Peaky Blinders Season 4 Trailer, Release Date, Cast, Story and Everything to Know

Peaky Blinders Season 4 will see the Shelby crime clan unleashing another salvo of chaos. Showcasing an impressive cast and a wonderfully grimy early 20^th century urban aesthetic, the series has not only become a hit in its native U.K. on BBC Two, but is also achieving praise in the U.S. where the series has evolved from an oddly-named curiosity on the Netflix queues of American viewers into highly anticipated destination television.

Back in May of 2016, the BBC officially announced the renewal of Peaky Blinders for Season/Series 4 and 5 for BBC Two. This utmost vote of confidence came shortly after weekly U.K. airings of Series 3 episodes had started to air. Consequently, the fruits of this development will eventually be enjoyed in the U.S., allowing American viewers to binge the latest episode crop in their entirety.

Peaky Blinders Season 4 Release Date

Peaky Blinders Season 4 will make all of its episodes available for binge consumption in the U.S. on Netflix on Thursday, December 21.

The season premiered in the U.K. on BBC Two on November 15, scoring 2.3 million viewers, its highest-rated opening since the 2.4 million earned by the 2013 series premiere. It’s a promising upward trajectory, since Season 2’s premiere drew a low of 1.7 million, followed by a 2 million rebound for the Season 3 opener. Of course, as usual, Netflix, is treating the U.S. release numbers as classified information.

Peaky Blinders Season 4 News

It appears that the scandal-strewn news headlines surrounding disgraced movie mogul Harvey Weinstein are about to affect one of our favorite shows.

When Peaky Blinders Season 4 finally surfaces, expect a notable change in the credits, specifically regarding its domestic distributor. The BBC Two series, which is delivered to U.S. audiences on Netflix, is distributed stateside by The Weinstein Company (with Endemol Shine International distributing outside the U.S.). However, don’t expect to see the dreaded “W” cited in Season 4, since THR confirms that The Weinstein Company name will be excised from Peaky Blinders from here on out.

The reason for the move is obvious, considering that the company’s (recently-terminated) titular head, is facing a rapidly escalating series of accusations for sexual harassment that even reaches the reprehensible apex of rape. Peaky Blinders joins a growing list of Weinstein-connected projects to make the name persona non grata, with television series such as MTV’s Scream, History’s Six following suit, as well as imminently-landing films such as the Benedict Cumberbatch historical inventor drama The Current War and the Kenneth Branagh-directed drama Artemis Fowl.

As far as the status of Peaky Blinders itself goes, the series (still) has yet to confirm its Season 4 release date, despite the fact that it will likely arrive sooner, rather than later. Indeed, the BBC have booked a U.K. premiere event in Birmingham for October 30, which indicates that (as of this October 13 update,) Season 4 will probably arrive within a month’s time.

Peaky Blinders Season 4 Trailer

The Peaky Blinders Season 4 trailer is here!

In the short teaser, we witness some of the fallout from the Season 3 shocker in which family crime boss Tommy Shelby (Cillian Murphy) seemingly threw his family under the proverbial bus of the law for (admittedly reckless) criminal acts made in the effort to save his captured young son, with the portentous glance of a noose to drive it all home. However, while Tommy attempts to repair the damage done from that act and reveal his reasons, a new criminal organization “of a different dimension,” headed by a ruthless crime boss (Adrien Brody), moves into Shelby territory, representing an existential threat to the already-fractured family crime clan.

Peaky Blinders Season 4 Cast

Aidan Gillen, a regular cast member from HBO’s television juggernaut Game of Thrones, will appear on Peaky Blinders Season 4 for an unspecified role. On GoT, Gillen fielded the role of Petyr “Littlefinger” Baelish, the machinations-making climber of the Westeros ladder of chaos. Amongst several other films and shows in his vast resume, Gillen has HBO to thank for his other signature role on The Wire, having played a political ladder-climber of a different nature in the idealistic-but-ambitious Baltimore councilman-turned-mayor Thomas Carcetti.  

Charlie Murphy is the other newly-announced fresh face for Peaky Blinders Season 4, playing an also-unidentified character. The English actress – not to be confused with the Charlie Murphy who was famously slapped by Rick James – has been seen in notable runs on U.K. television such as the historical action series The Last Kingdom, the quirky crime drama Happy Valley and the pastoral drama The Village.

Charlotte Riley will make her return to the series in Season 4 as May Carleton. Riley first fielded the role back in Season 2, depicting May as a rich widow who, brandishing stunning looks, substantial coffers and business-beneficial connections as a champion horse trainer, was the perfect woman on paper for gangster Tommy Shelby. While the romance was hot and heavy, Tommy ultimately chose to remain with his baby-mama and would-be wife Grace, who would be tragically killed in Season 3. Riley was notably seen in the BBC event series Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell and in the 2014 Tom Cruise-starring sci-fi/actioner Edge of Tomorrow.

