Luther Review: “Series Three, Episode Three”

Although it’s unlikely that the press conference would ever have been allowed to go ahead, not least on live television, this isn’t the real world. This is Luther-world. In Luther-world, that sort of press conference needs to happen, because it adds the requisite amount of chaos to facilitate the close of the episode. It gives it all an end-of-the-world feel, like Thomas Marwood is the devil incarnate. If you ever wondered what a BBC version of Dexter would be like, watch this episode. This is how it would play out. Lots of heartbreak, crying, pale men with beards looking over grey cityscapes. Barely any Cuban music, visible sweat patches, or Angel Batista.

No hats.

Mary appears for a short time in this episode but still her narrative purpose is becoming depressingly clear – she’s there to provide Luther with a personal stake in catching Marwood, as opposed to just a professional one. My prediction is that Marwood will kidnap Mary, and he will have to team up with George Stark to capture him. Oh yes, George Stark. He also appears in this episode, at Luther’s doorstep, along with Erin. There’s a tension growing between the pair, and Erin is clearly unhappy with George Stark’s obsession at catching Luther. This comes to the boil when, on Luther’s doorstep, Stark finds not Luther himself but, yes, Mary. They enter and confront her, asking questions of her relationship with the man himself, and if she knows what happened to  Zoe, his ex-wife. She doesn’t at that time, but later confronts Luther and he admits everything (it’s a series one spoiler, I’m not going to reveal it here). She believes him, which is asking a lot. It’d be nice if she was fleshed out a little more, as we’ve yet to see her doing anything meaningful by herself – the closest thing to character development we’ve seen is when she breaks down in to tears in her little shop after her George Stark encounter, and even that is ruined by an immediate phone call to Luther.

By setting up such an inventive villain for the finale, they’ve left the door wide open for an action packed final hour. If this episode was anything to go by, literally anybody could be next. The addition of Alice to the mix, shown in the post-credits “Next week, on Luther” preview, is an exciting one as she is an electrifying character, when not being smug and overbearing. Hopefully she’ll bring some of her calm, completely batshit crazy psychosis to the proceedings, and will allow Luther to use a psycho to catch a psycho, and play him at his own game. The old saying used to be “Go for the weak point – the wife,” but Marwood’s wife’s dead.

Crap! The man’s invincible!