British television crime drama series
| Top Boy |
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| Genre | Crime drama |
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| Created by | Ronan Bennett |
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| Starring | |
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| Opening theme | "Finished I Ain't" by Ghostpoet (Series 1) |
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| Ending theme | "Cold Win" by Ghostpoet (Series 2) |
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| Composers | Brian Eno
Michael Asante |
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| Country of origin | United Kingdom |
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| Original language | English |
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| No. of series | 5 |
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| No. of episodes | 32 (list of episodes) |
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| Executive producers | Aubrey Graham[1]
Adel Nur[1]
Maverick Carter[1]
Jamal Henderson[1]
Ronan Bennett
Charles Steel
Alasdair Flind
Yann Demange
Ashley Walters
Kane Robinson |
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| Producers | Laura Hastings-Smith
Yvonne Isimeme Ibazebo[1]
Alasdair Flind |
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| Cinematography | Tat Radcliffe
Christopher Ross |
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| Editors | Chris Wyatt
Matthew Tabern |
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| Running time | 48 minutes (approx.) |
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| Production companies | Cowboy Films
Easter Partisan
DreamCrew (2019)
SpringHill Entertainment (2019)[1] |
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| Network | Channel 4 |
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| Release | 31 October 2011 (2011-10-31) –
10 September 2013 (2013-09-10) |
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| Network | Netflix |
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| Release | 13 September 2019 (2019-09-13) –
7 September 2023 (2023-09-07) |
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Top Boy is a British television crime drama series created and written by Ronan Bennett. The series is set on the fictional Summerhouse estate in the London Borough of Hackney. It focuses on two drug dealers, Dushane (Ashley Walters) and Sully (Kane Robinson), along with others involved with drug dealing and gang violence in London.
There are 32 episodes across five series. The first two series, with 4 episodes each, were broadcast on Channel 4, with the first series airing over four consecutive nights from 31 October to 3 November 2011 and the second series airing from 20 August to 10 September 2013.[2] Although storylines for a third series were proposed, the series was dropped by Channel 4 in 2014.[3]
Following interest from Canadian rapper Drake, it was announced in 2017 that Netflix would revive the series, with both Ashley Walters and Kane Robinson, as well as the original crew, reprising their roles, and Drake and his team serving as executive producers.[1] The third and fourth series premiered on Netflix in September 2019 and March 2022, respectively, and were presented as the first and second series of an original Netflix series. The previous two series originally broadcast in the UK were added to Netflix under the name Top Boy: Summerhouse.[1] A fifth and final series (third series produced by Netflix) was renewed on 31 March 2022 and aired on September 7, 2023.[4][5]
The series has received critical acclaim for its writing, acting, cinematography, themes, realism, and soundtrack, with favourable comparisons to other crime shows such as The Wire, Snowfall, and Power. It has received several awards and nominations from the British Academy Television Awards, including nominations for the British Academy Television Award for Best Mini-Series and the British Academy Television Award for Best Supporting Actress for Jasmine Jobson. In addition it won British Academy Television Craft Award for Best Original Music, British Academy Television Craft Award for Best Director: Fiction, and British Academy Television Craft Award for Best Scripted Casting.
Plot
Series 1 (2011)
The series follows the plight of Ra'nell as he navigates the pitfalls of living on the crime-filled Summerhouse estate after his mother, Lisa, is admitted to a mental hospital. Ra'Nell, who has gained a reputation around the estate for his volatile behaviour after stabbing his abusive father, is quiet and closed off. While his mother is in hospital, he is cared for by her close friend, Leon, who was once a respected enforcer of the estate but has since put his past behind him. Meanwhile, Lisa's pregnant friend Heather enlists Ra'Nell's help to grow a cannabis crop so she can earn enough money to move out of the estate to a safer place.
Meanwhile, his best friend, Gem, realizes he is in over his head when he begins to work for Summerhouse drug dealers Dushane and Sully. Gem is easily coerced and is at the mercy of their trusted enforcer, Dris, who is ruthless and violent.
Dushane and Sully run the estate together with relative ease, but are at risk after Kamale, a rival drug dealer from London Fields, steals a large amount of their supply. They need to find the thief and recover their stash before their supplier, Bobby Raikes, takes action. The urgency of the chase puts Dushane and Sully's partnership in jeopardy.
