There’s no way of getting around this spoiler alert: Tommy Shelby may be gone, but “Peaky Blinders” is not done handing out flat caps. Today, Netflix revealed that Jamie Bell has joined the new Netflix/BBC sequel series as Duke Shelby, the son of Cillian Murphy’s Tommy, as creator/writer Steven Knight pushes the franchise deeper into its next chapter. Bell will take over the role in two new sequel seasons; the character was previously played by Conrad Khan in Season 6 and Barry Keoghan in “Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man.”
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Charlie Heaton (“Stranger Things”), Jessica Brown Findlay (“Downton Abbey”, Lashana Lynch (“The Woman King”), and Lucy Karczewski (“Nan Swap”) are also joining the cast.
Knight framed the handoff in direct terms. “I am thrilled that we are announcing a new era of Peaky Blinders, moving the story to post-war Birmingham in the early 50s. We are incredibly fortunate to have Jamie Bell taking the role of Tommy Shelby’s oldest son, Duke, and to have the incredible Charlie Heaton also leading the cast. There are more exciting cast announcements to come, and Peaky is on the road again.”
That new era is set in 1950s Birmingham, with the city rebuilding after the war and the Shelby family still planted at the center of the violence and opportunity that comes with reconstruction. Netflix’s official setup describes a race to control Birmingham’s massive rebuilding project as “a brutal contest of mythical dimensions,” with the family once again stuck at the blood-soaked heart of it.
The broader structure has been in place for a while. Netflix and the BBC previously confirmed that the sequel would run for two six-episode seasons, with Knight writing and Cillian Murphy executive producing. That always suggested the franchise was building toward succession rather than closure; Bell’s casting makes that shift official in a way the earlier announcement did not.
There is still no release date for either of the new series. But the shape of the next phase is clear enough now: Tommy Shelby’s shadow still hangs over Birmingham, yet the story is moving on without him, toward Duke and whatever kind of ruler he turns out to be. In the meantime, “The Immortal Man” is still pulling audience numbers strong enough to explain why Netflix and the BBC are not letting the Shelby business close shop.
Check out the first look image of Bell below.
