BBC Two
Tommoi Shelby will be the first to admit that he’s not much of a letter writer. Scrawling “Oi’m gonna kill yow” on a chitty then stapling it to the forehead of a debtor is about his limit. And yet we find him writing a letturd to the Editor of the New York Times the gist of which is that if he’s dead when the editor receives it it’s all Campballs‘ fault. How exactly the New York Times editor is expected to tell Tommoi’s shitty letter from all the other letters from lunatics newspaper editors receive is not made clear. The important thing is that Tommoi thinks it matters and with his big day at the races coming up that’s all that matters.
Before all that though he takes a trip with Gay James for an outing to Alfie Solomons‘. For the 350,000th time this series Tommoi gets a gun pointed at his head and people really need to start learning that this changes nothing for him. Kill the cunt or don’t but you may as well be making pistol fingers at him as pressing a barrel to his temple. After some World War I ammunition fuelled brinksmanship he negotiates a 35% cut for Solomons of their exports dealings and the Gypsy-Jew alliance is back on.
And so with a freshly released Arthur it’s off to the Derby they all go. May Fitz-Nicely‘s looking predictably smoking yet doomed but Secret Agent Grace messes with her hustle, turning up unannounced like a proper cockblock. As predicted, she’s pregnant with Tommoi’s babby in record time. His fecundity is legendary, his sperm are legion and his balls are magic.
His fecundity is legendary, his sperm are legion and his balls are magic.
“I love you, not him” she tells him as May makes the blowjob gesture at her behind his back. Later the two ladies have a long discussion over the merits of Tommoi’s cock and the benefits and perils of their membership of the international sisterhood of sexually attractive women. You can tell they are both thinking “threesome” but both are too proud to say it.
Tommoi’s too busy to get into that conversation as he’s got a Field Marshal to fuckup. Using Lizzie as a honeypot to isolate Russell in one of the many Fuck Stalls owners enclosures routinely have installed Tommoi ends his life with a bullet through the brain after a titanic struggle that leaves Tommoi with an eye jammie and Lizzie with a bruised fanny. She’s hella pissed at Tommoi for leaving her with her arse quite literally hanging out and encourages her short lived fiancé John to take the road less travelled away from his life of crime, riches and hot gypsy wife. The sales pitch needs a bit of work but her heart’s in the right place.
Fortunately things go more smoothly on the track with the Blinders bum rushing Sabini‘s bookmaking pitches and burning their licences. Tommoi stops off at the bar to rub Campballs’ nose in it about Grace again. You notice he’s never too busy to do that? Campballs doesn’t have to suffer the insolence much longer though as Polly ices him in a Fuck Stall disguised as a phone box. “Ring, ring motherfucker” she said as he slumps to the ground as dead as a Geldof locked in a room with a Geldof parent.
So it’s a win-win win-WIN for Tommoi who is starting to feel that things are finally going his way. The feeling quickly dissipates when the three UVF men Campballs set up to kill him abduct him and bring him to a big empty field with a freshly dug grave with his name on it. So it all ends here.
“So fucking close!” he wails.
He wrangles a last fag out of them before settling down to enjoy the firing squad.
It turns out to be a lot more fun than he had anticipated. Just as he’s about to get plugged UVF man #3 puts one each in the dome of his comrades. He informs Tommoi that Winston Churchill will be in touch with a job for him and if he wouldn’t mind running along so he can bury the two Ulstermen that would be splendid. Bloody Churchill, eh?
Tommoi howls with grief – he thought he’d got away with it. He’ll have to pay child support now. And even worse is facing him when he gets back. Michael is ignoring every piece of good commonsense advice out there and choosing Birmingham over London. He’s starting to wish that fake UVF man had done him instead.
Nonetheless he does reveal that he’s planning on getting married. Possibly to a girl. What’s he like?
The verdict: Good runner on soft ground.
Marks out of 10: 8