Series 2 (2013)
The second series was set one year after the events of the first series. After the police uncover a body, Dushane, Sully, and Dris are arrested. Dushane quickly realises that there is a snitch in their crew, and must deal with the repercussions. The snitch is revealed to be Michael, Dushane's favourite dealer. The police forced him to give information about Dushane.
Meanwhile, Sully is attempting to start up his own crew to rival Dushane's with his friend Mike, a borderline psychopathic ex-convict. When a deal with Dushane's Albanian business partners goes bad, he attempts to enlist Sully's help once more to take them out. He comes into contact with Jason, a neglected boy who is trying to survive in a world filled with drugs and murder.
Series 3 (2019)
The first series of the revival show takes place five years after the original series. Dushane has fled to Jamaica, where he is getting by working in his uncle's car-rental shop with his cousin. After killing a soldier in the organisation of an imprisoned drug lord Sugar in a robbery (unsanctioned by Sugar) gone wrong, he makes a business deal with Sugar that would ensure no retaliation on his life in return for running an empire in London on Sugar’s behalf. He returns to London and enlists the helped of Dris and Jaq, who were running Summerhouse by this point while Dushane was away. However a new crew from London Fields, headed by the ruthless Jamie, won't stand for Dushane stepping on their turf.
While Dushane was in Jamaica, London has become more gentrified and the cost of living has risen. After his return, he learns that his sick mother is being cared for by Shelley, a young carer and single mother. Her eight-year-old daughter begins to form a strong relationship with Dushane.
Sully is in prison with Modie, a murderous drug dealer who ran the rival London Fields gang in Dushane and Sully's absence. An altercation between the two men when queuing up in the prison cafeteria escalates to the point that Sully throws boiling sugar water on Modie's face days before he is due to be released. Modie sees him as an enemy and later in the series, he seeks revenge against Sully.
By then Modie has escaped with the help of Sully's cousin Jermaine, whom Sully had kidnapped in the previous series. When Sully is released, he reconnects with Jason and Gem to begin selling in Ramsgate. Jason is killed in a house fire and Sully reluctantly reunites with Dushane to do business again. Meanwhile, Dris, having suffered a stroke that has left him partially disabled, struggles with his responsibilities after Dushane's return.
Jamie attempts to assert his dominance in the borough; he is driven to provide for his younger brothers, Aaron and Stefan. Their parents both developed cancer and died within days of each other, when Jamie was 18-years-old and the brothers even younger.
He starts business with an upper-class Irish drug supplier, Lizzie, and her husband, Jeffery. Jamie's thirst for power and subsequent battles with Dushane's crew at Summerhouse comprise the main plot throughout this series. Dushane eventually orchestrates Jamie being prosecuted and convicted, and sent to prison. He led police to find a bag filled with weapons and drugs in the flat where Jamie lived with his brothers.
Series 4 (2022)
The second series of the revival show takes place six months after the events of the last. Dushane wants to expand his empire beyond the streets by making huge investments in London and finding new connections in Spain and Morocco. This causes tensions between the community and his sick mother, who is now aware and ashamed of her son's business.
Jamie, after agreeing to work for Dushane in exchange for Dushane forwarding CCTV footage that would exonerate him, has been released from prison: with his gang now beginning to work with the Summerhouse gang. He attempts to reconnect with his younger brother, Stefan, following his friend Ats's death due to knife crime. But Dushane sends him to sort out a botched drug deal in Spain and Morocco.
Jaq, Dushane's new second-in-command following the death of Dris, tries to rescue her pregnant older sister Lauryn. She is in an abusive relationship with Curtis, a weapons dealer based in Liverpool.
Sully suffers from PTSD in the aftermath of murdering Dris and struggling with the death of his younger friend Jason, who was almost a son to him. He is suspicious about Jamie and Dushane doing business together. Meanwhile, Shelley and other local residents try to fight against Dushane's planned redevelopment of Summerhouse. Shelley comes to terms with her dark past; she was being blackmailed for aiding in the burial of her ex-boyfriend's murder victim.
Series 5 (2023)
The third series of the revival show takes place immediately after the previous series. After killing Jamie, Sully threatens to kill Dushane next if he doesn't step down as the leader of the Summerhouse gang. Dushane reluctantly does so, and Sully becomes the leader, alongside his friend Junior. Dushane takes the time to focus on helping Shelley expand her business. As the new leader, Sully is forced to form an uneasy alliance with Irish gang leader Jonny McGee and his uncle Tadgh, who killed the Moroccan drug suppliers.
