'Peaky Blinders' was a strange TV phenomenon.
Deeply loved by its fans across the world, the stylish English gangster series was undoubtedly full of working class swagger.
Very cinematic, it drew a cast most series would have died for and had some powerful TV moments.
Yet Steven Knight's Brummie gangster show also lacked consistency and often tied itself up in knots with convoluted plots.
Now it's back with another outing for Cillian Murphy's haunted Romany Gypsy mob boss Tommy Shelby in a typically star studded Netflix movie.
With Knight back on board as the writer and Tom Harper in the director's chair, 'Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man' is set seven years after Shelby tried to stop the rise of British fascism.
Britain is at war with the Nazis in 1940, with Luftwaffe bombers decimating cities from the skies.
In addition to taking lives, the Nazis are producing counterfeit pound notes in Germany to flood and weaken the British economy.
Helping them is Tim Roth's English Nazi agent John Beckett who woos Barry Keoghan's Erasmus 'Duke' Shelby, Tommy's eldest son, to his cause.
Duke has taken over the leadership of the Peaky Blinders in Tommy's absence but is quickly losing respect in Birmingham.
The Blinders have begun to anger some locals including his aunt Sophie Rundle's Ada Thorne, who is now a local MP, by raiding a munitions factory bombed by the Luftwaffe and savagely beating those who stand in their way.
Living in self-imposed exile in a farmhouse, Tommy has maintained only one connection to his former life - Packy Lee's Johnny Dogs who tends to his needs.
However after the bombing of the munitions factory, Ada turns up to warn Tommy that Duke is squandering the goodwill he built up in Birmingham when he was leading the Blinders.
Rebecca Ferguson's palm reader Kaulo Chiriklo arrives and reveals she is the sister of the Romany Gypsy who Tommy slept with and fathered Duke.
She sleeps with Tommy too after getting him to admit under the influence of opium that he was responsible for the death of his troubled brother Arthur who we learn passed away two years earlier.
Haunted by the deaths of both Arthur and also his daughter Ruby, Tommy sets off for Birmingham on a mission of redemption after being persuaded by Kaulo that Duke needs his guidance.
Noting Ada is whipping up animosity to the Blinders on the streets of Birmingham after the munitions factory raid, Beckett tests Duke's loyalty by asking him to set his aunt up for assassination.
But will the young man succumb to the Nazi agent's machinations?
Or can Tommy ride to his and the Blinders' rescue?
At a running time of 112 minutes, Harper's movie version, like the TV series before it, has a lot to recommend it.
It's handsomely shot by its DPs George Steel and Ben Wilson.
Alison McCosh's costume designs are superb and Jacqueline Abrahams' production design is spot on.
There's a typically blistering rock and folk soundtrack with Fontaines DC, Antony Genn, Martin Slattery, Amy Taylor, Tom Coll, Girl In The Year Above and Nick Cave involved.
As ever, Murphy anchors the film with a haunting, enigmatic lead performance.
However, the movie is a mixed bag in terms of pacing and yet again, Knight's script lacks consistency.
Some scenes, like those between Ferguson and Murphy or Murphy and Keoghan, drag and lack sufficient bite.
Others involving Roth and Keoghan or Tommy and the various Blinders recover the spark of the series at its best.
As a result, Keoghan and Ferguson struggle to assert their characters in the 'Peaky Blinders' universe - the former really suffering when pitted against Roth or Murphy.
Roth, by way of contrast, has much more fruitful time as the movie's principal villain and he arguably steals the movie as Beckett, the wily Nazi sympathiser.
Stephen Graham makes a welcome return as the Liverpool dockworker Hayden Stagg, while Sophie Rundle is effective as Ada.
Lee and other 'Peaky Blinders' favourites like Ned Dennehy's scrapyard owner Charlie Strong and Ian Peck's Curly comfortably slot back in, while Jay Lycurgo makes a decent fist of playing Duke's right hand man, Elijah.
There's a good sequence in The Garrison bar when Tommy is confronted by a soldier after putting an end to its music.
Harper does a good job too with a shootout involving Beckett and Tommy in an inner city farmyard.
The big set piece finale in Liverpool docks is a bit Scooby Doo, playing out like a Mersey version of 'The Guns of Navarone' but it's still thrillingly executed.
And while it is in the higher end of the 'Peaky Blinders' storyline spectrum, Harper's well made movie doesn't quite hit the heights of the first two series or Season Four.
In many respects, you walk away feeling about 'Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man' the way you felt about much of the TV series.
It has memorable moments and some crowd pleasing performances but it also has some deep flaws, mostly stemming from Knight's inability to maintain any writing discipline.
That's why, despite all its pouting and preening, 'Peaky Blinders' could never hold a candle to 'The Sopranos'.
If we are being brutally honest, it is also why 'Peaky Blinders' has been lapped by other, less stylish British and Irish gangster shows.
They may not have its style or swagger but they certainly have more substance.
('Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man' was released in UK and Irish cinemas on March 6, 2026 and was made available for streaming on Netflix on March 20, 2026)
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