The Immortal Man Is The Swan Song Peaky Blinders Deserves
In the bleak midwinter.
Period dramas have a legacy problem. You can set your story in, say, New York in 1927, but if your show lasts more than two years, then you have to address the Wall-Street-sized elephant in the room. That’s why Downton Abbey, despite airing for six seasons and three movies, was ended for good before the series reached the thirties. Bridgerton found a way around it by hand-waving geopolitics away completely, even though the Napoleonic Wars were raging at the time.
Then, there’s Peaky Blinders. Steven Knight’s long-running crime thriller series has always embraced time passing in-universe as part of the show’s natural evolution. Season 1 followed crime lord Tommy Shelby (Cillian Murphy) as he built up a syndicate after returning from the trenches of WWI, and by the end of Season 6, the series had reached the late 1920s — and yes, it did address the 1929 stock market crash.
Now, Tommy Shelby is back for one last adventure: Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man, a feature-length movie, now streaming on Netflix. And while the tone is bleak and grey as the Birmingham smog, this story is a masterclass in how to define a show’s legacy.
Tommy Shelby’s son Duke is running the Peaky Blinders as the chaotic leader Tommy never wanted to become.
The Immortal Man begins with the very thing other shows would be terrified to portray: a concentration camp in 1939. It depicts Operation Bernhard, a real-life plot by the Nazis to forge and distribute counterfeit British currency in an effort to ruin the British economy and ensure a victory for the Germans. The next scene is another real-life history event: a Luftwaffe air raid that destroyed the Birmingham Small Arms Factory on November 19, 1940.
These two events tee up the perfect environment for the much-anticipated return of Tommy Shelby. Alone and graying, he’s living in solitude, writing a book while the Peaky Blinders are run by his long-lost son, Duke (Barry Keoghan). When Duke is offered the opportunity to help the Nazis smuggle in counterfeit banknotes for millions of pounds, it puts him in an ethical dilemma that drives his father out of hiding.
Duke Shelby has evolved into the kind of man Tommy was terrified of becoming — and the kind of man “manosphere” memes love to paint him as. He feeds on power and prides himself on being unfeeling and neutral. If the phrase “the lion does not concern himself with the opinions of sheep” were a person, that would be Duke Shelby.
Rebecca Ferguson’s character Kaulo brings the supernatural into Tommy Shelby’s life.
Tommy, on the other hand, is feeling too much. Haunted by the loss of so many family members — occasionally very literally — he’s only in search of peace, and if the only way to achieve that is by saving his son, then so be it.
But this movie’s secret weapon is Rebecca Ferguson, who plays Kaulo Chirklo, the twin sister of Zelda, Tommy’s one-time lover, and Duke’s mother. Using Romany seance techniques, she is able to channel her sister from beyond the grave and promise him peace in return for helping Duke.
However, achieving peace after wreaking havoc for six seasons of television is easier said than done. It all leads to a heartbreaking ending that, after two hours, feels absolutely earned and the final answer on what Tommy Shelby stands for. Peaky Blinders may be the most iconic crime thriller series of the 2010s, but you don’t get there without a few regrettable actions.
