Media Studies Factsheet Summaries

• Focus areas of A Level Media Studies

  • Media language
  • Representation
  • Media industries
  • Audiences
• Genres of media product

  • Gangster
  • Western
  • Historical drama
• Peaky Blinders is a hybrid-genre, long form TV drama that combines gangster, Western and historical drama elements
• The set product is the first episode of season 1, broadcast in September 2013 on BBC Two in the UK
• Peaky Blinders was produced in the UK by Caryn Mandabach Productions and Tiger Aspect for BBC Two. The show ran for six seasons from 2013 to 2022. For seasons 5 and 6, the show moved to a primetime slot on BBC One
• The ‘showrunner’ for all six seasons was Steven Knight, an established screenwriter and TV producer
• The plot of Peaky Blinders focuses on the Shelby family, who run the eponymous criminal gang in 1920s Birmingham. The first seasons examine the effects of WWI on the working classes, while later seasons portray Tommy Shelby’s attempts to move from crime into legitimate businesses, and then onto politics
• Peaky Blinders has won a host of awards, including – for season 1 – Best Director at the BAFTAs, and numerous awards for lighting, set and costume design. It has also attracted big name actors like Tom Hardy and Adrien Brody
• In the USA, the show was first distributed by the Weinstein Company and Endemol; it was purchased by Netflix in 2014, who also distributed it worldwide, leading to a global audience
• Genres are ‘types’ of media product that present codes and conventions in a way that provides very specific audience pleasures. They are favoured by producers and institutions as they often represent a risk-free investment. Audiences’ (and creators’) relationship with genres is complex, involving a balance between familiar tropes and fresh elements that enable genres to evolve
• Peaky Blinders could be classed as a cross-genre or hybrid long form television drama. It has many characteristics of the gangster subgenre. This differs from other crime genres; in that it often focuses on the personal lives of a criminal family. Peaky Blinders could also be classed as historical drama – it uses lavish production design to evoke a specific period and location concentrating on Birmingham in 1919. It also explores many of the social and political issues of that time
• Peaky Blinder’s creator and chief writer, Steven Knight, has also said each season is based around another movie genre. In season 1, he said he was particularly inspired by the Western
• Knight said he wanted to ‘mythologise’ British working-class lives in the way ‘Americans took 19th century agricultural workers and called them Cowboys and made them heroes of Westerns’
• Some of the gangster conventions that Peaky Blinders uses are: The importance of family loyalty – it doesn’t matter who the enemy is, the Law or other gangs, the Shelbys are devoted to protecting and securing their family. This focus on family dynamics (an element familiar from soap opera) is also reminiscent of the US crime drama The Sopranos
• The protagonist in Peaky Blinders is a cool, quiet but ambitious antihero who uses intelligence and cunning, as well as brutal violence, to ascend the ranks of a criminal family/organisation – or is strategic in order to maintain their position at the top. Tommy Shelby embodies this stock character in Peaky Blinders – a man of few words, as he says to Arthur in the first episode; ‘That’s what I do, I think.’ His plan to inflate the value of the racehorse, despite Arthur’s concerns, illustrates his ingenuity
• The antagonist in Peaky Blinders is a lawmaker who is investigating the hero and his family/organisation. This is unusual in crime drama as here the investigator threatens the status quo, established by the criminals, rather than seeking to preserve it. Often the detective resorts to unorthodox methods, including those as brutal as the gangsters, to achieve results (see Eliot Ness in The Untouchables). In Peaky Blinders, Campbell is the antagonist in the first season – in episode 1, his ride through Birmingham, righteous sermon to the police and his torture of Arthur
• The detective resorts to unorthodox methods


  including brutal ones, to achieve results
• Eliot Ness: 'All those who eat, are what they eat'
• Campbell is the antagonist in the first season of Peaky Blinders


  In episode 1, his ride through Birmingham, righteous sermon to the police, and his torture of Arthur establish him as a binary opposition to Tommy
• Stock gangster genre characters

  • Older patriarch/matriarch, less smart, more violent sibling of the hero
• The narrative of Peaky Blinders

  Typical of the gangster genre: the power of the criminal family is threatened and main characters must pull together or sometimes betray each other to survive
• Episode 1 of Peaky Blinders


  Establishes plots and subplots around themes such as Tommy's robbery, threats from other gangs, the IRA, Communists, and potential romance and betrayal with Grace
• Characters in Peaky Blinders

  • Aunt Polly, Ada, Freddie, Billy Kimber, the Lee Family, the IRA, Danny Whizz-Bang
• Meanings are established through intertextuality


  References to the Western genre in the opening episode of Peaky Blinders
• The story of a crime family in Peaky Blinders

  Immortalised in Francis Ford Coppola's The Godfather
• The 'rise of the foot soldier' narrative arc in Peaky Blinders

  References The Godfather 2
• The 'ruthless enforcer vs mob boss' set up in Peaky Blinders


  Recalls The Untouchables
• Genre conventions in Peaky Blinders

  Socially and historically relative, dynamic, and used in a hybrid way
• Peaky Blinders production design

  Spectacular and lush, impacting mainstream fashion with ornate sets, costumes, and décor
• Elements of media language influence meaning

  Combination of elements including technical and visual codes work together to create meaning in Peaky Blinders
• Visual codes in Peaky Blinders


  Clothing, costumes, iconography, and setting contribute to creating meaning
• Iconography and setting


  Knight visualised the story through the eyes of a young boy growing up in this environment, creating a sense of heightened reality
• Production design


  Reflects the narrative tone of being set within industrial poverty but full of energy, vigour, and excitement, not despair
• Opening sequence


  Tommy rides through Small Heath establishing his reputation using Western iconography, tall man on a horse, and a sense of vigour
• Mise-en-scène


  • Creates a sense of energy and excitement, not despair
• Camera shots and editing

  Establish tension between Arthur and Tommy, Tommy and Freddie, Tommy and Polly
• Camera movement, editing, and mise-en-scène

  Create a sense of energy and excitement, not despair
• Dialogue


  • Tommy is a man of very few words but well-chosen, fitting with his character's backstory
• Dialogue


  • Campbell's speeches reveal his character and a brutal backstory
• Music


  • Use of punk and rock songs, establishing a modern feel to a period drama, emphasising modern emotions, aspirations, and expressions