BBC One: Luther 2011

Watched it on BBC-America; good show.

I believe it's one of the best British police dramas I've watched in a long time.

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I always look out for Elba`s work and was really looking forward to this series, but I was so disappointed, Luther was just awful. The writing was terrible, plotting worse and the stories simply didnt make any sense. I got fed up of trying to work out character motivations, as they just did what ever the storyline demanded. Troubled genius series are not easy to do. Requires a fine balancing act. Cracker, was excellent and so is, House. Luther is a very, very poor man`s version.
Biggest mistake they made with the series was not to have the first episode feature length. This would give them more time to properly introduce, Luther and his world. Because of this, everything just seemed forced.

IllustriousKnight said:

That's a shame you didn't enjoy the show MikTal. What aspect's of the stories did you feel didn't make sense?

The only persons motivations who I sometimes struggled to understand were Alice's. But what I did find out is that I have quite the soft spot for intelligent psychotic redheads lol.

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As a casual viewer I can understand a level of acceptance for this show, but as a fellow writer, I`m shocked that you are asking this.
It was over a year ago now and I did comment at length over on the Digital Spy forum about this, but my recollection is not clear enough now to properly detail. However, from memory, I just didnt feel that the main character was set up correctly, so from the beginning, I couldnt empathise with him; this is suicide for a tourtured genius series.
The whole relationship with the murderous red-head was one of the most forced I think I`ve ever seen. Absolutely no reason for them to be even talking except that the script demanded it. The plots, character motivations and Luther himself, just got worse and worse with each episode.
Dont get me wrong, I`m not after perfection a few plotpoints and slips are not enough to stop the enjoyment and cannot outweigh the other good work, but in this there were way too many.

I'm afraid that I agree with MikTal. It was terrible. Especially as I was really looking forward to it. I mean, Idris Elba!

You`ll have to forgive me for quoting myself but....

Biggest mistake they made with the series was not to have the first episode feature length. This would give them more time to properly introduce, Luther and his world. Because of this, everything just seemed forced.

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It seemed that they`ve at least picked up on that, making this series just 2 x 2hour cases. The improvement in pacing and build up was stark in comparison to last year. However, they cant paper over all the cracks and one glaringly big one, John Luther himself, still stands out.

The problem with Luther is we dont know who he is, as he wasnt set up correctly from the start. Clearly they were trying for a Jeykll and Hyde type personality, but we didnt get to know Dr Hyde beforehand, which made it difficult to see Mr Hyde.
House MD, is a perfect example of how to do it right. Mr Hyde is obnoxious, rude, arrogant, at times almost inhuman, but as soon as he`s reminded of his humanity, he goes away and Dr Jekyll returns. What happens with Luther? Everytime he got frustrated or angry, he smashed things up and shouted. Hey, dont we all. Last nights show, while better than before, highlighted the shallowness of Luther`s character. It simply stayed the same throughout the show, before doing something inexplicable, that had no foundation; trying to break Alice out of prison. Was that Jekyll? Hyde? Who knows!

One minute the killer is a failed art student, then next he is an electronics wizard! How in the world did he hook up a live link directly to Luther`s unit?? LOL!