In its penultimate episode, Lucifer asks, “Is This Really How It’s Going To End?!”
TV Reviews Lucifer
As the penultimate episode of this season—and originally, the penultimate episode of the entire series—“Is This Really How It’s Going To End?!” sets things up just right for an epic finale and an even greater status quo shift. The odds are stacked against our heroes, they’ve lost one of their own, and the stakes couldn’t be higher. Much like in the penultimate episode of the first half of Lucifer season five, “Our Mojo,” there’s a huge tonal shift in this episode that changes everything. The difference is, here, that tonal shift comes from something much more personal to the characters and the audience: Dan’s death.
Prior to the shift though, “Is This Really How It’s Going To End?!” is an episode with a final case so boring (until it’s not) and tedious that Lucifer can’t help but complain throughout about how boring and tedious it is. Not in the usual way either, because he doesn’t even find a single case detail to latch on to for his typical personal projections. (The closest he comes is when he tries to get the psychic to read him and help him with his family problems.) Watching the episode, there’s the sense that if this is the official end of the “crime-solving Devil” aspect of the show, then it’s strangely a fitting one at that; it’s the weakest part of the show going out as such, with a whimper. That is, until the case becomes celestial and puts a member of the team in mortal danger. Neither is boring at all.
Then there’s the runner of Lucifer attempting to convince his angelic siblings to support him in the upcoming God election. The episode opens with Lucifer failing to get the one sibling you’d think would be the most willing to join him—Jophiel (Miles Burris), an absolute bro of an angel—on his side and then continues down an increasingly more futile path. As the story progresses, the humor of the situation consistently decreases, even before Lucifer has a real sense of just how bad things are going to be when it comes to challenging Michael for the spot of God. The Saraqael (Ginifer King) scene starts off by being played for laughs, but it ends with Lucifer fumbling when it comes to answering Sara’s simple question of why he wants to be God so badly. (“Um, well, you know, because… Who wouldn’t want it?” Oof.) Then there’s the Zadkiel scene, which is when things get more serious. Luckily, at that point, Lucifer has an answer to the question: He’s doing it all for love.
We learned in “Nothing Lasts Forever” that proving he’s worthy of being God is very important to Lucifer. But more specifically, he wants to be God so that he can finally be worthy of Chloe. However, that realization plays a lot differently after the tonal shift of the episode. Which is exactly why Chloe calls Lucifer out for it. One might expect a catharsis of sorts or some kind of emotional milestone set when Lucifer tells Chloe why he wants to be God, that he’s doing it to finally be worthy of her. And that is technically what we get, in terms of Chloe saying something that’s been a long time coming, after five seasons (and especially in 5B):
“So you’re telling me that Trixie is in there right now crying herself to sleep, and the real reason that she’s gonna grow up without a father is because you still don’t know how I feel about you? How is that even possible? If that’s the case, Lucifer… Then your brothers and your sisters are right. You shouldn’t be God.”
Which brings me to that tonal shift of the episode, Dan’s kidnapping and subsequent death at the hands of a messianic mercenary (Rob Benedict).
The last time there was a Lucifer character who became so overwhelmed and consumed by thoughts of their afterlife and the punishment they’d have to endure, it was Charlotte Richards. Charlotte spent so much of the third season afraid of returning to Hell, doing everything she possibly could to avoid going back. And it ultimately paid off, as Amenadiel even transported her soul directly to Heaven. So there’s a bittersweet type of symmetry in the fact that her soulmate, Dan Espinoza, would go through a similar sort of journey in the aftermath of learning the truth about the celestial.
After “Daniel Espinoza: Naked And Afraid,” it looked like Dan had finally found a healthy amount of clarity. Maybe he hadn’t completely gotten over his guilt, but he was definitely on a good path moving forward. In “Nothing Lasts Forever,” he takes the possibility of Lucifer becoming the new God in stride, not fear of what it would mean for the Devil to control the universe. And here, he’s trying to help Ella find love, he’s being a good dad to Trixie, he’s helping Chloe out on her final case. Even the one non-supportive thing he does in this episode (his reaction to Amenadiel telling him he wants to cop) is just a temporary lapse.
And yet he still ends up in Hell, even though all of those moments—up to his dying breath—are as heroic as an ordinary human can be. Because even a sliver of human guilt is enough to send you to Hell, even if it’s far in the back of your mind.
