Conscience: Friend or Foe?

 Gilbert Magazine contributing editor Chris Chan reviews the BBC series Luther

by Chris Chan
The tagline for the second season of the BBC series Luther is “What if your worst enemy was your own conscience?” This question is an intriguing one, but for the titular character, Detective Chief Inspector John Luther, the answer is “no.” DCI Luther’s conscience is actually his best friend, although he does not realize it.

As of this writing, two seasons of Luther have been produced, the first six episodes long, the second consisting of four episodes. As the series begins, Luther is a brilliant star of the police force, although his constant exposure to the worst of humanity has shaken his psyche and left him desperately wrestling with the problem of evil. In the opening scene, Luther confronts a despicable criminal in a decaying building, and the villain takes a very nasty fall. Whether Luther is responsible for the plunge or if it was an accident is not revealed until later. In any event, Luther is left utterly devastated by the incident, and soon afterwards he is viewed as a loose cannon in the department and his marriage is on the rocks.

Each episode of the first season focuses on a different case, with a clever criminal committing a twisted crime, and Luther attempting to peer into the villain’s mind in order to bring the perpetrator to justice. Over the course of season one, Luther deals with his relationships with two very different women and attempts to regain the trust of his superiors. The shorter second season revises the format somewhat, with the first two and the last two episodes each covering the hunt for a killer who thrives on brutality and chaos, with an overarching redemptive plot-line wherein Luther tries to rescue a teenaged prostitute.

When Luther first premiered, the publicity releases described it as unlike any other police drama. This is not accurate. Most of the major plot points, such as a detective wrestling with the depravity of the world and a shaky marriage, a supervillain causing havoc, the identity of the killer being known early in the episode, police corruption, and an innocent man framed, have all been done before, sometimes exceedingly well. Luther is very dark, with a central focus on how nihilism and violence can transform human beings into monsters. It could easily have devolved into a dreary muddle of depravity and stock detecting clichés, but Luther has two attributes that lift it above the commonplace: the magnificent acting, and the cinematography, which makes the streets of London appear to be a gritty, despairing place that is the perfect breeding ground for violent criminals. I don’t think that the city anywhere near as stark as it is portrayed onscreen, but well done to the cameramen for setting a superlative atmosphere.

Idris Elba is spectacular in the title role, striding into every scene knowing that he has the sheer force of charisma and character to dominate the screen. Playing a brooding man with anger management issues, Elba plays a man who determinedly hunts for justice while gradually losing his faith in the decency of humanity. Equally excellent is Ruth Wilson as Alice Morgan, a genius scientist, malignant narcissist, and psychopathic killer, who escapes Luther’s attempts to bring her to justice, and gradually, bizarrely, becomes both Luther’s arch-nemesis and his closest ally.

The relationship between the two slightly strains credulity, but when Elba and Wilson are on screen together, the results are so electric that one could do an entire show about the two of them having coffee and discussing the criminal mind and astrophysics and still be entertained. Alas, Alice is absent from the latter half of season two, aside from a marvelous reference toward the end. In a way, her absence (hopefully temporary) makes perfect sense dramatically, since season two is all about Luther finding his way back from the depths of despair, and if one is to successfully escape the clutches of madness, it’s best not to hang around Alice. Still, it’s never wise for a series to cut what makes the show truly great, so hopefully future series of Luther will bring the Luther/Alice dynamic back to front and center.

The other actors are all quite good, particularly Warren Brown as the loyal and perceptive Detective Sergeant Justin Ripley, and Dermot Crowley as Detective Chief Inspector Martin Schenk, who appears in season one as a cantankerous internal affairs investigator, and who is promoted to Detective Superintendent in season two, thereby being seamlessly humanized into a warmer and more likeable figure. The actors playing guest roles as “freak of the week” villains are mostly competent at playing psychopaths, although the most multi-dimensional and accessible performance comes from the performer playing the villain in episode four of season one.

At one point, Luther’s estranged wife Zoe (Indira Varma) says that if Luther had only read the right book at an impressionable age, he might have been a priest instead of a detective, and he might have been happy. Heck, had Luther simply read G.K. Chesterton in his formative years, he would probably have spent less time sinking into anguish over the fate of the world. As it stands, he sunk his nose into Bertrand Russell and the like, and now plays Russian roulette. Elba makes us care about Luther, and we can only hope that he finds he way out of the abyss and into daylight. Throughout the series, it’s clear that Luther’s conscience is his best chance at salvation.

For more information on Luther, see http://www.bbcamericashop.com/.

About Sean P. Dailey

Sean P. Dailey is the editor-in-chief of Gilbert Magazine. Besides G.K. Chesterton, Sean reads J.R.R. Tolkien, Hilaire Belloc, J.K. Rowling, Tim Powers, and Michael Flynn. When Sean isn't editing GM or reading, he helps his wife raise their two sons and brews his own beer. He and his family live in Illinois.