Luther follows the cases of a troubled yet brilliant English police detective, DCI John Luther (Idris Elba). Separated from his wife, whom he loves passionately, he is torn between an unrelenting approach to solving serial killings and his attempts to rekindle his marriage. Luther is a highly charged emotional man who is not above stretching the law to solve a case or save a life.And here's the trailer for Series 1:
I was originally planning on just checking out the first couple episodes of Luther and then doing a quick recap but I failed miserable because I just couldn't stop watching. The first season of Luther is only 6 episodes long and each episode is about 50 minutes long. Often British TV shows have very short seasons compared to to American shows. This can be frustrating because they almost always leave you wanting more, but this also often means the show creators have complete control over the shows and are able to craft tight, well paced stories.
Luther is exactly that. It plays almost like an extended movie with an overarching narrative that slowly builds steam and explodes in the last episode. I'm glad I decided to wait until I had finished season 1 to recap the show because if I hadn't I would have thought that the show was just a well executed police procedural with a bit of British flavor and flair. While there's nothing wrong with that it just wouldn't have stood out in the sea of police procedurals already on TV. However, the different story elements that are set up and later payed off and the character development really elevate the above the dredges that are CSI and NCIS.
Idris Elba is amazing as DCI John Luther. Luther is a troubled man. Caught in between his devotion to his job and his resolve to fix his marriage he has a lot of inner turmoil. On top of that his job causes him to struggle with his morality. Over the course of the show Luther tries to decide what is right and wrong when dealing with the madmen he encounters. Elba is wonderful at conveying all of Luther's emotions. He's wonderfully intense and gives you this feeling that Luther is constantly fighting to keep himself in control, that he's on the always brink of losing it but somehow manages to keep it all reigned it. That makes it so much more impacting when Luther does lose it. Its a good reminder that he's only human. Luther is so good at his job he seems superhuman at times. He's pretty much Batman, but without the costume and gadgets and that makes difficult to feel like he's ever really in danger some times.
The rest of the cast is great as well. Some of the supporting characters seem a bit one dimensional at first but there are small character moments that makes them feel real. The show may be called Luther but there are are other people involved in his story that are almost all significant in their own way. Ruth Wilson really stood out to me because she was just amazingly creepy as the genius and insane Alice Morgan.
Overall I really enjoyed the show. It had interesting characters and a compelling story. The cast was solid and the show looks great. If you like crime dramas, thrillers, or police procedurals this should be right up your alley and the show runs circles around stuff like CSI. Sometimes tension is lost because Luther is just so good at what he does you're just waiting to see exactly how he'll get out of something, but Luther's internal struggle is so engrossing you really don't mind. I rated it 4 out of 5 stars.
Next time I''l be covering Takashi Miike's samurai epic 13 Assassins.
Hmm I think I hear sirens...
That's my cue.
Jose
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