“I not only earned this, I deserve it,” Kingsley Marshall says in the series premiere of Fightland, Starz‘s new crime drama. Because Fightland is as much about boxing as Power was about nightclubs. And it’s reminiscent of Starz’s flagship series in all the best ways.
There will be deserved comparisons between Fightland and Power. Both are crime dramas with diverse casts centered around the drug trade with a side order of semi-legitimate business. There are similar dynamics between certain characters. Both shows have a gritty visual style, rap soundtracks and the same executive producer: Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson. The difference is that Fightland, a co-production with Sky Atlantic, is set in London and is stacked with British talent. But anyone who loves the Power universe will fall in love with Fightland before the opening titles, probably for some of the same reasons.
The protagonist is Maduka “Duke” Kilroy, a champion boxer whose title reign lasts all of a few hours after a violent and tragic turn of events. From then on, Fightland is summed up well by that statement from Kingsley. Duke’s one-time manager. All of the main characters are out to grab what they feel they deserve—but it’s not typical TV gangster ego. The series does a fine job of showing how hard all of them worked to get where they are, which in turn makes it very clear why they’ll be so ruthless to stay there. It’s a crime drama, but an interestingly relatable one.
Howard Charles is an excellent choice as Duke; British TV fans will enjoy the contrast of the former Whitstable Pearl detective now deeply embedded on the other side of the crime world. He has a quiet strength, yet like Omari Hardwick before him, can turn vicious without alienating the audience. And Charles is actually even better in the scenes that have nothing to do with the crime story. The viewer can see the pain in his eyes and he never overplays any of the considerable angst that Duke is dealing with.
In that sense, Fightland shares some emotional DNA with the excellent Australian film Beast, which also centered on a disgraced former champion fighter. What made that film cheer-worthy was the incredibly vulnerable performance of actor Daniel MacPherson, giving the movie depth beyond the sports arc. He was so good that it almost made the fighting irrelevant. Charles similarly gets viewers invested in Duke’s journey as a person; they want him to be happy, even if they question his idea of what that happiness looks like. Duke crosses several lines he can’t take back, but Charles always gives a sense of what that costs him, even if Duke himself doesn’t realize or doesn’t care.
The series also does a noteworthy job of keeping the characters around Duke from feeling too one-dimensional. Like Ghost with Tommy, Duke has his more unpredictable friend Jay (Tyler Conti). But for all his attempted jokes. Jay’s best scene is talking to Duke’s estranged father Gary (an incredibly good Richard Pepple, Line of Duty) about how they’re the only family he has. He’s not just the comic relief guy. Likewise, Kingsley’s two children have their own individual story arcs beyond the family. It’s a kick to see Anita-Joy Uwajeh as Cebella “Cece” Marshall, who has the biggest set of balls in the first few episodes.
Viewers who have seen Power—and there will probably be several given that the two shows are on the same network—will recognize multiple plot twists in Fightland before they happen. The show checks off all the boxes of the crime genre, and those similarities to Power are also easy to see. But that also means it delivers everything that fans of crime shows want. And it’s served up by cast members who raise the intensity of their performances to match the world that their characters are living in. Everyone except Jay seems to be constantly one step away from the edge. The plot twists happen faster than a flurry of punches in a boxing bout. It’s a British drama with the brashness of an American show: gritty but also a hell of a lot of fun. And it deserves to be another massive hit for Starz.
Fightland premieres July 31, 2026 on Starz. Photo Credit: Courtesy of Starz.
Article content is (c)2020-2026 Brittany Frederick and may not be excerpted or reproduced without express written permission by the author. Follow me on Twitter at @BFTVTwtr and on Instagram at @BFTVGram. For story pitches, contact me at tvbrittanyf@yahoo.com.
