Cillian Murphy as 1940’s Tommy Shelby returns in a new inflection point for Peaky Blinders

cillian murphy is back on the big screen as Tommy Shelby in Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man, a feature expansion that shifts the saga into a wartime showdown set in 1940. The release marks a turning point: the story moves beyond a long-running TV arc into a standalone film built around national stakes, family fracture, and Tommy’s unresolved ghosts.

What happens when Cillian Murphy’s Tommy Shelby is pulled back into Birmingham in 1940?

The film positions Tommy Shelby as a weary figure living far from the Birmingham crime scene he helped create, with only his henchman Johnny Dogs (Packy Lee) for company. He is haunted by memories of his late brother Arthur and his dead daughter Ruby, while working on what is framed as his definitive autobiography. That inward-looking exile is disrupted when a woman played by Rebecca Ferguson brings news that Tommy’s son, Erasmus Shelby (Barry Keoghan), is now running the Peaky Blinders.

The central pressure point is political as much as personal. Erasmus is described as leading a new group raiding government armouries for guns meant for the military, while also accepting a secret offer from a Nazi fifth-columnist named Beckett (Tim Roth). The scheme involves distributing counterfeit currency with the aim of damaging the economy and making Britain easier to invade. The result is a clean narrative mechanism: Tommy’s return is not nostalgia, but necessity—an attempt to contain betrayal inside the family and a threat outside it.

Within this framework, the story is built as a homefront wartime film, with mud-and-blood intensity and a clear antagonist structure. Tommy is positioned against the Nazis, and the war becomes the backdrop that pushes him from isolation into action, culminating in a big-screen confrontation that blends personal reckoning with national crisis.

What if the movie’s scale changes the franchise’s real-world footprint?

One immediate sign of expanded impact is logistical: the production used Calke Abbey, a National Trust property in Derbyshire, with filming taking place in November and December 2024. Caroline Taylor, Visitor Operations Manager at Calke Abbey, said the filming transformed the stately home into a “different world, ” emphasizing the scale of the operation beyond on-camera work—make-up, hair, costumes, and catering—turning the site into what she described as a “hub of activity. ”

The changes were not superficial. Taylor said more than 1, 300 objects had to be packed away, and artificial snow was used on the grounds at one point. Calke Abbey remained open to visitors while the film crew was present, though staff were not allowed to reveal what was being filmed. Stuart Alcock, General Manager of the stately home, described the filming as “critically important” financially, noting the cost of caring for such places and highlighting that filming fees create income while also sharing the location with wider audiences who may later visit.

That combination—cinematic production intensity plus heritage-site economics—underscores how a film continuation can function as both entertainment and an engine for place-based visibility. The release pattern reinforces the scale as well: the film is in cinemas for a limited run before it begins streaming on Netflix from 20 March (ET), creating two distinct waves of attention rather than one.

What happens when legacy characters are present—without physically returning?

A defining emotional lever in the film is Arthur’s absence. Paul Anderson, who played Arthur across the show’s six seasons, said he was initially “apprehensive” about the move to a movie and expressed a preference for more seasons rather than a film. At the same time, he described the finished film as “amazing, ” while stressing that the audience response ultimately determines how the project lands.

Anderson also addressed the long-running fan hope that Arthur would appear. His comments frame a careful balance: Arthur is “somewhat present” through Tommy’s guilty conscience, but Arthur is not physically alive, and Anderson said Steven Knight gave him advance notice of this outcome. Anderson characterized the storyline as “great” and “sad, ” describing it as a powerful creative choice.

In narrative terms, that approach consolidates the film’s core theme: Tommy’s battlefield is not only Birmingham in wartime, but his own interior life—memory, grief, and responsibility. With Arthur positioned as a psychological presence rather than an active participant, the film leans into a reckoning story rather than a reunion story. It is a risk, but it is also a way to push the franchise forward without relying on full character reversals.

What if the most likely future is a two-track audience—diehards and newcomers?

The film is explicitly described as a standalone feature built from a globally successful small-screen hit. Its 1940 setting and wartime conflict widen the canvas beyond gang rivalry into questions of loyalty and national survival, while still anchoring everything in the family’s internal collapse around Erasmus’s choices and Tommy’s return.

That creates a clear most-likely viewing dynamic:

Uncertainty remains: the film’s most effective landing depends on whether viewers need deep familiarity with the TV canon to fully connect with the emotional beats. What is clear from the film’s setup is that the creators have chosen escalation—war, infiltration, and economic sabotage—rather than a quieter epilogue. That puts pressure on performance, tone, and clarity, especially for anyone entering the story at this new point.

For El-Balad. com readers watching the entertainment landscape as a signal of broader shifts, the key takeaway is that the franchise is now operating as an events machine: a short theatrical window, a defined streaming date, and real-world cultural and economic ripples at filming locations. Whatever comes next will likely be shaped by how well this model holds—cinema first, streaming second, and story stakes large enough to justify the upgrade in scale—anchored by cillian murphy