REVIEW: It is heartbreaking to think that we had to say goodbye to two Netflix power-families in one year—’Ozark’ and now ‘Peaky Blinders’, if you’re asking—and we are only halfway through 2022. While the former left some of its fans mourning the lack of a knockout finale, the latter tactfully pivots away from the intense levels of gun violence that initially got us hooked to it. But here we are, yet again, cheering, semi-hoping that maybe the deeply troubled anti-hero Tommy Shelby (Cillian Murphy) will finally flush those demons out of his system for good. All the while, deep in our hearts, knowing full well that ain’t happening. It is this blatant cynicism and that bad-boy charm that made ‘Peaky Blinders’ an uproarious success in the first place and Cillian Murphy, the poster child of all things iniquitous.
Over the years, the Shelby family has graduated from being small-time thugs aggressively guarding their territory to becoming full-blown drug lords, sending out cargoes to international soils. The setting was such that politics meddled in their finances, and remarkable men of the past were thrown into the equation. Nothing that we witnessed in ‘Peaky Blinders’ so far has followed a socially acceptable plotline or a diegesis guided by protocols. So when Tommy took on the role of a prominent politician on the side, I bet no one’s even batted their eyelashes.
The show’s ambitious endeavours have paid off season after season, and now we are at a juncture in this immersive experience where we must part ways with the Shelbys. And the writers were reasonable enough to start Season 6 from where the previous season had ended. There’s a time leap of four years and the year is 1933, Tommy’s still a slave to his addictions but has vouched to fight them off this time around. His drug shipments find their way to Canada, which in turn, places him in front of his nemesis Michael (Finn Cole). His stance on fascism is pretty much the same: just as sure that if given a chance to blend in and mingle, he could take them down. Easily. It is rather heartbreaking to see Arthur (Paul Anderson) giving in to his appetite for narcotics and is now reduced to a haggard man living in the shadows of his once opulent self. The biggest blow to this season, and the overall show, is Helen McCrory’s (who plays the marvellous Polly in the series) sudden demise in 2021. As a quick damage-control measure, Ada (Sophie Rundle) tries to be that glue that holds the morally corrupt Shelbys together. She, however, is no match to Polly.
‘Peaky Blinders’ Season 6 tries—and I mean really tries—to end the saga on a viewer-pleasing note but it fails to shed its layers of surrealism. You see, creator Steven Knight has deliberately made it hard for a pop culture-ish, wham bam sendoff. Why? Laying the groundwork for people to watch the impending movie, of course. Keeping that in mind, I can reveal to you that some of what you are about to see would not quench your thirst on various levels. Tommy, for one, along with other Shelbys, is more of a thug-turned-spiritual being seeking resolution to his internal conflicts and the ones with his family members… What? Who are they?
Hold your horses before you call this season a dud. It. Is. Not. The emotional aspect of ‘Peaky Blinders’ may give out the impression of being a cheat-technique, get-out-of-trouble card (at first) to overcompensate for Polly’s absence—more on that later—but the ‘humanification’ of this troubled lot feels strangely cathartic. As if someone we know just made a deadly confession and your sins have somehow been absolved with his. Cillian Murphy and Paul Anderson are, and this statement is by no means a ‘stretch’, legendary together. And independently.
In all honesty, Helen McCrory’s dominating presence (something that will forever be missed) is completely out of this arrangement and that has clearly led to last-minute script edits, resulting in this pounding sense of hollowness and an unwelcome rushed ending. And, although they celebrate her life and legacy through flashbacks and what not, we all know it is not quite the same.
It gives me some relief that with a movie on the horizon, how long before Gina Gray comes at you, saying, “Don’t f**k with the Peaky Blinders.”
