jamaican fighter (Malachi Kirby), and introduced the Forty Elephants all‑female crime syndicate and Doherty’s pickpocketing queen Mary Carr.

That framework allowed room for commentary on colonialism, racism, tradition and class, and for explorations of female empowerment, poverty and risk. Season two is darker. The review notes the characters were already compromised at the end of series one — Hezekiah a pariah after an in‑ring death, Sugar desolate after beating his brother Treacle, and Mary rejected by Hezekiah — and now Sugar is a drunken down‑and‑out, Hezekiah is fighting on a barge‑based underground scene before openly racist crowds, and Mary is under the control of her mother Jane and Jane’s brutal boss Indigo Jeremy.

The new season’s narrative backbone is Mary’s planned robbery of a Caravaggio with mesmerist Sophie Lyons, which reunites her band of lady thieves; Hezekiah’s comeback is slower, involving training the puny Prince Albert Victor before returning to the ring. The reviewer finds the action less punchy and the stakes muted, with Sugar’s aimlessness affecting the show and Hezekiah’s wins feeling hollow.

Key Topics

Culture, Erin Doherty, A Thousand Blows, Steven Knight, Forty Elephants, Stephen Graham