Thomas aka Tommy Shelby is the protagonist of the BBC crime drama, Peaky Blinders. The viewers are well aware of his continuous battle between morality and immorality. Tommy is a grey character, with mental illness often affecting his emotions and actions.
However, that is not an excuse for Tommy’s maddening hunger for power and ambition and how he uses people all around him to get whatever he wants. In fact, the numerous vile actions of Thomas Shelby throughout the series are enough to dub him the actual villain of Peaky Blinders.
8 Cheating On May Carleton With Grace
Tommy dearly loved Grace on Peaky Blinders, but they split after season 1 and Grace left Birmingham. Tommy becomes devastated and he is looking for ways to forget about her and that is why he uses May Carelton as a rebound. He leads her on and she falls in love with him.
When Grace comes back into his life, he sleeps with her without breaking it off with May first. Then he discards her without an ounce of care about her feelings. While May was not completely innocent here because she knew the risks of getting in a relationship with Tommy, he still could have been more considerate of her feelings.
7 Using Ben Younger
Thomas Shelby is highly ambitious and he doesn’t hesitate to put innocent people in danger to meet his own ends. Introduced in season 4, Ben Younger was head of army intelligence officers, who later had a romantic relationship with Tommy’s sister, Ada.
Thomas knew how dangerous it would be to use him for getting inside information about the Fascist and Communist Party, but he still kept on using him, which ultimately led to Ben’s death. Tommy didn’t even care that his sister cares about him and will most probably be devastated if something happens to him.
6 Killing His Son’s Horse
One of the most disturbing things Thomas Shelby has done is when he kills his son’s horse in the season 5 premiere. It wasn’t the first time though. Tommy also killed a horse in season 1 when he learned that the horse is cursed by the Gypsies.
His reasons for killing horses are never logically explained and it gives another reason for fans to dislike Tommy. The heart-wrenching scene where he shoots the horse is enough to make him look like a villain. Even his son, Charlie, says to him that this is what he does, he shoots people and he shoots horses, signifying that he has killed more horses than the audience knows about.
5 Using Lizzie
Lizzie is one of the best characters on Peaky Blinders. However, the way Thomas treats her is appalling. From the beginning of the series until now, he keeps on using her for achieving his motives. In season 1, he pushed her away from John and kept on sleeping with her.
Thomas is well aware that Lizzie loves him but that doesn’t stop him from using her to fulfill his sexual and emotional needs. She keeps on supporting him through everything and whenever Tommy falls out of a relationship, he goes back to her without any regard for her feelings. She becomes pregnant, he marries her, and then he continues to sleep with other women. It is clear that he blatantly plays with her feelings for his own selfish needs.
4 Treating His Brothers As His Puppets
Thomas is not the oldest of the Shelby brothers, but he always acts like he is their master. He uses them to do his dirty work so that his hands can remain clean. He wants to become the politician that the public loves while his brothers engage in immoral acts and crimes for him.
At one point, John and Arthur feel like Tommy treats them as his puppets and they are not wrong. Thomas claims that he loves his family but he doesn’t know how to treat them right and show them some respect. The way he uses them as his soldiers is a testament to his selfish nature, which is one of Tommy Shelby’s worst traits.
3 Getting His Whole Family Arrested
The season 3 finale of Peaky Blinders was a huge shocker to fans because Thomas got all of his family members arrested at the end of it. It was one of the cruelest things one could ever do to the people they claim they love. Arthur and Linda were about to leave for New York and get away from this gangster life when it happened.
Moreover, Polly and others were about to be almost hanged when Tommy finally set them free. It is hard to fathom how they can forgive Thomas after what he did to them. Polly even had PTSD after this, and she would hallucinate long after she was free. Thomas himself had PTSD from the war, so it is even more shocking that he didn’t care to think about what this could do to his family members.
2 Manipulating Aberama Gold
Thomas Shelby used Aberama’s grief at the loss of his son for his benefit. He instigated Aberama into taking revenge for his son’s death and getting the leader of Billy Boys killed. So, he manipulated Aberama Gold for eliminating his enemy without partaking in the murder. Aberama died because of this and it was one of the most shocking deaths in Peaky Blinders.
This is an extremely dark thing to do, especially when he knew that Aberama and Polly were romantically together and Polly saw a future with him. He not only played with Aberama’s life and got him killed, but he also showed disregard for aunt Polly’s emotions.
1 Breaking His Promise To Lizzie
Lizzie used to be a sex worker until she started working as Tommy’s secretary. It was nice of Tommy to offer a job to her and he told her that he will never ask her to go back to her old ways. However, when it again came to achieving his ambitions in the season 2 finale, he asked her to seduce a man promising her that he will save her before anything happens.
Thomas is unable to keep his promise though, and he kills the man only after he has raped Lizzie. This proves how little he cares about her and despite giving her a secretarial job, he didn’t actually respect her.
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