SPOILER ALERT: This post contains details about the Season 6 premiere of Peaky Blinders. It's surprising to hear that it's been 889 days since BBC One aired the season 5 finale of the period gangster saga Peaky Blinders. With anticipation at fever pitch, the first episode of the sixth and final season begins tonight local time in the UK, providing the first glimpse of how things may add up for the Shelby family – and crucially star Helen McCrory. Tributes were paid to those who passed away. Last year after a battle with cancer. The premiere episode is dedicated to him.
Last time we checked in with Shelby, Tommy Shelby (Cillian Murphy) was at his wits end and pointing a gun at his own head in a failed attempt to assassinate fascist politician Oswald Mosley. In the opening frame of Season 6, we learn that Tommy didn't actually commit suicide—but not because of lack of trying: Brother Arthur fired a gunshot.
Face down in the mud, and with wife Lizzie (Natasha O'Keeffe) saying, "You're not a soldier, you're a coward," Tommy raises himself, and addresses his late mother ominously, "They Will do "lest I pass through there, as if there would be some other consequence."
As Tommy gets back into the house, a truck with a white flag passes him and a phone rings in the background. When Tommy responds, he is told by an Irish woman, "Last night the operation was conducted by soldiers of the Irish Republican Army." At the same time, body bags are being unloaded from the truck outside Tommy's window.
On the phone the woman insists, "We need to keep Mr. Mosley alive... Also, you should know that saving Mosley's life last night wasn't our only intervention - we made some changes to your organization's structure." Huh."
As the scene cuts to asking Tommy on the phone to open Tommy's body bag, the voice on the phone says, "Since you started building your empire, you've had a crutch to lean on. Last night, we did that. Kicked the crutches. From now on you will be dependent on us." She continues, "Mr. Shelby, please beware, that the deaths of your people are your own responsibility because you continually fail to understand your limits."
Viewers never see the contents of the body bag, but when Tommy opens the third encasing, it's clear he's devastated and we instinctively know the body inside is that of McCrory's Aunt Polly.
The family then gathers in a funeral pyre where Polly is being cremated inside a gypsy caravan - we don't see McCrory who appears only in flashback scenes from last season. As the flames rise, Polly's son, Michael Gray (Finn Cole), vows to take revenge on Tommy, "no matter what, no matter how many lies I have to lie."
The episode then shifts from four years to 1933, where Tommy moves to Miquelon Island, a French-controlled area near Newfoundland that served as a center during the Prohibition years. Michael is also there to meet Tommy. The two haven't seen each other in four years, and a title card tells us it's December 5, 1933—the day the prohibition was repealed.
Arriving at the bar of the hotel where the meeting is to take place, we learn that Tommy no longer drinks alcohol (this is an ongoing theme throughout the episode as the others try to force him to assimilate; a To the point, he says, "I feel now that whiskey is just fuel for the loud engines inside your brain"). As he is chased by the locals, and reacts violently, Tommy exclaims. , "Since I quit drinking, I've become a calmer and more peaceful person... Sometimes in moments of personal conflict I can resort to old ways."
While waiting for Michael to arrive for the meeting, Tommy hears Aunt Polly's warning in his head: "There will be a war, and one of you will die, but which I cannot tell." When Michael appears, he tells Tommy not to avenge Aunt Polly's murder. Tommy's response: "You know, Michael, sometimes the need of the hour is when you take revenge on a very powerful enemy. You have to choose your moment; that moment will come."
The two nonetheless discuss their common business interests of the opium trade. Instead of viewing the last day of prohibition as the end of something, says Tommy, "when one door closes, another opens."
Tommy suggests that the boats on Miquelon may operate with a different cargo as he tosses a pack of opium onto the table and explains that he has established a supply chain "with colleagues in Belfast over the past four years".
One of Michael's teammates says they have to take up "Uncle Jack"'s offer to Boston. Tommy responds to this mysterious uncle, "Maybe we can meet in Boston after you've talked with him, who, I believe, is Michael, your wife's uncle."
Uncle Jack, who Michael says "decides everything" certainly appears to be an oblique reference to Joseph Kennedy.
Little does Michael know that Tommy has put a nice sized pack of medicines in the briefcase he handed over to Michael before leaving the meeting. Tommy advises the officers who stop Michael and send him to Norfolk Prison in Boston.
Meanwhile, Tommy visits Michael's wife Gina (Anya Taylor-Joy) and Uncle Jack's "favourite niece" and says he wants to convey a message: "If he doesn't want to buy my opium, I'll ask the ex. I'll sell Boston Jews," thus opening the Solomons run by Tom Hardy's Alfie.
"Do you want to start a fucking war?" Gina asks.
Elsewhere, Arthur Shelby (Paul Anderson) has risen after the loss of Aunt Polly, wasting away on opium at various stages and bringing out the anger and increased power of Sister Ada (Sophie Rundle).
At the end of the episode and in a Boston hotel room, Tommy receives a call from Lizzie who tells him that his daughter Ruby is having nightmares and is uttering gypsy phrases in her sleep that speak of Satan. Huh. This sends Tommy into a panic as he hurries to return to Birmingham.
Season 6 will continue to air on BBC One on Sundays for the next five weeks. There's no fixed date yet for a global Netflix debut, although the show usually starts running in the UK after it starts its run on the service.