In multiple post-mortem interviews about this season and episode, Kevin Alejandro has talked about how he actually pitched the idea of Dan’s death to showrunners Joe Henderson and Ildy Modrovich before they started writing season five. (Again, it was meant to be the final season.) But it was his reasoning behind it that’s really stuck with me. From his episode port-mortem with TV Line:
“[T]hat at this point in our story, in this journey that we’ve all been through together, the audience is just now starting to understand who Dan is. And there’s even a few of them that are actually starting to like him. ‘Wouldn’t it be interesting if we ripped him away from them before they got a chance to fully fall in love?’ Because that happens in life.”
Honestly, I think Alejandro is both underselling the Dan character and himself as an actor with this reasoning. As I wrote in my review of “Daniel Espinoza: Naked And Afraid,” Dan’s trajectory as a character is kind of miraculous, speaking just in terms of audience reaction. The first season made it feel like it would be impossible for the character to work in a way as anything but a foil and a pain in the audience’s asses. But then season two came around. Then it was surprising just how loveable Dan could be. But now? It’s far from a surprise. “It shouldn’t work” is something I thought a lot in the transition from season one to season two for the Dan character—keeping in mind that he was a corrupt cop who essentially got away it, an issue that Dan himself has brought up as the show has gone on. But since then, I’ve regularly praised both the writing for the character (and his development) and Alejandro’s performance. Which is why I believe the audience wasn’t just starting to like Dan at this point—they already loved him. Much like all the characters who go on to mourn him here.
Alejandro doesn’t really do anything fancy in this episode, as that’s what “Daniel Espinoza: Naked And Afraid” was for. But in the aftermath of Dan’s death, Alejandro’s work as a supporting cast member over the years informs what we see from the rest of the cast. They may not be bouncing off of him like they would when Dan was alive, but they’re able to channel what they did have with him for scenes like the one in the hospital waiting room or the one where Lucifer and Maze go get their revenge. The former is absolutely gutting (especially with Lesley-Ann Brandt and Scarlett Estevez’s performances), while the latter taps into a visceral rage. These are two very different scenes, but the emotion that Modrovich captures in her directorial debut is palpable.
Dan’s death obviously matters on a grounded, human level, but ultimately, it’s also the first act of a celestial war. A war between a potential God who sees no value in human life (Michael) and a potential God who has only found value because of human life (Lucifer). And by the end of the episode, Lucifer is even more driven to become God—not just because he wants to prove he’s worthy but because he wants to fix a world and system that he believes is fundamentally broken.
Not bad for the “DevilCop” show.
Stray observations
- Sorry for the delay on this one: I did not have internet to start the day. But at least that gave me more time to think about how sad Dan’s death was, so… Great.
- If I remember correctly, there was a question of if there’d be repercussions for Amenadiel placing his necklace on Caleb Mayfield’s dead body back in “Super Bad Boyfriend” (which was also written by Jason Ning). We have our answer now.
- Jophiel: “Yeah, Michael’s kind of a dick. He’s a massive dick. But he keeps the trains running, you know? He…”
Lucifer: “Are you seriously telling me that Michael has got your vote because— Because he’s ‘the Devil you know?’ Do you have any idea how ironically infuriating that is?” - Lucifer (re: Odetta the Psychic): “My Dad did give some humans the gift, you know. Maybe this is one of the real ones.” I would like to know more about that.
- Chloe?: “Where were you last night at 8 p.m.?”
Odetta the Psychic: “Giving a reading to a programming exec… at FOX.”
Lucifer: “Oh, good luck with that.” Hehe. - Dan: “You wanna be a cop?”
Amenadiel: “Won’t it be great? I mean, we can even work together one day.”
Dan: “Oh, yeah, yeah, an angel and a detective solving crimes, makes total sense.” Don’t overthink it. - I don’t know who Michael Voltaggio is, but based on the fact that he’s the “bad boy” of Top Chef, I feel like I now know everything I need to know about Saraqael.
- Maze: “The whole soul thing, it isn’t for me. I’m the one who grew it, so I’m just gonna let it slowly suffocate and die. Like I did with Chad.”
Linda: “Who’s Chad?”
Maze: “Doesn’t matter.” - Aimee Garcia and Tom Ellis singing “It’s So Hard To Say Goodbye” is probably my favorite musical number of the season, and they just had a whole musical episode.
