Peaky Blinders season 6 episode 4, “Sapphire” sees Tommy Shelby (Cillian Murphy) tell Arthur (Paul Anderson) they are in the World War I tunnels again, with “just a few more yards to go,” but there’s a dark meaning behind this line. The BBC show’s sixth and final season focuses on Tommy as he tries to complete an increasingly complicated deal that will earn him a way out, four years after Polly Gray’s (Helen McCrory) death. But with Ruby (Orla McDonagh) gone, Tommy has reached a new low, and his brother seems none the wiser.
Peaky Blinders’ episode “Sapphire” proved Tommy is not such a changed man, as he once claimed at the beginning of the season. He guns down Evadne Barwell, as he holds her responsible for the curse that killed his daughter, and he descends back into his drinking habits, worrying Arthur that there will be no one to help him renounce his own opium addiction. Tommy then remembers a time when he was with Arthur in a 3,172-yard tunnel on the Dudley Stretch. Eventually, they saw a shaft of light “and you and me would both know it was nearly done.” Tommy feels the same way again: he and Arthur are inside the tunnels, with just a few yards left to go before they can “let the Peaky Blinders rest.”
When Arthur reminds Tommy he stopped drinking, Tommy says he kept marching on after Polly’s death, but after Ruby’s, he “stumbled and crashed.” In the cellar, both Tommy and Arthur are at their lowest points yet. Arthur is struggling with his opium addiction, and Tommy, although he doesn’t know it yet, is suffering from a terminal illness: a brain tuberculoma. Moreover, after Ruby’s death, his state of mind has declined, and he admits it. In this context, it’s safe to say the “just a few more yards to go” line has quite a tragic meaning behind it. It’s likely the end of the tunnel means death for both Tommy and Arthur.
There’s another problem with Tommy getting out: Tommy and Arthur Shelby have been cursed by Esme (Aimee-Ffion Edwards) not to have peace ever again after John’s (Joe Cole) death. Indeed, Tommy’s attempts to “get out” or go legit have failed dramatically; he has continued to lose his loved ones–Polly and Ruby included)–and now he has been diagnosed with a terminal illness. Furthermore, Arthur feels helpless, too. When Tommy takes a sip out of the wine cup, he asks: “What chance do I have if you start doing that again?” Tommy says he knows Arthur will quit because his family needs him. But even Arthur doesn’t believe it: the very next Arthur scene shows him ransacking the Chinese opium den that was ordered not to sell to him anymore.
As of Peaky Blinders season 6, episode 4, Tommy’s darkest ending theory seems valid. Tommy wants to “change the world” before he dies, but as his curse is he can’t get out, he won’t stop once the deal is completed; he has never been able to stop, and this is torturing Lizzie. Likely, Tommy will only stop when he dies: this gives extra meaning to his “just a few more yards to go.” Tommy has tried killing himself in the past, and Arthur is on a fast track to doing so himself, so it seems like Tommy just foresaw their tragic ending through a dark analogy.