As creator Steven Knight comments on the new acquisitions (via Deadline):

“We have a dream team gathered for series four of Peaky Blinders, coming to us for love of the series which is great. Adrien Brody, Aidan Gillen and Charlie Murphy give us a wealth of talent to work with. And with Tom Hardy and Charlotte Riley returning, we couldn’t have hoped for more.”

Adrien Brody is confirmed for the cast, playing a role that is still very much a secret, creator Steven Knight tells the Deadline that, “He genuinely was the actor in my head when I wrote the part. I’m sure he will be a formidable presence in the world of the Peaky Blinders.”

Brody, the 2003 Best Actor Oscar winner for The Pianist, is of course, is yet another high-profile coup for the series. The actor has tread paths across the genres, known to be a recurring player for Wes Anderson in comedies such as The Darjeeling Limited, Fantastic Mr. Fox and The Grand Budapest Hotel. He’s also had his share onscreen action in Peter Jackson’s King Kong, Predators and the Hollywood star-stacked Chinese production Dragon Blade, also fielding a noteworthy small-screen run starring as the titular magician in the 2014 History Channel miniseries Houdini.

We can also expect the whole gang to return.

Cillian Murphy will be back as family head Thomas “Tommy” Shelby. Helen McCrory, Paul Anderson, Joe Cole, Sophie Rundle, Finn Cole, Aimee-Ffion Edwards and Kate Phillips make their return, joined by Natasha O’Keefe and Packy Lee. Additionally, Tom Hardy also returns to field his tenuous relationship with the Shelby clan as the Machiavellian Jewish gangster boss Alfie Solomons.

Samuel L. Jackson might just bring his brand of ass-kicking cacophony. On a sidenote that’s dismissible as speculation, Jackson, the busiest man in show business, recently told the UK’s Daily Star that he was pondering a run on British television, specifically on Peaky Blinders. Jackson told the London-based tabloid, “I want to do some British TV. I’d love to be in Peaky Blinders. That’s a great show.”

Peaky Blinders Season 4 and 5 Renewal

While the decision to renew Peaky Blinders not just once, but twice over is obviously a welcome one to its increasing international fanbase, it’s certainly one that came under a curious context. By the time Series 3 rounded the finish line of its BBC Two broadcast run, the series had (for reasons we can only theorize,) started to see a weekly hemorrhaging of ratings. While the season’s performance in the U.S. on Netflix remains (as usual for the outlet,) unconfirmed, it was well-received and the show’s popularity seems to be growing.

Indeed, it does seem possible that the BBC’s renewal-happy zeal might be motivated by the show’s ever-expanding global presence. Besides its aforementioned Weinstein-distributed American streaming surge on Netflix, Peaky Blinders has reportedly been sold in 163 countries. Thus, even if U.K. viewers might be finding themselves knackered by the criminal exploits of the Shelby clan, the show seems to be a shiny new toy to mainstream audiences across the globe.  

Peaky Blinders Season 4 Story

According to Deadline:

“Season 4 will kick off when Tommy receives a mysterious letter on Christmas Eve and realizes the Peaky Blinders are in danger of annihilation. As the enemy closes in, he flees his country house and returns to the streets of Small Heath, Birmingham where a desperate fight for survival begins.”

This preview, however, glosses over the colossal cliffhanger event of Season 3, which saw an earnest attempt by Shelby family members, Arthur, John, Michael and Polly to keep Tommy’s kidnapped toddler son safe with the killing of a corrupt criminal priest and an unnecessarily explosive act of train terrorism. However, rather than helping the family escape to America as planned, the inevitable arrival of the police saw Tommy – motivated by reasons unknown – essentially hand his family over to the long arm of the law, watching as they are taken off in trucks. As star Cillian Murphy explained in a BBC interview last June:

“I think his family think that he’s betrayed them, and it will be up to Tommy to demonstrate to them that he hasn’t betrayed them, and that he has a bigger plan. The question is what that bigger plan is. Who is he going to call? What’s going to happen to the family? Can he ever get that level of trust or love back again?” Adding, “I think he will never stop. Because of what happened to him in the First World War, I think it’s never going to stop. He’ll just always be this man searching for something. I think that even if he achieved all this material wealth and he achieves some sort of position of power… I don’t see him retiring with a pipe and slippers, that’s for sure.”

Tommy, a ruthless gangster by trade, continues to walk the line of maintaining strength in the criminal underworld with his desire to establish legitimacy and respect for his family and businesses. However, circumstances always seem to pull in the former direction.