- Apparently, Scott Porter (who plays Dan’s former partner, Carol Corbett) announced back in September that he was joining the series for seasons five and six. So… Hello, Carol.
- I’m curious to see if Lucifer will dig deeper into the fact that most of Lucifer’s “when I’m God” rhetoric boils down to creating a utopia. No war, no famine, no pain, no suffering. All good, all the time. Nothing difficult ever. Honestly, it’s kind of an immature way of seeing things. I have no doubt that Michael’s vision for what the world will look like when he’s God will be a bad one, but Lucifer’s vision… doesn’t even have centaurs.
- I’ve seen criticism of Chloe’s decision to leave the police department, calling it her jumping the gun, but I actually liked it. But that’s also because I looked at the choice from a place of the show attempting to pull back on the copaganda to close things out. That, plus the decision to kill Dan (while he’s being an actual good cop), and Lucifer even saying, “The system is not only broken. It’s unjust.” But then you have the new cop character, Carol. And the fact that Lucifer’s not talking about the criminal justice system but instead the celestial one—and the universe as a whole. (Even though those words are very specific.) And Amenadiel deciding to become a cop. That one, I really don’t get (like Winston on New Girl), and I’d be curious to know if D.B. Woodside has spoken about it. I’d always imagined that if Amenadiel got a human job, he’d try to become a real therapist or counselor.
71 Comments
I guess that’s what a police funeral would look like, but something about Chloe in full cop eleganza plus Amenadiel’s decision, gave me bad vibes. I had never thought about it, but I love your take that he would choose to be a therapist too.I love Daniel Espinoza and I’m gonna miss him so much. (I’m sure he will show up, but still)
Chloe did jump the gun on quitting the police force, but it’s for a very good in-story reason: She’s burning the boats so she can’t retreat. It’s her telling Lucifer “I’m all in with you on this.”
I liked this choice too, and yet I feel like she then missed an opportunity to actually be of help. Lucifer had a very specific problem at that point: he needed to convince some of his siblings to elect him God. Chloe could probably have helped with that, since many of them were still thinking of him as the jerk who tore their family apart, but she was there to see him change and grow. I think she could have been effective in making the case that he deserved to be God, which is something political spouses do as a matter of course — they get people who might not be inclined to believe in their partner’s good character to conclude that if they have this person’s support, maybe they deserve yours too.Instead Lucifer just resorted to his go-to motivators, bribery and flattery, which work much better on people who don’t already mistrust you.
Practically, it also gives an excuse to not require to show Chloe working or explain how she’s not working, assuming it sticks. I mean her whole “I’m going to Italy for like a month” thing already pushed the boundaries of her holding down a job.
Chloe basically has a 100% clearance rate on homicides. No police force would fire her.
True, but imagine how many internal affairs investigations because of her unorthodox consultant.
Lucifer has enough pull with the mayor and the commissioner to take care of any issues with internal affairs.
I have to say, these two episodes absolutely gutted me emotionally. It’s good to see Lucifer tackling serious drama, but I sure hope we see a little more of Dan in season 6.The final episode, though…definitely feels like it could have used a few more drafts.
There’s twisting the knife and then there’s sending a kid in to do it. The hospital waiting room scene from when Trixie enters to the end was like having the knife removed, plunged back in to the hilt a half dozen times and THEN twisted. “Gutting” is an understatement.
I did love Maze going on the warpath though.
Oh yes, that was so heartbreaking. Everyone acted really well in that scene.
It was gut-wrenching, although I found myself wondering how Trixie got there on her own.
I assume that Chloe sent a fellow cop to pick her up (hopefully someone that Trixie had met and would be familiar with).
Oh, I’m sure there’s a way to explain. It just seemed so weird to see her wander in on her own.
She would have been picked up (presumably from a babysitter or school – I lost track of the timeline) by cops. It would be standard procedure for a cop hurt on the job.
Sure, but if I were the cop who picked her up, I would have stayed with her until she was with her mother, not send her wandering through the hospital on her own. Like I said, it’s a small thing, but it’s weird to see her walk through that door all by herself instead of with an adult.
The cop could have been outside the door. Trixie could have left them behind because she was worried about her dad.
I’ve already responded a couple of times about this so forgive me for replying again. But I just watched the hospital scene and when you hear Trixie speak, you can see a female cop going out of the door. So there’s your answer.
