Thomas Shelby’s fate may be unknown until Peaky Blinders season 6 is released, but season 5 already may have teased the way Tommy dies. Peaky Blinders fans have long tried to guess how the BBC and Netflix original show will end, and many are certain it will lead to the death of protagonist Tommy Shelby (Cillian Murphy) in season 6. While that is definitely plausible, the way in which many have assumed Tommy would die may be the one that Peaky Blinders season 5 teased.
While Peaky Blinders season 4 ended with Tommy at the top, having just won his seat in Parliament, season 5 did not share the same hope. Peaky Blinders never hesitated to kill central characters, as John Shelby’s season 4 death proved, but it also often tended to end seasons with some sort of silver lining for Tommy and his family. Peaky Blinders season 5 distanced itself from previous seasons, ending with Tommy betrayed and having no idea about the identity of the traitor, his plan thwarted.
Tommy will surely face multiple threats in Peaky Blinders season 6, but some viewers have started worrying that one thread of season 5 might be the thing that finally kills him. Peaky Blinders season 5 found Tommy with a new and persistent cough. Tommy never backed away from smoking in the previous seasons, and he didn’t either in season 5, but the subtly ever-present cough may be a hint that Tommy Shelby will die of a lung-related illness. Tuberculosis was still a significant problem in 1920s Britain, and with Tommy's heavy smoking habit, opium use, and fast life, it's certainly a disease that would easily take hold in his already abused lungs.
The Shelby family has never shied away from making enemies in order to pursue a deal that might benefit them, so the possibility that Tommy may be killed by one of their adversaries is not too far-fetched. Still, Peaky Blinders season 1 already introduced Tommy’s PTSD as something fundamentally part of him after World War I, and he always had to manage. Season 5 even explained that suicide, which Tommy contemplated at least twice in the last season, “ran in the family.” Charlie revealed to Tommy in Peaky Blinders season 5, episode 6 that both his mother and grandfather died that way. Still haunted by the loss of Grace, and now potentially the late Helen McCrory's Aunt Polly, Tommy may succumb to the demons that plague his mind.
Because of this, suicide has been what many believe will lead to Tommy Shelby's death in Peaky Blinders' ending. But season 5 introduced his unrelenting cough, which might have been dismissed as a character choice on actor Cillian Murphy's had it not been so pervasive. While it’s not even assured that Peaky Blinders ending will coincide with Tommy’s death, Tommy’s cough is clearly there for a reason and will have a greater narrative focus in season 6. Whether Peaky Blinders actually ends with Tommy dying or not, his trajectory makes it seem all but impossible that his story will end happily.
Peaky Blinders returns to BBC One on February 27 in the UK.