Peaky Blinder - Song - I am Peaky Blinder
Peaky Blinders - Intro
Peaky Blinders is a British period crime drama television series created by Steven Knight. Set in Birmingham, England, the series follows the exploits of the Shelby crime family in the direct aftermath of the First World War. The fictional family is loosely based on a real urban youth gang of the same name, who were active in the city from the 1890s to the early 20th century.
Peaky Blinders features an ensemble cast, led by Cillian Murphy, Helen McCrory, Joe Cole and Paul Anderson starring as Tommy Shelby, Elizabeth “Polly” Gray, John Shelby and Arthur Shelby respectively, the gang’s senior members. Sam Neill, Tom Hardy, Paddy Considine, Adrien Brody, Aidan Gillen, Charlotte Riley, Sam Claflin and Anya Taylor-Joy also have recurring roles at various junctures of the series. The show premiered on 12 September 2013, telecast on BBC Two until the fourth series, and then shifted to BBC One for the fifth series.
In 2018, after the show’s Drama Series win at the BAFTA TV Awards, Knight confirmed his “ambition of making it a story of a family between two wars, and by ending it with the first air raid siren in Birmingham”, which was 25 June 1940. The fifth series premiered on BBC One on 25 August 2019 and finished on 22 September 2019. Netflix, under the deal with Weinstein Company and Endemol, had acquired the rights to release Peaky Blinders in the United States and around the world. In January 2021, it was announced that the sixth series would be the final series of Peaky Blinders.
Summary: Peaky Blinders - Seasons 1
It’s 1919 in Birmingham when we meet Tommy and the Shelby family.
They’re a family of illegal bookmakers who have accidentally stolen some guns.
Here’s what goes down:
- Tommy starts a feud with Billy Kimber and a gypsy family called The Lees
- Under Churchill’s orders Grace and Inspector Campbell arrive in Birmingham to find the guns
- Ada Shelby falls pregnant with Freddie Thorne and they marry
- Tommy fakes the death of Peaky Blinder Danny and sends him to London
- Grace and Tommy team up to kill members of the IRA who are also hunting for the guns
- Tommy pits The Lees and The Kimbers against each other
- The Shelby’s acquire a betting license and legitimise the family business
- Tommy call a truces with The Lees so they can team up agaisnt Billy Kimber
- In return he has his brother John marry Esme Lee
- Ada goes into labour during the wedding
- Danny is killed during a shoot out with The Kimbers
- Grace falls for Tommy and resigns as a police officer, but not before telling Campbell where the guns are
- Inspector Campbell proposes to Grace but she declines
- When leaving for London with Tommy, Campbell turns up and fires a shot at Grace.
Summary: Peaky Blinders - Seasons 2
Season 2 opens with Freddie’s funeral, he has died of the Spanish Flu.
While The Shelby’s commemorate their local pub The Garrison is blown up.
Here’s what happened next:
- Grace shoots Campbell, however he doesn’t die and returns to Birmingham as a major.
- The IRA hire Tommy to murder a man
- Campbell learns of this and blackmails Tommy into working for Churchhill
- Tommy tracks down Polly’s son Michael and they are reunited
- The Shelby’s start at feud with London-based gangster Sabini
- Tommy meets with Alfie Solomons in an attempt to protect his family from Sabini
- We meet May Carleton who is hired to train Tommy’s horse
- John and Arthur burn down The Garrison after the owner disrespects The Shelby name
- Alfie and Sabini team up to murder Arthur’s men and have him sent to prison
- Michael is arrested and Polly sleeps with Campbell to have him released
- Grace is married in London, but returns to Tommy and reveals she’s pregnant
- On Derby Day Tommy has his men burn the licences of Sabini’s bookies and steal the bets
- Michael wants to join the family business
- Polly shoots Major Campbell
- Tommy is brought to a field and told to expect further contact from Winston Churchill
Summary: Peaky Blinders - Seasons 3
It’s 1924 and Tommy and Grace are married, but the celebrations don’t last long.
