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Despite setting an excellent standard, the first series of Luther struggled: viewers deserted it before it got going, and then it went up against the behemoth that is Britain’s Got Talent. Luther was therefore lucky to see that coveted green-light again, and the BBC seemed to have resigned themselves to the fact that it would fail, reducing the number of episodes and scheduling it for the beginning of the annual summer slump, as well as putting it in the same slot that worked so well last time. As such, it is a credit to all involved, that Luther has gone on to become one of the year’s best performing dramas.
As ever with Luther, some suspension of disbelief is required, with Tuesday’s finale seeing DCI John Luther (Idris Elba), amongst other things, covering up a murder and catching another serial killer. Many see its ridiculousness as an inherently bad thing but, if it had gone for a more believable take, would 6 million viewers persist in watching every week? Jurassic Park isn’t believable, but it doesn’t stop it being one of the most well-loved films of all time. It is Luther’s lack of believability that makes it so great: it’s what makes it stand out from the crowd. If we wanted just another ordinary murder plot every week, we might as well be watching reruns of Rosemary and Thyme.
Throughout this series, there seems to have been the attitude that if this was to be the last, it might as well be done in style. There’s been a boldness and a confidence throughout, and it is because of this that Luther is now the success it is. Writer Neil Cross has made each episode impossibly suspenseful, with the opening to the third episode being especially strong, featuring an enthralling attack on a petrol station. And as for the final 10 minutes of the finale: if a spaceship had crash-landed next to me, out from which two aliens adopting the guises of Hugh Laurie and Stephen Fry had appeared, telling me I had won a trip around the universe, I would have told them to wait until Luther had finished. I literally could not… no, dare not tear my eyes away from the screen.
Of course, there have been a few flaws on show. When you go for the two-part story format, you risk falling into one of two traps. And Luther fell into one of them: the second parts were much better than the first parts, with pacing proving to be a problem and most of the really interesting events being saved for the second half. And the other, major major problem was the lack of Ruth Wilson as resident psycho Alice Morgan. She was the highlight of the last series, yet only appeared in the first two episodes of this one (and only in 4 scenes at that). Every scene she’s in has this electrical charge: she’s dangerous and unpredictable, and like no other character on our screens at the moment. So why couldn’t we have seen more of her?
I’m going to leave you now with The Tale of John Luther: Once there was a man named John Luther, a cop, a scoundrel and a hero. He could solve fiendish crimes with the blink of an eye, but never massaged his ego. Then, after catching a killer one day, he thought: “there’s someone I need to see.” And so he headed to the Temple of Green-Light, with one thing, and one thing only, to say: “please let me do series three.”
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