Tom Hardy is one of those rare breeds of human who communicates on two entirely different levels: sometimes with words, but mainly in a series of moody grunts.

This will be immediately noticeable to anyone who's been following along with Hardy's latest TV series, Taboo; airing on the BBC, it sees the actor play adventurer James Delaney, who returns home to London in 1814 after a decade spent in Africa, upon hearing the news of his father's death.

Long believed to be dead himself, Delaney's return isn't exactly received with a warm welcome and he soon finds himself the target of a legion of different enemies, who all agree on one thing: the man is mad.

Which pretty much provides Hardy - who conceived the show alongside his dad, Chips - with the ideal platform for the art of grunting; with a supercut by YouTube channel flypiefilms counting an impressive 72 grunts over the course of the show's first five episodes.

Any potential incomprehensibility aside, Taboo is still managing to prove a hit with critics; currently ranked at no.8 on Metacritic's list of new shows for 2017, losing out to the likes of The Young Pope, Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events, and Legion.

Taboo - trailer