r/PeakyBlinders

It could have been so much better, but there were so many changes done for example:

-The actor for Fredie Thorne leaving and having to be killed off

-The actor for John leaving and having to be killed of

-Pollie's actress dying irl

-Arthur's actor not being able to appear in The Imortal Man

I'd say the original series was amazing but it could have been so much better

If the actor had chosen to stay on for S2, I wonder how FREDDIE THORNE would've progressed as a character.

He was never a favourite of mine, but He's integral to S1 and I do think it would've been interesting to not only see his relationship with Ada develop, but also see how Tommy's best mate would've gone along or not have gone along with Tommy's schemes and future business.

Looking at how heavy the politics was in the later seasons, it's fair to say there were many interesting possibilities for that character.

I do think the actor stepping out was a blessing in disguise. SERIES 2 is nearly perfect. Ada's questioning of her own identity and her journey throughout the show is overall pretty great, and I think propelled by losing her husband so early.

I’ve re watched peaky blinders so many times and each time I’m annoyed about how everyone blames Tommy for every bad thing that goes on in their life but can’t wait to receive all the good and money that comes from his benefit. John didn’t listen to orders and provoked the Changrettas and got himself killed yet Esme stupid ass blames Tommy then kills his daughter by putting a curse on her. Nobody told John to do what he did and there was consequences. Same with Polly she told the priest secret info that got Tommy in major trouble in season three and she killed the cop in season 2 and told everyone and was mad she got arrested for it when the only reason she didn’t get caught was because of Tommy. We all know Michael is a horrible character and deserves everything he had come to him and Polly defended Michael against Tommy even though Michael has been planning to kill him since season 4. Arthur needed Tommy to stay in control but he’s also a grown man and couldn’t handle his own decisions and couldn’t keep his wife in check. Everyone has done things on the own accord that got them in trouble yet blame Tommy the one who improved their life and gave their last name respect and power and what does he get for it? Hate disrespect all the above.

When Michael is introduced in Peaky Blinders, he is presented as an intelligent kid from a humble family who had never really had anything to do with organized crime before. Yet, once he enters the world of the Peaky Blinders, he adapts incredibly quickly.
He is smart, calculating, observant and, above all, he manages to fit into a completely new world with an almost unsettling naturalness. His gradual transformation into someone increasingly ruthless always made me think that Tommy had found someone who could potentially take over from him.
After Season 3, I personally thought Michael was going to become Tommy’s true successor.
And I think there were some very good reasons to think that.
Out of all the members of the family, Michael is probably the one who has the most in common with Tommy in terms of personality. Arthur is extremely violent, but also impulsive and much more emotionally vulnerable. John is tough and determined, but he doesn’t have the same level of strategic intelligence and ability to calculate his moves as Tommy. And then there’s Finn, who is simply too inexperienced to be compared to the others.
Michael, on the other hand, seemed to possess exactly the qualities that made Tommy so effective: intelligence, coldness, the ability to read people, and above all, the ability to adapt quickly to different situations.
And that’s what makes his relationship with Tommy so interesting.
After Polly’s test, however, something changes. Tommy sends Michael to New York, Michael loses money and, gradually, their relationship begins to deteriorate. From that point on, it almost feels like the show abandons the idea of Michael as Tommy’s natural successor and starts building a conflict between the two of them.
And personally, I think that’s a bit of a shame.
Not because Michael was necessarily destined to become “the new Tommy”, but because the show had spent several seasons laying the groundwork for him to become the most natural person to carry on Tommy’s legacy.
Even Duke, who eventually seems to represent a possible alternative, doesn’t get enough development to really fill the same narrative role. He is introduced very late, appears in only a handful of episodes, and simply doesn’t have the time to develop as a character in the same way Michael did.
His introduction therefore felt a little rushed to me: he arrives practically at the end of the series and is suddenly supposed to represent the future of the Peaky Blinders, without us really getting the chance to see his journey.
So am I the only one, or did Michael really seem like he was being built up as the perfect heir to Tommy?

Except for American. They are often quite wrong on American accents.
So I accepted James Frecheville's Jack Nelson.
BUT… He's supposed to be Boston Irish for Christ's sake

Oswald Mosley, a character I was very intrigued by the moment he took the screen. I loved how they built him up on seasons 5 and 6 making it look like Tommy has finally found his unbreakable opposing force… >!Only for them not to use him again especially with how season 6 ended where Tommy has put the pieces together.. The alley-oop was tossed so perfectly, why didn’t they use it 🤧!<

I liked how the movie ended, I think it was already given, but the road to getting there was a bit disappointing in my opinion. I don’t know if they switched up the writers, if they did. Oh well.

He's just so creepy.

This is about my thoughts on the movie, so obviously big spoilers ahead.

I just watched the movie yesterday after having waited to do it for quite some time. I wanted to do it justice and therefor waited until there was time for me to rewatch the series and to then see what I considered to be the last chapter of that saga. I've seen that this movie is a bit controversial so let me start by saying that I have no Intention of hating on it.
The movie looked gorgeous throughout, I can get behind all the Major plot Points of the Story and the last Scene was a very well done farewell to an iconic character, especially with that great final song they added to it. Tears were close, the good bye felt heavy.