Probably another cop brought her to the hospital.
That scene got me big time. Scarlett Estevez did a fantastic job and I expect to see a lot of great work from her.
This episode absolutely wrecked me. I was CRYING! Only two other moments in the show broke me similarly; the first was when Lucifer had to go to Hell to get the cure to Chloe’s poisoning, and the second was when Amenadiel actualized those wings to bring Charlotte to Heaven.I 100% agree with you that Kevin Alejandro is definitely underselling what Dan means to fans. Dan tries so damn hard to do the right thing. I have more to say about what we might see from Dan in season 6, but based only on a reveal in the finale…and I’m trying to keep my comments spoiler-free.The copraganda has definitely been hard to watch and I’m with you on Chloe’s retirement. She obviously finds a lot of fulfillment solving crimes, and I’m curious to see her role and purpose evolve in the next season. I’m glad they specifically drew the analogy to the broken system. It needed to be said.The consequences of Caleb being buried with the necklace felt like a nice payoff for those of us that think a LOT about this show and the details.
The copraganda has definitely been hard to watchIs that actually a thing? I get it, but as an European, I wonder how the two hundred police procedurals that still haunt U.S. network television are dealing with this shift in public opinion.
You’re so right about the cop stuff, and I also wish Amenadiel took up some other job. They’re actually going to have one more new detective character next season played by Merrin Dungey. Also, D.B Woodside talks about his cop storyline in the entertainment tonight Interview. That part starts at the 8:00 mark. I think I’ve linked the video but I’m not too sure if it worked.
Ooh, I didn’t know the Merrin Dungey news—she rules. As for the interview, re-link it. Just paste the link itself, don’t try to hyperlink text (seems to be a new Kinja issue I just experienced the other day when trying to link in a comment).
Thanks for the tip!
I’m starting to suspect the issues with links not working is intentional (possibly due to some trolls abusing it). So you can only include the full text of links now so that it’s more transparent where the links point to. (And they’re not clickable – you have to copy them into the browser.)I just wish they’d disable that function in the advanced editing tools if it IS intentional. Stop letting us think that we can make our comments fancy, Kinja, just to have the fancy not work.
There’s going to be another season? I haven’t kept up much with this show but I was expecting this to be the last.
Amenadiel becoming a cop is a bit odd, but it does make sense in that now that Lucifer and Chloe quit the police force and Dan is dead, the show will need a way to A) incorporate Ella into the plot, and B) give Lucifer and Chloe excuses to get involved in cases when and if need be. (I think everyone agrees with LaToya that the cases are the weakest part of the show, but _Lucifer_ without cases would be a very different beast indeed.)And while I don’t know if the showrunners will go there (Lucifer has always been more about pop psychology than about societal issues), the presence of an empathetic Black angel in the LAPD could provide an interesting venue for exploring issues related to police violence.
Here’s an idea: What if Dan is in neither heaven nor hell? Just some place else?
This was my first thought as well. They were very careful to say where Dan isn’t, but nobody has bothered to interrogate the premise that he necessarily has to be in Hell if he isn’t in Heaven. Coming to Netflix in 2022: Ghost Dan!
I was thinking that too but Michael “maybe” answers that question in the next episode(not to give too much to spoilt things atm). *Warning S6 info so if anyone doesn’t want it stop reading here*However, Alejandro is saying there will be Dan back in S6 but not as we think. So a “theory”(more of a joke) that I brought up in the last episode’s comment still can’t be ruled out!
So he’s in the Medium Place?
I said to my wife when we were watching this that Dan is in the other universe.Also, Michael is a liar. He lies in ways designed to hurt people the most. Telling Lucifer that Dan is in Hell is a good way to show that.
I like this theory. “Mom” is of course very fond of Dan, and God still owes him for the exploding.
That tricky prick Michael has to have him stashed away somewhere. (Of course, the more heartbreaking, obvious answer is Dan didn’t fully resolve his guilt and his now living his own bespoke Hell Loop, but)
now living his own bespoke Hell LoopWhich goes like this: “Palmetto Palmetto Palmetto. Palmetto Palmetto. Palmetto? Palmetto Palmetto!”(It’a punishment the audience will feel intensely alongside Dan).
I will never forget how long it took me to realize Palmetto was a street, not a person. Daddammit, Season One!
