More than a century after they first struck fear into the hearts of Birmingham residents, the Peaky Blinders are back—and this time, they’re heading to the big screen.*
Long before Cillian Murphy’s sharp cheekbones and razor-lined caps became iconic television imagery, a very real gang was terrorizing the streets of industrial Birmingham. In 1898, an anonymous letter to the Birmingham Daily Mail captured the public’s frustration: “No matter what part of the city one walks, gangs of ‘peaky blinders’ are to be seen, who ofttimes think nothing of grossly insulting passers-by… I venture to say that 99 times out of 100, they are not even brought to justice.”
Those original Peaky Blinders were bookmakers and racketeers who ruled the city’s underworld, clashing with rival gangs and police while locals looked on in fear. Their fictional counterparts—the Shelby family—have since become global sensations.
After six seasons of brutal violence, double-crosses, and enough emotional devastation to fill several graves in Birmingham’s cemetery, the story continues. A feature film arrives in select theaters on March 6 and hits Netflix on March 20. Before you dive back into the world of flat caps, smoky pubs, and postwar grit, here’s your essential guide to the Peaky Blinders universe.
Who Exactly Are the Peaky Blinders?
Meet the Shelbys—Birmingham’s unofficial royalty. When the series kicks off in 1919, the city is awash in sex, liquor, and violence, and this Irish-Romani family sits at the chaotic center. Their initial hustle? Rigging horse races. Their eventual empire? Hooch smuggling, government blackmail, and enough legitimate businesses to make their dirty money look clean.
Throughout the show’s run, the Shelbys battle everyone who dares challenge them: the Birmingham Boys, the Italian Changretta crime family, and eventually, the fascist movement itself when Tommy Shelby talks his way into Parliament.
The Peaky Blinders look the part—close-cropped hair, three-piece tweed suits, and those signature baker boy caps hiding razor blades designed to slice during brawls. Their home base is The Garrison pub, and they still prefer horses to automobiles, because nothing says “we’re dangerous” quite like the clip-clop of hooves announcing your arrival.
The Shelby Family Tree (and Its Gnarled Branches)
Tommy Shelby (Cillian Murphy): The icy-eyed mastermind behind it all. A World War I veteran who survived tunneling under enemy lines—left for dead, singing “In the Bleak Midwinter” while waiting for Germans who never came—Tommy carries battlefield trauma beneath his composed exterior. He’s lost everyone who mattered: his wife Grace took a bullet meant for him, his daughter Ruby succumbed to tuberculosis, and his second wife Lizzie left after his affair. “A daughter lost, a son found,” as his sister-in-law Esme put it when Duke—a son he never knew—appeared in Season 6.
Ada Shelby (Sophie Rundle): The sole sister among the siblings, Ada has always been the family’s conscience and thorn. A communist who loved the late Freddie Thorne, she’s spent years balancing her ideals against the morally bankrupt family business. Somehow, she manages to work at Shelby Company Limited without completely losing her soul.
Aunt Polly (Helen McCrory): The matriarch who held everything together until her devastating murder by the IRA. Polly’s presence looms over the later seasons, her wisdom and steeliness sorely missed by a family spiraling without her.
Michael Gray (Finn Cole): Polly’s son and Tommy’s cousin, whose ambition curdled into homicidal obsession. He ended up on the wrong side of a car bomb—one he’d planted for Tommy, only for the Peaky leader to outsmart him by switching vehicles.
Johnny Dogs (Packy Lee): Tommy’s oldest friend and most loyal cleaner-upper. He’s disposed of more corpses than anyone cares to count and brokered peace with the rival Lee family. Every king needs a fixer; Johnny’s theirs.
Duke Shelby: The son Tommy never knew existed until Season 6, who proved his Peaky credentials immediately by killing an informant and banishing Finn Shelby from the family. “By order of the Peaky Blinders,” of course.
Where We Left Off (Spoilers Ahead)
The final season left Tommy Shelby at his lowest point. Aunt Polly was gone, murdered by the IRA. Ruby was dead. Lizzie had taken their son Charles and left after his affair came to light. His physician delivered what seemed like a death sentence: a terminal tumor with little time remaining.
Then came the betrayal. His cousin Michael tried to kill him with a car bomb. Tommy, ever the strategist, had Johnny Dogs switch the vehicles and watched Michael die instead.
Isolated and believing his days numbered, Tommy prepared to end things on his own terms. But a vision of Ruby appeared, urging him to light a fire. Using newspaper as kindling, he spotted something that changed everything: a photograph showing his doctor standing alongside his enemy, Oswald Mosley.
The diagnosis was fake. The tumor didn’t exist.
Tommy tracked Dr. Holford down, ready for blood. But as the clock chimed armistice hour—that sacred moment of silence for the war dead—he did the unthinkable. He let the man live.
The final image: Tommy Shelby, riding his horse into an uncertain future, leaving behind everything and everyone. For now.
The film picks up from there. Where he’s headed, who he’ll become, and whether peace is even possible for a man carved from violence—that’s what comes next.
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