Arthur Shelby

Arthur is the eldest Shelby brother, the nominal head of the family business until Tommy quietly takes the reins. Volatile and devout in fits and starts, he handles the gang's dirty work with his fists, craving respect he never quite gets and loyalty he gives without question, even when it costs him.

Paul Anderson plays him as a man perpetually one insult from violence and one memory from tears, and that unstable mix is riveting rather than cartoonish. The writing never lets his brutality cancel out his tenderness — he can break a man's face and weep over his own weakness in the same episode, and you believe both.