It begins at Christmas, and heads back to the streets
When we left Tommy at the end of season three, he’d blown up a train and worked out a deal that involved shopping his family to the police while he looked on from his country hideaway, alone. Season four begins with him receiving a letter on Christmas Eve, alerting him to new threats and sending him back to the streets, where he will fight to regain control. “I think the arc is pretty recognisable in terms of the hoodlum who gets successful and is heading towards material wealth and legitimacy, and then there’s the downward spiral,” Murphy tells GQ. “We seem to be on the apex of that at the moment. It wouldn’t be too much to giveaway to say that series four is more of Tommy as the streetfighting man, back to the mean streets of Birmingham again. It has more echoes of season one than before.”
Tommy will not easily win back his family's trust
Regardless of Tommy’s motives, what he did to his family will not be fixed in a hurry. “Everything has changed,” Murphy said, promoting the show on the BBC. “His family think that he’s betrayed them, and it will be up to Tommy to demonstrate to them that he hasn’t, and that he has a bigger plan. The question is what the bigger plan is. Who is he going to call? Can he ever get that level of trust or love back again?” If he does, it will take time – quite possibly more than a season’s worth. “You will see,” Knight told Metro. “Tommy’s redemption might take a little longer. It’s the family being forced back together.”
Tommy's mental state is not looking any healthier
Tommy may not have been killed by his experiences during the First World War, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t destroy him. Everything that happened to him there has driven everything he’s done since, and defines who he is. “Tommy is medicating,” Murphy tells GQ. “He turns his trauma into this insatiable ambition. His experience took all faith away from him, and it took all respect for authority away from him. And it took away any fear of death from him. I think every day for him now is a bonus, because he came so close to dying so many times in that conflict that now every day he’s like, ‘Fuck it, why not?’”
Adrien Body's character will put Tommy through his paces
As well as the returning cast – including Tom Hardy’s Alfie (“We can’t do it without Alfie,” Knight said), season four introduces new blood. Aidan Gillen plays someone the Peaky Blinders call on for help, and Adrien Brody stars in a role written for him – his character, says Knight, is a huge threat to the family. “Every series has had a nemesis that Tommy has faced, and this year Adrien Brody personifies it,” Murphy tells GQ. “I think it’s fair enough to say that there is an American influence in this series. He’s a powerhouse. If you look at Sam Neill, Tom Hardy, Paddy Considine, you have heavyweight actors in there, and so you need somebody like that. It was great to see Adrien come in and step up and do that, and we had some great, well, tête-à-têtes.”
Creator Steven Knight says it's the best season yet
It’s business as usual behind the scenes, with creator Steven Knight, who calls the show his “baby”, having written all six episodes. Shooting (in both senses) began on March 20, in Liverpool. A Toxteth area of uninhabited terraced streets, perfect for filming, doubles up as Birmingham, where the older parts of town have either been demolished or are still lived in. It was directed by David Caffrey (Line Of Duty, Prime Suspect 1973), and filming wrapped on July 7. “I’m very, very excited,” Knight told Deadline.com in January as he was completing script duties, claiming the new series to be “the best yet.”
There will be a fifth season, and maybe more
Knight has said he’s always wanted Peaky Blinders to be “a true between the wars family story,” the gang becoming wealthier and more powerful, for Tommy to be knighted, and for the show to end as the first WWII air raid sirens howl over Birmingham. Knight has recently said that season five, which films next year, could be the last – but will it be? “Well that’s the million dollar question, isn’t it,” Murphy tells GQ. “It’s been commissioned for five. As long as the writing is as strong as it has been, and has improved as it has been, then I’ll stay on board. Why would you not want to play a character like that? It’s incredibly rewarding, to keep going back to Tommy. It’s a gift I never thought I’d have – when we’ve done five that will have been 30 hours of television. Which is staggering really. But at the same time it has to be right. So we’ll see.”
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Peaky Blinders season four starts tonight on BBC Two at 9pm
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