BBC sparks up Peaky Blinders season 4: Smoking-hot Cillian Murphy leads more murder and mayhem

The wait is nearly over; Peaky Blinders is set to return to our screens very soon as the brilliant Cillian Murphy reprises his role as gang leader Thomas Shelby for a fourth series.

Murphy, 41, returns as the leading man in the Birmingham-based period drama, with the show's writer Steven Knight opening up about his plans for the gang to reach the 1920s and see the fallout of the General Strike in 1926.

He explains that the show is a true "between the wars" tale, as the city recovered from World War One with no knowledge of the impending World War Two.

He said: "I hope it does run and run all the way up to the Second World War, but it does get harder to get the cast together as the actors are being pulled into feature films. It's a victim of its own success."

And Murphy isn't the only superstar in the fourth offering, as he'll be joined by The Pianist actor and Oscar winner, Adrien Brody, with his role being kept under wraps, and returning star Tom Hardy as the priceless Jewish gangster Alfie Solomons.

Filming began of series four back in March, but it has been rumoured that fans won't be reunited with their favourite characters until spring 2018 – worst case scenario. No official date has been set for its release so far.

The third series ended on an extraordinary note when the Blinders were left in a mess, with Polly (Helen McCrory), Arthur (Paul Anderson), John (Joe Cole) and Michael (Finn Cole) being arrested out of the blue.

It was soon revealed that they had been shopped to the authorities by none other than their own leader Tommy in a shock twist.

The fourth series will pick up six months after we last left them, with Tommy received a mysterious letter on Christmas Eve which tells him that the Peaky Blinders are in "danger of annihilation," the BBC teases.

They stated: "As the enemy closes in, Shelby flees his country house and returns to the streets of Small Heath, Birmingham where a fight for survival begins...."

Peaky Blinders will (hopefully) return to BBC2 later this autumn.