Paramount+’s explosive crime drama MobLand features some true A-listers in its cast, but there are times when the accents of characters in the London-based show can be distracting. The Guy Ritchie-produced series follows the exploits of the Harrigan crime family, who run drugs and guns through modern-day London, and their inner circle of associates, most notably Tom Hardy’s fixer Harry Da Souza. Despite the London setting, the Harrigans are an Irish family, and as a result some of the family’s members have a thick Irish accent.
Tom Hardy has a lengthy history when it comes to distracting accents, as some of his most well-known roles have been hit-or-miss on clashing with the character or with the movie/TV show itself. Tom Hardy’s natural speaking voice has a Cockney accent, a product of his upbringing in Hammersmith, London. In several roles though, he’s slipped into a variation of Welsh, and that’s to say nothing of his roughneck frontier American accent from The Revenant or the garbled accent of Bane in The Dark Knight Rises. However, in MobLand, Hardy’s isn’t distracting at all compared to his costars.
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Helen Mirren & Pierce Brosnan Both Have Distracting Accents In MobLand
The Thick Irish Accents Take Some Getting Used To
Pierce Brosnan and Helen Mirren play Conrad and Maeve Harrigan, the patriarch and matriarch of the Harrigan crime family in MobLand. While Hardy’s accent is perfectly fine and fits nicely with his character (and natural speaking voice), both Brosnan and Mirren affected an exaggerated Irish accent for the show, which can be distracting given the speaker. Brosnan is, ironically, actually Irish, but over time his original accent has been lost, or evolved. That makes the thick Kerry accent he uses for Conrad Harrigan particularly jarring.
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MobLand – Key Details |
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Created By |
Streaming Network |
Season 1 Run |
RT Tomatometer Score |
RT Popcornmeter Score |
Metacritic Score |
Metacritic User Score |
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Ronan Bennett |
Paramount+ |
March 30th, 2025 – June 1st, 2025 |
79% |
70% |
59 |
5.4/10 |
Helen Mirren has a smooth, clean British accent in real life, clearly a result of her London upbringing. In MobLand she once again busts out the heavy, semi-muddled Irish accent that she recently used in Paramount+’s Yellowstone spinoff, 1923. In that show she used it to emphasize her character’s status as an Irish immigrant. The accents are intended to reflect their true Irish background, as that plays a role in the code of honor and loyalty that the family operates under. They don’t ruin the show by any means, but they take some getting used to early in MobLand.
Despite The Accents, Mirren & Brosnan Are Great To Watch In MobLand
They’re Both Clearly Having Fun In Their Roles
The accents are easy to overlook in MobLand because both Mirren and Brosnan are two of the best parts of the show. Brosnan’s somewhat volatile, unpredictable old gang boss, Conrad Harrigan, is equal parts intimidating and entertaining, especially as he doesn’t always seem to have the decision-making power that usually comes from the patriarch of a crime family. Helen Mirren’s Maeve, on the other hand, is basically playing the Lady Macbeth role, pulling his strings from behind the scenes as the true alpha of both the relationship and the criminal enterprise.
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It’s very obvious that both Brosnan and Mirren had a ton of fun playing Conrad and Maeve Harrigan while filming MobLand. Both characters have a sort of crackling energy to them, whether it’s Mirren mischievously providing her grandson with cocaine or Brosnan internally struggling with killing his best friend right up until the moment he pulls the trigger. Their delight in bringing the characters to life elevates the show as a whole, and makes the sometimes-distracting accents easy to forgive, especially given that they help inform the characters’ backgrounds.
Bad Accents Are Nothing New For Guy Ritchie
His Movies Have Featured Several Stars With Questionable Accents
Guy Ritchie has written and/or directed a number of movies that, for whatever reason, seem to feature distracting accents. One of the most famous examples is hearing the crazily-exaggerated Irish accent pouring out of Brad Pitt’s character Mickey in the 2000 crime comedy Snatch; Pitt’s character is borderline unintelligible at times, which if you ask Pitt, was intentional. His 2021 Jason Statham vehicle Wrath of Man also features several positively brutal American accents from British actors, and Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels is difficult to understand at times due to thick Cockney accents.
The heavier, less-refined accents that Ritchie uses often serve the purpose of informing the characters, as is the case for MobLand.
It’s clear that Ritchie is aiming for authenticity when it comes to the use of accents in his movies and shows. The heavier, less-refined accents that Ritchie uses often serve the purpose of informing the characters, as is the case for MobLand. The thick Cockney accents in Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels are meant to evoke the idea that the characters are roughneck gangsters from humble origins. In most cases, it’s something that just takes some getting used to, as is the case for MobLand, but there are some instances in Ritchie projects that make them almost difficult to enjoy.
MobLand
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March 30, 2025
- Network
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Paramount+
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Pierce Brosnan
Conrad Harrigan