Here’s what happened in season 3:
- Anton Kaledin, a refugee from Russia, makes contact with the Peaky Blinders
- He provides them with an incorrect code name for a money exchange and Arthur kills him
- Mr. Romanov thanks Tommy for killing the impostor by giving him a sapphire
- Father Hughes threatens to murder Grace and Tommy’s son Charlie over Ada’s communist connections
- Arthur and John get in a fight with the Changretta family and Angel Changretta is brutally beaten
- During the Shelby Charity Foundation dinner Grace is shot and killed by a man shouting, “For Angel”
- Arthur, John and Finn beat the shooter to death
- Tommy orders Arthur and John to kidnap Vicente Changretta and shoot his wife
- Rather than torture Changretta, Arthur shoots him out of mercy
- Arthur Sr. dies
- Linda is pregnant and attempts to get Arthur to leave the gang
- Tommy attempts to have Father Hughes murdered, but he learns of the plan
- The Shelby’s plan to double cross The Russians and rob their vault
- Father Hughes kidnaps Tommy’s son and blackmails him for his safe return
- He must give him the stolen Russian jewels and blow up a train killing six people
- Tommy figures out where Charlie is being held and sends Michael to retrieve him and kill Father Hughes
- Arthur and John set off to carry out the train bombing in case Michael can’t rescue Charlie in time
- Michael is successful, but word doesn’t reach Arthur in time and the train is blown up
- Tommy learns that Alfie passed information Father Hughes
- The Shelby’s successfully break into the Russian vault
- Grand Duchess Tatiana takes her share of the jewels and the rest is distributed between the Shelby family
- When they meet to collect their loot the police arrive and they’re all arrested
Summary: Peaky Blinders - Seasons 4
The Shelby family are released from prison just before their planned hangings.
But there’s no celebrating for Arthur, John, Michael and Polly who deal with their new reality by self medicating.
Here’s what goes down in season 4:
- Ada returns from Boston to a broken Shelby family
- Each of the Shelbys receives a letter from Luca Changretta, a member of the Sicilian mafia
- They’ve been marked for death in retribution for the murder of Angel and Vincente
- John and Michael are shot multiple times on Christmas Day
- The Shelbys are reunited in the wake of John’s murder
- Ada is under investigation by the government because of her marriage to a communist
- Tommy teams up with killer-for-hire Aberama Gold
- Gold agrees to fight for the Shelbys if they take on his son, Bonnie
- Workers at Tommy’s factory in Lanchester strike
- Polly plots to betray Tommy to Changretta and sets up a fake meeting with him
- When Tommy arrives he’s caught up in a battle against Changretta and his men, killing three
- Later when The Shelby’s discuss the ambush it’s revealed Tommy and Polly plotted it together
- Changretta travels to London to team up with Alfie Solomon
- Lizzie Stark falls pregnant with Tommy’s baby
- Arthur is shot and presumably killed at Bonnie’s boxing match
- During his funeral Changretta’s wife proposes a truce
- Changretta demans Tommy sign The Shelby family fortune over to him
- However, Tommy has sent Michael to America to turn Changretta’s men against him
- A very much alive Arthur then shoots Luca dead
- Tommy confronts Alfie for his betrayal, who reveals he did so knowing Tommy would track him down
- Alfie has cancer and welcomes his murder
- Tommy takes a holiday but soon grows bored
- He double crosses Jessie Eden and acquires the names of her communist party contacts
- Tommy uses this intel to become a Labour MP in Birmingham South.
Summary: Peaky Blinders - Seasons 5
Season 5 begins in 1929 during the aftermath of a big financial crisis.
The official description reads:
‘When Tommy Shelby MP is approached by a charismatic politician with a bold vision for Britain, he realises that his response will affect not just his family’s future but that of the entire nation.’
‘Opportunity and misfortune are everywhere.’
Tommy’s big plan for the end of this season was to off his political rival and frenemy Oswald Mosley, a fascist smack-dab in the middle of Parliament who, as it turns out, is almost literally Hitler. (And he was a real guy, by the way! Weird that we never learn about British Hitler in high school anymore.) Tommy broke an old war buddy named Barney, who was an expert sniper, out of a psychiatric asylum so that he could shoot Mosley during a Nazi-esque rally. But, if you’ve seen the very end of the episode, you know that this plan failed, tragically. In the mayhem, Shelby ally Aberama Gold was also taken out by a masked, stabby assassin.
Like Tommy, I have no idea who’s behind the plans-thwarting betrayal, and opinions about whodunnit vary wildly online. The Season 5 finale is a departure for the show, which generally wraps up with one of Tommy’s unlikely, brilliant plans working out precisely the way he’d planned, or close to it. But this time, there’s no neat ending and, until Season 6 arrives, we probably won’t know for sure who the traitor is. Let’s separate the possible finks from the red herrings, and try to circle in on who might have beaten Tommy at his own game.
Summary: Peaky Blinders - Seasons 6
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