Hulu has announced that the six-episode series A Thousand Blows will premiere on Friday, February 21, 2025, on Hulu in the U.S. and Disney+ internationally. From Peaky Blinders creator Steven Knight, the series is set in the perilous world of illegal boxing in 1880s Victorian London and is based on little-explored real-life characters with incredible stories.

A Thousand Blows is inspired by the true-life stories of a group of characters battling for survival in the brutal East End of London in the 1880s. Hezekiah Moscow and Alec Munroe, best friends on the run from Jamaica, find themselves thrust into the criminal underbelly of London’s thriving bare-knuckle boxing scene.

As Hezekiah finds fortune and fame through the art of pugilism, he attracts the attention of the infamous Queen of the Forty Elephants, Mary Carr, who sets about exploiting his talents to further her criminal enterprise.

Meanwhile, the menacing and self-declared emperor of the East End boxing world, Sugar Goodson, is determined to destroy Hezekiah whose ambitions to fight in the West End threaten everything he has built. What ensues is a battle of the old world against the new.

The cast includes Malachi Kirby, Erin Doherty, Stephen Graham, Francis Lovehall, Jason Tobin, James Nelson-Joyce, Hannah Walters, Darci Shaw, Nadia Albina, Morgan Hilaire, Jemma Carlton, Caoilfhionn Dunne, Susan Lynch, Daniel Mays, Adam Nagaitis, Gary Lewis, Tom Davis and Robert Glenister.

A Thousand Blows was created, written and executive produced by Steven Knight. The executive producers are Stephen Graham and Hannah Walters for Matriarch Productions, Damian Keogh and Kate Lewis for The Story Collective, and Tom Miller and Sam Myer for Water & Power Productions.

Award-winning broadcaster and historian Professor David Olusoga acts as executive producer on the series with Tom Miller as Series Producer and Barrington Robinson and Jo Johnson as producers.

The Original series is executive produced for Disney+ EMEA by Lee Mason, Director of Scripted Content.