Peaky Blinders

One of the best quasi-historical series on television. This is the sensationalized telling of the story of the gang of organized criminals that rose to power around the turn of the 20th century in Birmingham, England. It's violent and full of tension, it’s sexy and exciting. I absolutely loved it.

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One reason I loved it is because each character, including the women, have definite character arcs. Over the six years, each of the individuals grows and changes in ways are consistent with their characters.

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I also enjoyed the fact that each season the adversary that the family has to face becomes increasingly larger, complicated, and more terrifying. By the final season, the family is battling fascism.

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Overall, the casting is remarkable, especially Cillian Murphy as Tommy Shelby and Paul Anderson as his brother Arthur. They have great chemistry and have created truly memorable characters.

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The guest actors are extremely well-chosen also, including Stephen Graham (from Adolescence), Alexander Siddig (the doctor from Deep Space Nine), Benjamin Zephaniah (the British poet), and Anya Taylor-Joy (as the annoying American wife of one of the brothers). There are two exceptions, though.

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Thomas Hardy was cast as a the leader of a Jewish gang and Adrien Brody as a mafioso. Thom Hardy takes up all the oxygen in the room whenever he’s on the screen and is not convincing at all as a Jew. Adrien Brody, too, is totally implausible as an Italian gangster. I angrily cringed all the way through the episodes he was in and was grateful when he was killed.

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The characters and stories created for this series are so impressive that they went beyond this long-running series. In 2020 when production had to go on hold, the writers conceived of a movie as a way to close out the series. But production on the series continued instead. They chose one more season of the TV series and the movie too.

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The movie came out in 2026, and another series began production in 2026 because a lot of people, like me, just can't get enough of this sensibility. 100% recommended.

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