SAS Rogue Heroes, Series 2, BBC One Review – Paddy Mayne’s Renegade Warriors Take the Fight to Italy

The renegades of the Special Air Service (SAS) are back, and this time their battleground is Italy. Steven Knight’s SAS Rogue Heroes, the swaggering World War Two drama from the creator of Peaky Blinders, has returned to BBC One for a second season, and it wastes no time reintroducing viewers to its uniquely hard-rocking, blood-soaked brand of wartime storytelling.

Having torn through the Axis forces in North Africa during the first series, the SAS return to action in 1943, this time at the forefront of the Allied invasion of Sicily and southern Italy. The new episodes again marry gritty period detail with a deliberately anachronistic soundtrack, featuring pounding contributions from The Cult’s “She Sells Sanctuary,” Deep Purple’s “Highway Star,” and Magazine’s biting “Shot by Both Sides.” It’s a formula that shouldn’t work but somehow does, injecting a jolt of adrenaline into the wartime genre.

A Leader Transformed

At the heart of the second season is the transformation of the unit’s leadership. With founder David Stirling now languishing in captivity at Forte di Gavi — an Italian fortress with the grim character of a medieval dungeon — the role of commander falls to Paddy Mayne. Played by Jack O’Connell, Mayne emerges as the dominant presence of the new season.

O’Connell’s portrayal is riveting and often terrifying, capturing Mayne’s volatile mix of brilliance, brutality, and utter disregard for convention. His Paddy Mayne is a soldier who recites poetry in his rich Ulster brogue one moment and leads men into suicidal combat missions the next. “Most of my men are quite keen to live, whereas I am at best equivocal,” he remarks dryly — a line that sums up his unshakable willingness to risk everything in the pursuit of victory.

This balance between Mayne’s cultured interior life and his capacity for violence makes him one of the most compelling characters on British television. He is at once magnetic and monstrous, the embodiment of the “rogue hero” ideal the series champions.

Renegade Missions

Under Mayne’s leadership, the SAS — temporarily renamed the Special Raiding Squadron — are dispatched on a series of nightmarishly hazardous tasks. Their missions include launching predawn raids on enemy gun positions, paving the way for larger Allied forces. The risks are staggering, and Knight’s script pulls no punches in showing the moral compromises that such operations demanded.

One early sequence encapsulates this perfectly: as Mayne and his men sail toward their target, they pass through waters littered with British paratroopers whose gliders have crash-landed in the sea. The cries of the drowning are heart-rending, but Mayne’s orders are uncompromising — his unit must ignore them and push forward to complete their mission. It is a chilling moment, one that forces the audience to confront the ruthless calculus of war.

Steven Knight’s Bold Style

Knight once again bends the rules of historical drama, blending fact with stylization to create something both thrilling and unsettling. His willingness to score combat scenes with hard rock tracks has become a hallmark, energizing the battles with a raw, rebellious power. But it is not just a stylistic flourish — it underlines the show’s ethos that these men were not traditional soldiers, but outcasts and radicals, fighting on the margins of the military establishment.

The dialogue, too, often straddles the line between gritty realism and Shakespearean cadence. Mayne’s habit of speaking in near-verse gives his character a mythic quality, as though he is both warrior and bard. It is a bold choice, and O’Connell’s commanding delivery makes it convincing.

A Bloody, Compelling Ride

The violence remains as visceral as ever, with firefights, demolitions, and raids depicted in bloody detail. Yet what makes the series compelling is not just its action sequences, but its exploration of character. Mayne is not painted as a simple hero. His courage is undeniable, but so too is his capacity for ruthlessness and cruelty. His disdain for the “blundering obtuseness” of top brass positions him as an outsider even within his own army.

In this sense, the second season continues to echo the themes of Peaky Blinders: men defined by their ability to defy authority, shaped as much by violence as by vision.

Verdict

SAS Rogue Heroes Series 2 is not a conventional war drama. It is louder, bloodier, and more unashamedly stylized than its predecessors in the genre. Yet it remains rooted in extraordinary true stories — tales so wild that Knight has admitted he often tones them down to make them believable.

With O’Connell’s electrifying performance at its center, the show pushes beyond mere entertainment, becoming a meditation on leadership, sacrifice, and the cost of war. For those looking for history served straight, this may not be it. But for audiences hungry for a bold, visceral, and unforgettable retelling of the SAS story, the second season proves a triumph.