You mean like a Medium Place?
I have to echo the total gut-punch that this episode turned out to be. After Naked and Afraid, I thought we were more or less done on the Dan character arc for the season; that the show went there was a total blind-side – and seeing the reactions of even Maze and Lucifer added a layer of emotion to it.(That retribution scene also gave me vague vibes of Reese going on the warpath in The Devil’s Share episode of Person Of Interest).
“Gut punch” isn’t really the way I would put it. After playing the Butt Monkey all through Naked and Afraid he finally shows some canny competence AND GETS KILLED ANYWAY. I’m kinda hating this show right now.
Yeah, as a plot device to motivate Lucifer to go to war against Michael, it wasn’t really necessary and is the worst kind of fridging. And other than that, the various reactions might give all the actors good material for their showreel, but within a still largely goofy show about the devil solving crimes, I’d still call them grief porn.
Seeing Maize and Lucifer going after the people that killed Dan really shows how much they do care about him.
I get how Amenadiel didn’t feel supported by Dan’s rather cool reception of his big career change idea, but I also felt like what he was trying to express is that Amenadiel (an actual angel!) is SO impressive and capable and powerful that he should be bringing his talents to bear on a larger scale than just walking a beat and writing tickets. Dan was actually trying to compliment his best friend; the only thing he didn’t like about his plan was that Amenadiel wasn’t thinking big enough.
And I don’t disagree. It makes sense that Lucifer is content to mete out “justice” (still focusing mostly on the “punishment” part, seemingly) one case at a time because he’s still almost completely self-centered and is only doing this because it’s something Chloe does. But Amenadiel wants to make a safer and more just Planet Earth for his child, and given his celestial abilities, starting at the bottom of a troubled institution (to put it mildly) is probably not the most effective way to do that.
yeah, I sure wish Carol wasn’t a copalso, I would’ve imagined Amenadiel’s human career to be something along the lines of social worker or teacher because that man has so much patience for lost causes
Wasn’t gonna cry, wasn’t gonna cry, wasn’t gonna cry…..then Trixie shows up….$%$#^$%^%$^$#$
One of the early S6 episodes had better be rescuing Dan from his Hell Loop. Like, THE first episode. Possibly with the help of Mister Said Out Bitch.
It’s a testament to how far Dan’s come that I was very sad at death. I really hope that his story isn’t over because that’s a horrible ending for him, just being stuck in Hell for all eternity.I assumed the cop stuff wasn’t going to be done regardless of Chloe quitting and Dan dying since Ella’s still there and weak or not, crime solving is a key feature of the show. If they did have the main characters forming their own PI agency though, that could be fun.Also fuck you Chuck Shirley, can’t believe that the Supernatural God is ruining things on two shows now.
I can’t believe Chuck walked away alive all over again
I like that Rob Benedict couldn’t stop talking as God in Supernatural, and had basically no lines here. He would fit this show (in a different role), by the way, since he’s also able to make an excellent shift between goofy and scary.
I hope the addition of Carol is less about keeping cop stories going than about giving Ella something to do!Dan’s death hit my hard and Trixie saying she wants her daddy was the WORST. It made sense as far as upping the stakes of the whole thing. I do hope we might get some resolution on Dan’s afterlife in Season 6.
MAZE: Which favours do you want me to call in?LUCIFER: ALL of them.
I had a very weird weekend. My dad died just before the shutdown and my mom sold the house in the fall to someone who was renovating it and putting it back on the market. As we live closest, my family asked me and my wife to go to the open house on Saturday to take pictures and let them know how it looked. On top of that, my mom and my sister pretty much dared us to walk up to someone else who was viewing the house and at the right spot, point at the floor and say, “My dad died there.” (Yes we have sick senses of humor). No one else was there when we were so it didn’t happen. It was a little emotional to be there but not too much to handle. Then we came home and watched this episode. Dan’s death hit us hard (cause how could it not). Then Trixie showed up. Floodgates opened. Great freaking episode. Wrong night to have watched it.