Tormented by Jamie's death, Stefan has been moved to a care home and has been taken under the wing of Jamie's friend and fellow ZT member Si, who encourages Stefan to avenge his brother's death. Stefan refuses, in favour of beginning a relationship with Dris' daughter, Erin, who is now living with her mother and Dris' widow Mandy.
Dushane learns that Lizzie and her accountant friend, Lithe, has stolen £15 million from his account, putting him in a state of desperation and anger, to the point where he kills Lizzie's husband, Jeffrey, and snaps at Shelley, who subsequently breaks up with him due to his obsession with money and power. Dushane's failure to clean up after Jeffrey's murder puts him on the police's radar.
Meanwhile, upon giving birth to a baby boy, Lauryn suffers from post-natal depression, and eventually dies and drowns in the bath from a drug overdose. Heartbroken, Jaq becomes disillusioned with selling drug. She decides to steal Sully's drugs to provide a better life for her girlfriends, Becks, and her newborn nephew.
The show ends with Sully killing Dushane, who stole Sully’s drugs from Jaq, in an attempt to pay for his illegal escape to Turkey. Stefan, having a change of heart and not choosing the life of crime, walks away from Sully after having him at gunpoint. The final scene is an unknown assailant killing Sully by shooting him in the head as he sits in his car in the carpark of the park after being confronted by Stefan.
Production
Development
Top Boy was written and created by Belfast-born novelist Ronan Bennett. He also produced the series through his production company Eastern Partisan. Bennett was inspired to write the series after he saw a twelve-year-old boy dealing drugs at his local Tesco supermarket in Hackney, London. Bennett, assisted by his friend Gerry Jackson, interviewed several drug dealers in the area about their lifestyle in order to portray the society realistically. Jackson was later credited as a story consultant on the series.
The series pilot was originally commissioned by the BBC, but the head of drama was very critical about the strong violence and profanity in the script. Eventually, Bennett met with producers Charles Steel and Alasdair Flind of Cowboy Films, who gave support. In July 2010, it was announced that the series had been commissioned by Channel 4 as a four-part drama.
Casting
The series cast UK rappers, along with seasoned and newcoming acting talent. So Solid Crew rapper turned actor Ashley Walters and British rapper Kane Robinson were cast as lead characters Dushane and Sully, respectively. Following his breakthrough performance in the 2004 film Bullet Boy, Walters turned down several roles in urban films and TV shows but he chose to audition for Top Boy because of its realistic characterization. The character of Sully was written as an Asian drug dealer, but casting director Des Hamilton, director Yann Demange, and Bennett were all impressed with Robinson's chemistry test with Walters and rewrote the character for Robinson.
Walters and Robinson led the series alongside other rappers, including Scorcher as London Fields gang leader Kamale. UK rappers Giggs and Sway make cameo appearances in the first series. The first series also featured Shone Romolus as Dris, Dushane and Sully's trusted enforcer; newcomers Malcolm Kamulete and Giacomo Mancini as best friends Ra'Nell and Gem; Sharon Duncan-Brewster as Ra'Nell's mum Lisa; Nicholas Pinnock as Leon, Lisa's friend and a father figure to Ra'Nell; Kierston Wareing as Lisa's pregnant friend Heather; Benedict Wong as cannabis dealer Vincent; and Geoff Bell as drug lord Bobby Raikes. The series also featured a then-eighteen-year-old Letitia Wright as Chantelle, a member of the Summerhouse gang and Gem's love interest.
The second series features the reprisals of Walters, Robinson, Romolus, Kamulete, Mancini, Duncan-Brewster, and Wong with new additions including rapper Bashy as Jermaine, Sully's cousin; Lorraine Burroughs as Rhianna Parkes, Dushane's lawyer; Paul Anderson as Mike, Sully's new business partner; Nabil Elouahabi as Babrak Mustapha, Gem's father; Ricky Smarts as Jason, Sully's friend and son figure; and Michaela Coel as Kayla Thomas, a woman who was in contact with Kamale.
