SmallTheory: Confirmation from SK that Grace is alive

I honestly don’t know why I didn’t realize this before when I first read it, I guess I was blinded by the idea of Grace being dead due to the elapsed time between S3, when she dies, and S5, when I started watching the series.

Forget all the previous theories and focus for a moment on this small compilation of answers from Steven Knight when he is asked about Grace over the years.

2016-17 (after S3)

With these declarations he already gave us hints about what Grace’s role was going to be in the following seasons and how long it was going to last despite being dead, and subsequently, that was exactly what we saw. SK’s words are revealing and (maybe) tricky.

2018-19 (before S5)

I don’t think it’s necessary to remember that Alfie Solomons came back from the dead in that season. And I also want to highlight the abrupt change in his answer on Grace.

In the first interview, made after she “died”, SK confirms that’s true, but doesn’t give a definitive closure to the character since her presence will continue being in the series. But now that the end of the story is approaching and also the redemption of Thomas, his answer is a very different one. (Personal Perception: I suppose after seeing the insistence of the fans with this topic he avoid ambiguous answers, or with double meaning as I explain below, so as not to be accused of lying).

Answers with double meaning: another important fact to be considered is the belief in this series that when someone IS CLOSE to death undergoes a kind of psychological metamorphosis in which these people think they are dead, or at least, they are more dead than alive, and that’s why the author said Grace was dead, because by his own rules she is.

At this point and now taking everything into consideration, I could almost say it’s an open secret that Grace will return and not exactly as a hallucination… But since SK may come up with one of his fantastic plot twists along the way I keep this affirmation to myself and will only say the probabilities of her return have increased exponentially.

[Disclaimer: the dates of these interviews are unclear, for this reason I don’t set an exact date, but it’s obvious that all this happened after and before those seasons respectively due to the context of the questions and answers].

Sources:

https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/showbiz-tv/grace-peaky-blinders-really-dead-13090639

https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/whats-on/film-news/key-peaky-blinders-questions-answered-14691301