So, I’ve already seen the last episode and won’t comment much here on plot stuff, since this works largely as a two-parter, but the one plot thing I will say is… this is what I’d been worried about since the absolutely phenomenal Dan episode earlier this season.Narratively, knowing it was the final season at the time, giving someone a stand-alone episode to essentially close out their mental issues — and having Lucifer call him “Dan” (not Daniel) in true acknowledgment of their closeness— was a gigantic red flag for me. As awesome as it was, I was waiting for, well, this other shoe to drop and I was decidedly not happy about it.And Jesus, the emotion… Trixie at the hospital, Ella and Lucifer singing, Amenadiel’s speech, finding out Dan still had guilt… ugh…But there was a lot great. Michael Voltaggio (who devoted watchers of Food Network, both before and after the pandemic, would recognize as being the perfect chef for that moment)… Lucifer and Maze wrecking shop (Brandt posted a BTS clip somewhere of how they shot it — single-shot — and a failed one because the cameraman fell over…)… Maze’s earlier anger at someone taking Dan being a genuine “soul-ful” emotion… and Dan’s belief in Amenadiel’s goodness being too big for “just being a policeman”…
> and having Lucifer call him “Dan” (not Daniel)
It meant that Dan was going to die, or Lucifer and Dan were falling in love (bit of both, in the end.) The only two explanations possible, in the world of television.
It meant that Dan was going to die, or Lucifer and Dan were falling in loveMan, such a missed opportunity for a wonderful and very thematic devil’s thresome!
Another parallel between Charlotte Richards’ and Dan’s deaths? Now there’s two episodes of Lucifer that will forever make me ugly cry.
I took the Chloe quitting stuff as part of what they didn’t bother to change because, and you will see what I mean at the end and that story seemed to just get some things adjusted at the end, I think season six will be the show shrugging off a lot of the procedural stuff. It also could entirely take place in her last two weeks. But there is one story that becomes clear that will be told too.
This episode… solid A indeed. So many thoughts and feelings…
There were rumblings on the internet that they would kill off a major character this season, and I knew it would be Dan. As you noted, similarly tragic to have someone with a questionable past learn of the celestial and do their best to right their wrongs before it’s too late. While Dan was an integral character, he is just important enough to kill off, but not too much so that there would be lost viewership (vs say if they killed off Ella, who has an incredibly loyal fan base). Especially with some of the ‘love to hate’ Dan sentiment from the earlier seasons, it just made sense.
Then “Resting Devil Face” happend, and I thought “Oh, they did kill Dan. There it is, he died, but God put him back together. How clever.” When he got kidnapped, I wasn’t really worried. He even got away! I was thinking “Fuck yeah, Dan is tough, he’ll get out of this” Then he was shot…three times… uh oh. Not looking good. But Chloe found him! Still alive! He’ll totally make it…
Then when the nurse was shaking her head… and the whole scene with Trixie. I said out loud “Oh fuck. They actually did it”. Honestly, brilliant writing on this episode because I was wholly convinced he would make it out. Also tragic to have Trixie grow up without a dad like Chloe did. Trixie begging Lucifer to tell her it’s not true because he never lies. “My dear sweet child, I can’t…” Excuse me, who started cutting onions in my living room? That’s just rude.
And then to find out he didn’t make it to Heaven? At his Funeral? Ugh. Way to twist the knife, Joe Henderson and Ildy Modrovich. I agree that Lucifer and Ella singing at Dan’s funeral has been my favorite of all the musical sequences. Especially Ella singing in Spanish. This over a warranted Maze rampage. I do wonder what Lucifer said to the guy who killed Dan.
I saw in another comment thread that the actor that killed Dan played God in another series (Supernatural, maybe?) That had to be intentional, God killed Dan twice this season. Brutal.
The Chloe/Luficer “Please tell me you’re going to win, that you can fix this, that you’re going to be God” scene was also so well done between Ellis and German. I hated everything about it, which is what made it so great. Damnit, Lucifer, always stepping in it with your insecurities.
And of course, very impactful scene with Ellis and Harris at the end. These are always some of my favorite scenes, in both the dynamic between the two, but also showing the power of therapy as a major plot point. *chefs kiss* I found Lucifer talking about Trixie loosing her father extra powerful, given how his own father relationship changed this season.
Dan’s death aside, I also loved the scene with Lucifer and Zadkiel. The “I’m doing this for love” had sincere passion and bafflement, and there’s something poetic about Lucifer laying it all out there to a brother that clearly hates him versus confiding in Amenadiel or Maze.
