REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR THE EPISODE

 

 

 

 

 

From its High Noon-in-Hackney opening to the wintry SE1 send-off, the final part of this series of Luther (possibly the last ever) is less a cop drama, more a Western revenge story relocated to London: metropolitan, manic and magnificent.

Keeping the nerves – not to mention the credulity – as taut as an overstretched elastic band right to the end, Neil Cross’s detective series has always been fairly preposterous, and is often as histrionic as a school play depicting the life and times of Brian Blessed. But when a show is this compelling, and drives one to care this much about its characters, who really gives a damn?

DI John Luther is having a particularly bad day. Justin Ripley, his best pal, is dead; deranged lone wolf Tom Marwood is still stomping about the city with a pump-action shotgun, targeting the pregnant wife of a prison doctor as part of his bloody and bonkers campaign of vengeance; and Luther himself has been arrested by mumbling meanie George Stark – a cop as incompetent as he is inaudible – for Ripley’s murder.

Idris Elba is extraordinary during the scene in which Stark and his uneasy subordinate Erin Gray interrogate Luther about his sidekick. ‘Loved him,’ he gasps, pointing a palsied finger at Gray before slapping his hand down on the table, all but broken. The grief is written all over his face like a misguided tattoo and it’s heartbreaking – possibly Elba’s finest moment yet in the detective’s overcoat. But Luther isn’t detained or damaged for long. A stinger, a smoke grenade and a can of mace later and he’s busted from custody by his serial killer pen-pal (and biggest fan), Alice Morgan.

Alice may be a booted caricature of an anti-heroine, with a sink full of washed-up cliches to mutter to herself at opportune moments, John McClane-style, but she has Luther pegged, pointing out he saves lives at the expense of those closest to him: ‘Your conscience has killed more people than I have.’ She also helps him save Mary Day from Marwood (with some assistance from Benny Deadhead, who covertly texts vital info from his desk like a professional skiver), stabbing the vigilante in the neck during the climactic rooftop standoff. Mary is so grateful she isn’t even bothered by Alice pinching her boyfriend. It’s like Some Kind of Wonderful remade by Steven Bochco.

The closing moments see Luther and Alice strolling off across Southwark Bridge while the famous grey coat floats down the Thames, its owner – possibly aware that even the best laundrette would struggle to wash out three seasons’ worth of sweat and grime – having flung it over the parapet at Alice’s behest. It’s this symbolic act of skin-shedding, even more than Ripley’s death, Luther’s hug of farewell with Benny or the palpable sense of finality hanging over the episode like a smoke in a beer garden, that makes this seem like the last bow for London’s modern-day genius loci – on the small screen, at least.

Elba has said he would like to see a John Luther movie one day – possibly an origins story. This would not just befit a character who is more superhero than sleuth, but also seems like the only conceivable way of telling a fresh story. Luther has reached a perfect end; where else is there to go except back to the beginning?

Aired at 9pm on Tuesday 23 July 2013 on BBC One.

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