Viewers who were left scratching their heads after the first season of Taboo will have a chance to get maybe some explanations with eight more episodes, after both FX and BBC renewed the Tom Hardy show for a second season.
Hardy played James Keziah Delaney, according to The Hollywood Reporter, a man “thought long-dead” who returned to London from Africa to “inherit what was left of a shipping empire, but find himself navigating increasingly complex territories in order to survive.”
The series was created by Hardy, Hardy’s father Chips, and Steven Knight. BBC and FX aired the series almost simultaneously, with just a few days separating the broadcast in Britain with the one in the United States.
Taboo also starred David Hayman, Jonathan Pryce and Oona Chaplin, although it’s likely the second season will have a much different cast for the period drama that takes place not long after the War of 1812.
Both the younger Hardy and Knight are Oscar nominees. Hardy earned his nod for The Revenant while Knight got his writing Dirty Pretty Things in 2004. They both produce the series, along with Ridley Scott, who directed Hardy in his first film role – 2001’s Black Hawk Down.
Knight, who also is the creator behind Peaky Blinders and is one of the three people who developed the game show Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, said in a prepared statement that he was “thrilled that a work which pushes boundaries has been so well received and found such a large and enthusiastic audience” in both the United States and the United Kingdom.
“We have tried to take an impressionistic, rather than figurative, approach to a narrative which we hope more accurately portrays the spirit of an extraordinary time in history. James Delay will continue to explore many realities has he takes his band of misfits to a new world, thanks to FX and the BBC, partners who could not be more suited to collaborating in groundbreaking work.”
