PEAKY BLINDERS: THE IMMORTAL MAN
The smoke has never truly cleared from the streets of Birmingham. For decades, Thomas Shelby has walked the line between life and death, between the gutter and the throne. But as the world edges toward the precipice of World War II, the ghosts of the past are no longer whispering—they are screaming. Directed by Tom Harper and written by Steven Knight, Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man (2026) is the epic cinematic conclusion to the Shelby saga. Starring Cillian Murphy in his most haunting, atmospheric performance yet, this film is a brutal study of a man who conquered the world only to realize he is the only one left standing in the ruins.
I. The Man Who Should Be Dead
The film opens in 1937. The world is a powder keg. Thomas Shelby (Cillian Murphy) is a man living on borrowed time. After faking his own death at the end of the series, he has been living as a ghost, watching his empire from the shadows of a remote estate. But Tommy is a man built for war, and the silence is eating him alive.
The catalyst for his return is a series of coordinated assassinations targeting the remaining Shelby family members across Europe. It isn’t just a gang war; it’s a systematic erasure. When a letter arrives at his door containing only a single, dried Blue Bell flower—the symbol of a promise made in the trenches of 1916—Tommy realizes that the enemy isn’t a fascist politician or a rival mobster. It is a man from the “Before Times,” a ghost of the Great War who knows Tommy’s soul as well as his own.
II. The Rising Tide of Fascism
Tommy returns to a Birmingham he barely recognizes. The air is thick with the rhetoric of the British Union of Fascists. Sir Oswald Mosley (Sam Claflin) is more powerful than ever, backed by the rising shadow of the Third Reich. Tommy must navigate a world where the razor blades in his cap are no match for the industrial-scale hatred of the 1930s.
He reunites with Ada Thorne (Sophie Rundle), who has been trying to keep the family legitimate, and Arthur Shelby (Paul Anderson), who has spiraled into a religious frenzy, believing that the family is cursed by God. The chemistry between the siblings is frayed; they blame Tommy for the “Immortal” nature of their troubles. They are tired of being figures of history; they just want to be men and women.
III. The Architect of Vengeance
The antagonist is revealed to be Colonel Henry “The Hangman” Reed (played by Barry Keoghan). Reed was a tunneler alongside Tommy in the 71st Tunnelling Company. While Tommy became a king, Reed was left behind in a collapsed tunnel, presumed dead, but surviving in a hell of earth and darkness. He views Tommy’s success as a betrayal of the men who died in the mud.
Reed isn’t interested in money. He wants to dismantle Tommy’s “Immortal” legend piece by piece. He is a tactician who uses Tommy’s own methods against him—blackmail, psychological warfare, and surgical violence. He targets the younger generation of Shelbys, forcing Tommy to choose between the empire he built and the children he tried to protect.
IV. A War on Two Fronts
The middle act is a masterclass in tension. Tommy must balance his secret war against Reed with his public duty to infiltrate the inner circle of the fascist movement. The film utilizes a “Neo-Noir” aesthetic—long shadows, amber streetlights, and the constant, rhythmic sound of industrial machinery.
Cillian Murphy portrays Tommy as a man who has lost his fear of death, which makes him the most dangerous man in England. He uses his position in Parliament to leak Nazi secrets to the British Intelligence, while simultaneously leading a midnight raid on Reed’s fortress in the Welsh mountains.
V. The Climax: The Burning of the Garrison
The finale takes place in the heart of Small Heath. Reed has lured the entire Shelby clan back to The Garrison Tavern, which he has rigged with the same explosives they used in the tunnels of France. The battle is visceral and personal. No flashy gunfights—just the cold, desperate work of knives and brass knuckles in the dark.
The duel between Tommy and Reed is a mirror match. They fight in the flooded cellar of the tavern, a setting that mimics the tunnels of their youth. Reed mocks Tommy’s “immortality,” but Tommy realizes that his power doesn’t come from surviving—it comes from his willingness to burn everything down to do what is right.
In a climactic explosion of fire and glass, Tommy saves his family, but at the cost of the Garrison. He doesn’t kill Reed with a bullet; he leaves him to be consumed by the very hatred Reed cultivated, as the police—now controlled by the Shelbys—close in.
VI. The Last Cigarette
The film ends as the sirens of the first air-raid drills begin to wail across London. The “Peaky Blinders” as a gang are over. The Shelbys have transformed into a different kind of entity—a shadow network that will serve as the backbone of the British resistance in the coming war.
Tommy stands on a hill overlooking Birmingham. He lights a cigarette, the flame illuminating his face for a brief second. He looks older, but his eyes are finally at peace. He isn’t a gangster, a politician, or a ghost anymore.
Thomas Shelby (Voiceover): “They said I was an immortal man. But the only thing that lives forever is the truth of what we did in the dark. The guns are silent for now… but I can still hear the shovels.”
The final shot is a slow-motion montage of the family moving in different directions, as Tommy walks into the fog, disappearing into history. The screen cuts to black with the familiar, haunting chords of “Red Right Hand” playing in a slow, orchestral funeral march.
