Peaky Blinders' 'Black Cat' Billy Grade explained and how he sets up the finale (2024)

Peaky Blinders season 6, episode 5 spoilers follow.

Peaky Blinders season six has thrown so many reveals at fans lately with long-lost son Duke Shelby, Tommy Shelby's terminal illness and even Finn Shelby's blink-and-you'll-miss-her new wife, Mary. It'd be easy to forget that the Black Cat betrayer was finally properly revealed, long after that season five cliffhanger.

As a refresher, the show's season five finale focused on the attempted assassination of British Union of Fascists leader Oswald Mosley (Sam Claflin) by Tommy Shelby (Cillian Murphy).

However, at the last second, several members of the gang were killed, including shell-shocked sniper Barney Thomason (Cosmo Jarvis) and Aberama Gold (Aidan Gillen) and as we later discover, Polly Gray (Helen McCrory).

This all left speculation rife as to who the 'Black Cat' betrayer was, which drove Tommy to the brink of madness, as he worried about the "man he can't defeat", and almost shot himself in the field.

Who betrayed Tommy Shelby?

Essentially, it's a combination of a very daft Finn Shelby (Harry Kirton), Billy Grade (Emmett J Scanlan), and Captain Swing (Charlene McKenna).

Finn Shelby is working with former Irish footballer Billy Grade to fix matches and they slowly corrupt him to the Peakys' ways – namely cocaine and crime. However, in the pair's final scene of season five, Finn lets slip that Tommy is going to assassinate Oswald Mosley, and we briefly see Billy reaching for the phone after Finn leaves. Interestingly, this plot point was a lot more obvious in the show's original draft.

It seems fairly likely that Billy then rang the IRA's Captain Swing, who we met very briefly when she imprisoned Michael Gray (Finn Cole) while he travelled back from New York in season five, but wasn't seen again until the season six premiere.

Speaking to the RadioTimes about Swing having Polly killed, actress Charlene McKenna explained: "They needed rid of Aunt Polly because they are in business for the opium, and Polly was always opposed to that. So they take no prisoners, as you can see, with anything that gets in the way of her mission, their mission, which is ostensibly money to fight for their cause, which is a united Ireland."

Obviously, Finn wasn't being malicious when he let that information slip, but Tommy isn't known to suffer fools lightly, so perhaps there will be repercussions for him in season six's finale.

Who is the Black Cat, Billy Grade?

Billy Grade was a new character added in season five, first appearing in the episode named 'Black Cats'. He's an Irish singer, retired footballer player and ex-manager.

Arthur, Finn, and Isaiah corrupt Billy into helping them to fix football matches by paying off goalkeepers using his contacts.

Billy finishes the season seemingly fully immersed in the Peaky Blinders' lifestyle, doing cocaine, drinking booze and suited up while fixing the matches. Meanwhile, his wife has moved out and we briefly hear he's likely caught gonorrhoea, or 'the clap'.

Arthur Shelby constantly intimidates Billy, despite helping the gang earn lots of money, and warns Finn that Billy's life will be at risk if he spills any "family business" to him.

The last we saw of Billy in season five was him reaching for the phone to – we assume – call Captain Swing and the IRA about Oswald Mosley's assassination. Fast forward to season six and Arthur forces Billy to kill the referee refusing to take payments to fix matches, threatening to kill Billy himself if he won't do it.

The final piece of the puzzle comes when US fascist Jack Nelson (James Frecheville) confronts Billy in the showers washing off the blood.

Now Jack is in cahoots with Captain Swing and she's agreed to help bring fascism to Ireland in return for getting guns for her cause from Tommy. The American knows that Billy Grade is the informant inside the Shelby organisation.

Jack Nelson demands that Billy give up information so Arthur can be killed, all while garroting Billy's testicl*s with a similar wire to the one he killed the referee with, threatening him with an "Italian death" if he fails.

Jack adds that he will have Tommy Shelby killed and it seems Michael Gray will kill him as revenge for Polly's death.

So now Billy has lost his wife, his singing career and been corrupted into a life of crime – which he did seem to be enjoying – before being forced into murder, and now potentially losing his testicl*s, with more death threats if he doesn't comply.

All of that sounds like plenty of motivation to have betrayed, and keep betraying, the Shelbys, but it does seem unlikely he'll make it out of the finale alive.

Speaking to Digital Spy ahead of season six about being the potential betrayer, Emmett J Scanlan said: "Hypothetically speaking, would you blame him if he did [betray Tommy Shelby]? They do force him, threaten him, manipulate him into doing their bidding. They do bully him psychologically and physically. So if he did, and I'm not saying he did, would you blame him?"

But will Finn be punished for kicking off this chain of events? Will Captain Swing get away with having Polly killed? And will Michael Gray still want to kill Tommy when he discovers that his wife, Gina Gray (Anya Taylor-Joy) has been sleeping with Oswald Mosley?

All we know is Aunt Polly's ominous prediction looks set to come true: "There will be a war, and one of you will die, but which one I cannot tell."

Peaky Blinders airs Sundays at 9pm on BBC One, and will then be available on iPlayer.