How did a scrappy period drama about Birmingham gangsters become a cultural phenomenon? In a new Netflix original podcast, you’ll find out — just in time for Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man, the new film continuation of the epic series. You can watch the podcast trailer above.
The story behind the making of Peaky Blinders is almost as thrilling as the exploits of Tommy Shelby (Cillian Murphy). “It’s been a long road to get us here,” podcast co-host Packy Lee (who plays Johnny Dogs in the series and film) says in the trailer. “The violence, the power, the bones, stretched to their limit.”
Lee would know — his character’s been there as Tommy’s loyal compatriot for every season of Peaky Blinders, and he returns for the new film. He’s joined by radio and television presenter Edith Bowman (Soundtracking) for an in-depth examination of the history of Peaky Blinders.
The trailer reminds us of the scope of the Peaky series leading up to The Immortal Man, with glimpses of other characters like Ada (Sophie Rundle), Grace (Annabelle Wallis), and John (Joe Cole). “Family, love, and losses,” Lee narrates. “It’s all been leading to this.”
And it’s a fitting conclusion. As Bowman points out, the story of the Shelby clan started with their service in World War I. “This story didn’t start with crime,” she says. “It started with war.” In The Immortal Man, that story comes full circle: Tommy returns to Birmingham to foil a Nazi plot that could lose World War II for Great Britain.
That plot could also lose Tommy his estranged son: Duke Shelby (Barry Keoghan) and a new generation of Peaky Blinders have been drawn into the scheme. “The Shelby name carries a lot of weight and danger,” Keoghan says in a new interview for the podcast. That danger is coming home to Birmingham.
All episodes of the Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man podcast are on Netflix now. The podcast is also be available across all the usual platforms. Guests include creator Steven Knight, director Tom Harper, producer Guy Heeley, and actors Murphy, Rundle, Keoghan, Rebecca Ferguson, and Tim Roth.
