Peaky Blinders creator Steven Knight has given an update on series 4 of the BBC and Netflix show, having just polished off the scripts for it.

“I’m very, very excited,” he told Deadline during an interview about his new show Taboo, “because I’m just completing Episode 6 of Series 4, which again I think is the best yet. And I’m loving it and it’s not like work, it’s not like a labor, I love doing it, and the boys are coming back and they’re loving the scripts, and we start shooting in March.”

By ‘the boys’ Knight not only refers to Cillian Murphy and the rest of the actors in the Shelby clan but Tom Hardy, who he confirmed will be back.

Asked whether Hardy’s incredibly charismatic character Alfie Solomons features in the new episodes, he said: “Of course. We can’t do it without Alfie.”

Murphy previously suggested a March shoot date was on the cards; the first two seasons came within a year of each other, but then there was a gap of a year and a half between season two and three.

A similar gap would mean a spring 2018 release on the BBC, though the last series took four months to film and then three to edit, which means we could get the new instalments in October.

The dramatic final episode of series 3 saw Tommy outsmart the Russians in a jewellery heist, only to find his family in handcuffs when he returned home to share the spoils with them.

Knight and Hardy’s latest collaboration, Taboo, began on the BBC on Saturday night.