# The Boy's Word: Blood on the Asphalt (2023)

> In late 1980s perestroika-era Russia, a music student is drawn into a teenage gang to protect himself from street harassment.

Canonical page: https://ember.film/tv/152025

## Facts

- Seasons: 1
- Episodes: 8
- Episode runtime: 52 min
- Status: Ended
- Genres: crime, drama
- Network: NTV , START, Wink
- Cast: Ivan Yankovsky, Ruzil Minekaev, Leon Kemstach, Anastasiya Krasovskaya, Anna Peresild, Nikita Kologrivyy, Elizaveta Bazykina, Yuliya Aleksandrova
- TMDB rating: 7.6/10
- IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt28429213/

## Ember's analysis

- Pacing: measured
- Intensity: moderate
- Complexity: accessible
- Violence: moderate
- Tone: gritty, intense, melancholic, tense

## What critics say

Audiences rate this Russian street-gang miniseries positively, with a modest but favorable response to its portrayal of 1980s youth gang life.

## Synopsis

The Boy's Word: Blood on the Asphalt (2023) is a Russian crime drama miniseries created for NTV, START and Wink. Set in the late 1980s as perestroika unravels the Soviet Union, the eight-episode limited series follows Andrey Vasilyev (Leon Kemstach), a music school student who lives with his mother and five-year-old sister. Harassed by street teenagers, he makes an uneasy alliance with Marat Suvorov (Ruzil Minekaev), who pulls him into a gang where territory is fought for block by block and loyalty is sworn as brotherhood. Vova Suvorov (Ivan Yankovsky), known as Adidas, stands at the center of the group's codes. Each episode is built from street confrontations, shifting alliances and the pressure of vows that clash with the adult world's violence and fear. Its tone is gritty and emotionally heavy, with a grounded, rough-edged atmosphere of a city losing its order. Fans of Brigada and Once Upon a Time in America will find resonance in its coming-of-age crime story, where youthful loyalty and survival collide with a society in collapse.

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