Serving as a film continuation of the BBC crime series Luther, which ran for five seasons between 2010 and 2019, Luther: The Fallen Sun sends DCI John Luther (Idris Elba) where no cop wants to go: prison. And how he gets there speaks to the abject disinterest with which this film unfolds, as serial killer David Robey (Andy Serkis) gives orders over the phone to send in evidence of Luther’s extralegal methods of investigation.
The detective’s trial, conviction, and imprisonment are swift. Clearly writer and series creator Neil Cross means to establish the power and resources available to this new villain, but Luther has been under investigation, if not outright on the run, so often by now that the film doesn’t even bother to ruminate on what exactly got him caught and how he might feel about it.
How Luther gets out is no more inspired, what with him calling in a few favors and turning his imprisonment into little more than a minor obstacle. For 129 minutes, the film defaults to the most pedestrian narrative turns imaginable when it’s not just recycling bits from the series: murders posted online, a glowing mask, a chief (Cynthia Erivo) who’s had it up to here with Luther’s methods. It’s all run together by now for what is, at least, meant to support a standalone viewing experience, further pushing Luther into the realm of vigilante action hero, complete with a secret hideout and a heroic shot of him gazing out over the rooftops.
With Robey orchestrating very elaborate and very public violence at every turn, the plot could very well star Batman if Batman only got anywhere by phoning friends and following blindingly obvious breadcrumbs. Robey has dirt on everybody, and everybody will do just about anything when threatened with having their dirty laundry aired in public: They’ll dispose of bodies for him, and they’ll even dispose of themselves by jumping off high ledges around Piccadilly Circus.
The whole setup might have been taken as some asinine “what if” extrapolation of cancel culture if The Fallen Sun ever seemed to have more on its mind than the most perfunctory means of reaching its destination. For one, Cross can hardly be bothered to draw a line between the fear of public disgrace and Luther’s own ostracization before he drops the theme altogether in favor of genre standbys like kidnapped loved ones and elaborate trap rooms.
Robey’s methods and clearly far-reaching organization are barely explored, of a piece with slapdash storytelling that suggests the script was barely tinkered with after the first draft. Characters often appear out of thin air, so underwritten and purely functional that they might as well be wearing signs that label them “Terrorized Wife” or “Imperiled Daughter” or “Guilt-Inducing Relative of Victim” or “Dying Cop.” As if perversely designed to test how far Elba’s innate charisma might carry him when he’s given so very little to do, the film’s greater mystery lies in the question of why Cross even bothers to feign interest in writing more Luther.
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