But here comes the but... I am an emotional watcher, I love a good story and a good song under the cight circumstances works like cutting onion to me. All the ingredients were there - a character that accompanied me over a long time, an emotional ending of a well-told story, a few very well chosen words of good bye and that song - it should have had me in tears for half an hour. But it didn't. And I think, thats kind of the movies fault for preventing me from getting really into it.

As I said, the major plotpoints aren't a huge issue for me, specific parts of the plot kept me out though:

- Rom Baro. The gypsy king. A concept like that has never been introduced in the series. We know that Polly was seen to have such a status but it seemed to apply within a specific family. Is the Rom Baro higher than that? If yes, why hasn't that been talked about earlier? How much sense does it make that the title seems to be inherited by child - as if it is an actual crown? Do we really think that the people around when Tommy died, merely seconds ago, really felt the need to make sure that Duke knew that he was now seen as such a king? This felt like a plot device only there to ramp up the weight of the story.

- No real villain. One of the staples of the series was the presence of an intriguing villain. They grew more and more intimidating over the series - but in the movie, thats completely different. The agent Beckett seems way too nice, why would he give Duke a 2nd chance after he showed himself not ready to execute an order? Why was he so gullible to run right into a trap? Was this really an attempt to play into the "Duke seeks a father figure" trope because if yes - they did a terrible job doing it. Because it wasn't clear enough and the solution was even more weak since even at the end of the movie, the situation between Tommy and Duke was exactly the same as before the movie since they didn't have any real moment or conversation that really showed that something changed - except for the mud kicking.

- Pub Scene. It was intended to show how badass Tommy still is. Love the concept. But that particular scene still felt a bit off. I mean, do we really think that Tommy would kill a soldier with no remorse? Couldn't that group that partied there just be some sort of goon? Violent dumb people who in part actually didn't know who Tommy was? And why did the soldier, a person trained in handling grenades, run so conviniently out of the pub with the grenade instead of trying to pull his clothes and get rid of the grenade? Did he want to save everybody but himself? The scene felt gimmicky, I can't accept that this couldn't have been written a bit more grounded.

- Arthur. I learned about the struggles of the actor and I think, the decision to kill him off off-screen is servicable enough. I agree with fans who say that he is one of the cornerstones of the series and therefor deserves more but it seemed like he was simply incapable and therefor, I wouldn't hold it against the writers per se. The decision to have Tommy be the one felt a bit off - considering there were more than enough villains left from season 5, I guess I would have gone for a different story but even if we accept that Tommy had to be the one, I think it needed better exposition. A simple "drunken rage" doesn't do that connection justice, so either find another way or at least don't skip over it so quickly.

- Devices. There were so many things in the movie that felt as if the writers had some sort of checklist with items they wanted to make use of for some sort of effect. Opium check. Gypsy magic check. River boats check. Horses check. Suit, flatcap, whiskey check. And some just weren't really integrated well enough and felt off even though they are in the exact correct environment. As soon as they started to talk about a plan on how to get into the ware house, I knew it had to be through some sort of tunnel. Because trauma... Okay film, is there a chance we can have that a little less shoddy?

- Duke. The script felt as if it didn't know what to do with him. We know from the series that he has no issues killing a man in cold blood. The film then introduces him as "maybe more violent than 1st generation Shelby" but half a scene later, we see how he botchers the execution of an unknown goon and then seemingly having second thoughts about it? I mean, figure it out - the guy is either a volatile mess because of his craving for a father figure and/or urge to prove himself or he is a force of nature like Tommy is that slightly has lost direction. But the movie picked neither of those. Only to then name him Rom baro at the end...

- The end of Tommy. It was depicted to be a final relieve and I get that. But I think it could have been made way more effectful. Why did the movie in the beginning waste time on Tommys connection to the strange woman nobody knew while instead that could have been cut short and instead they could have showed Tommys suffering? Show him actually being haunted by his ghosts. Show him being actually devasted by all that. Show him having internal dialogues that depict his inner war and conflict. Show some of those demons return to him in Birmingham and while executing the plan. We know that Cilian as an actor would have been able to do so much more on that and every investment there would have amped up the weight of him finally returning and in the end, to finally leave all that behind to be free. It was an easy win and for the life of me, I can't understand why the writers missed that opportunity for a really really well-earned payoff. For the gain of... nothing.

After all - all this criticism doesn't come from a place of hate. It comes from a sense of sadness about what feels like a lost oppourtunity. Of potential that was there but wasn't made use of. The Peaky Blinders series is so extraordinary because of the internal struggles depicted on screen amidst a gangster saga with powerful adversaries. The movie, for me, didn't even attempt, to follow up on those strengths. I didn't want a happy ending, I just wanted an ending that did justice to the series and the journey we've been on for 38 hours if you include the movie. For me personally, I probably will continue to see season 6 as the end of the saga. With the movie feeling like some sort of fan fiction that is well meant but not executed at the same level of the series.