Tom Hardy’s Best Historical TV Crime Thriller As A Lead Actor

Tom Hardy’s Peaky Blinders movie cameo might have been cut before its release, but the Birmingham-based gangster franchise isn’t the only historical crime thriller written by Steven Knight in which the actor has played a starring role. It’s now nine years since Hardy last played wayward adventurer James Delaney in Taboo, but the show remains as fresh as ever.

This eight-episode miniseries features all the hallmarks of Knight’s TV shows, from brooding visuals, to exquisite period details, and stylized Gothic depictions of shady criminal dealings in a version of Britain dripping with blood. Unlike Peaky Blinders and House of Guinness, though, Taboo focuses its lens squarely on the British capital, during the era of pre-Victorian empire-building.

Tom Hardy gives one of his best TV performances as Delaney, the son of a shipping merchant who has spent the previous 12 years of his life in West Africa, seemingly living among the Ashanti people of modern-day Ghana. Taboo begins with Delaney’s return to London as a mystical figure feared for his apparent readiness to commit moral transgressions.

Much of the series revolves around its protagonist’s dealings with the East India Company, which was the largest corporate entity in the world during the early 19th century. There’s often little to choose between the EIC and London’s criminal underworld, with the main difference being the overwhelming power and influence it exerts.

Taboo Is One Of Tom Hardy’s Best TV Shows

For any fans of Tom Hardy or Steven Knight, or even those with a passing interest in the history of the British Empire, Taboo is a must-watch crime thriller. Hardy is at the peak of his powers, presenting us with a character who’s almost deliriously unhinged.

James Delaney arrives back in London shrouded in tribal mysticism, which only serves to underscore the seething intensity of his demeanor. He’s a wholly unpredictable element amid the cold-blooded business of British imperialism, who demands respect purely by virtue of the fact that he seems capable of anything.

Yet, it takes someone like Delaney to shine a light on the greatest crimes committed in the name of empire, which were ultimately determined not by soldiers, traders or slave-drivers, but men in suits stalking the corridors of colonial power. Although Taboo provides us with a somewhat condensed dramatization of history, it has the unmistakable ring of truth about it.

The show effortlessly blends fact and fiction – including with Jonathan Pryce’s bone-chilling portrayal of entirely-imagined East India Company chair Sir Stuart Strange – while being faithful to the bigger picture. At the same time, the historical significance of its setting forms the backdrop to a dazzling character portrait, which proves just how special Tom Hardy is at his best.

Will Taboo Season 2 Ever Happen?

Despite a second season of Taboo being announced not long after it ended, pre-production work on follow-up episodes hasn’t moved forward for almost a decade. Fans are understandably starting to lose hope that the series will ever make a comeback.

On the other hand, Steven Knight has publicly given a positive update around Taboo season 2 relatively recently. In January 2026, Knight confirmed that he and Tom Hardy have already decided on what they want to do with this prospective new season of the show. It’s just their busy schedules that are holding it up.

Whether Taboo’s central star and lead writer manage to find the time to make a new season happen is far from certain. But their desire to keep the story going gives us the best possible reason to be optimistic. Where there’s a will, there’s usually a way.

It definitely feels to most viewers as though James Delaney’s story has plenty more legs in it. One of Tom Hardy’s most colorfully enigmatic characters deserves to be revived at some point, especially since Taboo continues to draw plaudits nearly a decade on from its initial release.