In April 2019, following the series' revival by Netflix, it was announced that Micheal Ward would join the cast as the new London Fields leader Jamie. He previously auditioned to play Jamie's younger brother Aaron. Rappers Dave and Little Simz were cast as Modie and Shelly, respectively. New additions to the third and fourth series include Jasmine Jobson, Hope Ikpoku Jr., Araloyin Oshunremi, Keiyon Cook, Jolade Obasola, Kadeem Ramsay, Lisa Dwan, Joshua Blisset, Saffron Hocking and Adwoa Aboah.
Filming locations
The Heygate Estate and Loughborough Estate, both in South London, were used as the Summerhouse Estate during the first two series. Production visited several locations in Kent for the third series. Filming took place in Margate at Walpole Bay and Fulsam Rock Beach and nearby streets including Athelstan Road. Production also visited Ramsgate, where they filmed at Jacob's Ladder, outside the Rose of England pub on the High Street and Ramsgate Station. Gordon Place in Gravesend doubles as the fictional Summerhouse Estate throughout the series.[7]
For the third and fourth series, the Samuda Estate in Cubitt Town on the Isle of Dogs in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets and the De Beauvoir Estate in De Beauvoir Town in the London Borough of Hackney double as the Summerhouse Estate. Locations in Liverpool were shown throughout Series 4 Episode 5, with the Dockside Outlet Shopping Centre in Chatham, Kent doubling as an imitation shopping centre in Liverpool.[7]
With the series being set in Hackney much of the filming took place in the borough in areas including Dalston, Haggerston and London Fields.[8] Legal scenes in series 4 were filmed in the old Blackfriars Crown Court.[9]
Music
The original score for the series was composed by Brian Eno and Michael Asante. In addition to its original music, Top Boy features grime, hip-hop and R&B from artists including Ghostpoet, AJ Tracey, Giggs, Central Cee, Roots Manuva, Burna Boy and J Hus.
On 13 September 2019, an original soundtrack for the series, titled Top Boy (A Selection of Music Inspired by the Series), was released by OVO Sound and Warner to accommodate with the release of the third series.[10][11] The soundtrack includes appearances from OVO's Drake, Baka Not Nice, and Popcaan and British artists AJ Tracey, Avelino, Dave, Fredo, Ghetts, Headie One, Little Simz, M Huncho, Nafe Smallz, Central Cee and SL.[12][13]
Cancellation and revival series
Despite its successful ratings and critical acclaim, in 2014, it was announced by Walters that Channel 4 had cancelled the series after two series.[14] Speaking in 2019, Bennett expressed his disappointment about the abrupt cancellation, feeling that Channel 4 cancelling the series was a "smack in the face to the community".[citation needed]
Around the time of the show's cancellation, Canadian rapper Drake became a fan of the series after watching it in parts on YouTube and posted screenshots of the series on his social media. After learning that a third series was cancelled, Drake met with Walters and the series' producers about reviving the series. Drake bought the rights to the series and pitched it to Netflix, who greenlit the third series in November 2017, with Drake serving as executive producer and most of the original cast and crew reprising their roles.[citation needed] The third series was filmed from July 2018 to February 2019 and was released on 13 September 2019, the first series on Netflix, consisting of ten episodes.[citation needed]
In January 2020, the series was renewed for a second series on Netflix (fourth series overall), with filming set to start in the spring of that year. However, due to COVID-19, filming was delayed and started in late November/early December. The series was released on Netflix on 18 March 2022, consisting of eight episodes.[citation needed]
In March 2022, shortly after the debut of the following series, it was announced that the series was renewed for a third series on Netflix (fifth series overall), which was announced as the final series of the series. Filming began in July 2022.[citation needed]
Reception
Critical reception and viewership
Top Boy received positive feedback from critics. The first two series premiered with 1 million viewers and managed to maintain its audience share over the course of its two-year run.[15] Tom Sutcliffe, writing in the Independent, said, "The drama involved virtually no preaching at all, but a sense of morality was everywhere, as bad conscience flickered in the face of the toughest characters and grief hit the culpable and the blameless alike. Best of all, it always found a little time for something other than plot, whether it was banter on stairwells or the melancholy beauty of the city at night. Seriously good television."[16]
The Netflix revival series was met with greater acclaim for its performances, emotional depth, soundtrack, writing, and bigger scope and scale. Rebecca Nicholson, writing in the Guardian, described the third series as "more violent, more gripping and more shocking than ever". Ellen E Jones, also of the Guardian, praised the fourth series, writing that the series "always leaves you guessing".[17]