That said, with all the intensity of this episode, again there was so much comedic levity. Jophiel’s scene, Chloe’s concern about being God’s Consultant and if that means she has to die, and “Alabama’s actually really nice” all got me. Plus a few nice tender moments between Lucifer and Chloe.
10/10. Everything a penultimate episode should be.
You know, I got spoiled Dans death thanks to a goddamn site, and although it hitted me nontheless but I couldnt stop thinking about Trixie, how was going to cope with it and how full circle Chloes life ends being as her own child ends living his life without his father, as Chloe did… Also, its incredible powerful how Lucifer describes how unfare our universe is, we are talking about a milenial-old entity here, who used to run hell…
Can I just take a moment to appreciate the physicality Tom Ellis brings to his performance. His movements/stance as fun loving Lucifer are just perfect for being a dandy, someone over the top and who you wouldn’t see as a threat. Michael is just pure sneer and I forget its the same actor when they are facing off. The most impressive to me though (and they do a great job with the camera angles) is angry Lucifer. In the scene where he is facing off to Dan’s killer he looms, he seems bigger, unrestrained and takes up the whole room. It’s pure menace. Such subtle changes in posture which displays the pure rage, if you showed me a scene without showing his face I could tell you what Lucifer was feeling – the feeling displayed in his face is the icing on the cake.
It helps that he’s very freaking tall. When he stands next to Amenadiel, it almost feels wrong because you’d expect Amenadiel to tower over him.
Not sure if anyone mentioned it already, but did Dan get killed by ‘God’…from Supernatural?
Yep. That’s why I called him a “messianic mercenary” in the review. I was having fun with that cruel twist of fate.
Yes. He got “Chucked”
And just like Chuck Shirley, Vincent is left alive as a cruel mercy.
The utopian vision Lucifer was selling rang hollow for me too, LaToya. I always think about the big Agent Smith monologue from The Matrix (I’m old), but The Good Place just did this too. I’m pretty sure Hinduism was the first, but someone can check me.
One small example: “no hangovers,” would mean a lot of people would be drunk for their entire lives.RIP Dan. The only problem I had with that part of the episode is there’s almost no way Dan would still be alive and talking (after three gunshots to the chest with a .45) to tell Chloe about Caleb, except by miracle… which is a thing in this show, so whatever.
there’s almost no way Dan would still be alive and talking (after three gunshots to the chest with a .45) to tell Chloe about CalebYeah, at first I didn’t even understand that scene. I thought, maybe he hadn’t really been shot after all, it was some sort of trick? But no, apparently, they super-ruthless mercenary left him while he was still breathing, and he willed himself to stay alive while waiting for Chloe, who he had no reason to expect would show up at all, to then give her a cryptic one-word clue, while still having enough life in him to keep talking for several more minutes, 10 seconds of which might have been devoted to elaborate a little bit on what “Caleb” meant.
I never fully bought into the “Dan is a douche” motif because of my pre-Lucifer crush on Kevin Alejandro, who was actually the reason I started watching the show. So he better be back next season (and I hear that’s a foregone conclusion).
Dan’s death was a very touching and I thought well handled moment. It should have been a red flag that he got a spotlight episode to highlight his most endearing qualities, in TV that pretty much always foretells an imminent death (though in other shows, it tends to be characters that have been largely ignored and/or unsympathetic in every previous episode, whereas Lucifer has been pretty generous to its entire cast, and Dan was beloved long before that episode).I can see from comments that some people found the scene with Trixie at the hospital particularly heart wrenching. For me, even as someone who has been very impressed with the child actress throughout the series up to that point, my suspension of disbelief came to a complete halt. It’s long been an issue that she is written younger than she is, but it never really bothered me until that scene. She’s plenty old enough to understand death, and to understand the risks in her dad’s line of work, and to have her express disbelief like she was being punked by her mom (who heretofore has had no sense of humour) was very unconvincing. Both the writing and the performance, it hit me as a stark reminder that I was watching actors, and took me out of what was otherwise a teary eyed moment very well earned by the previous scenes.
I keep reading how “Daniel Espinoza: Naked and Afraid” was a red flag, but I don’t think it’s true. Linda has had a focus episode this season too, Ella had in the past, and they weren’t killed off.
Yeah but those aren’t characters with any kind of redemption arc, the trope is when it’s an unsympathetic character (or someone who has been ignored most of the series). It’s not so much it guarantees the character will die, it’s that *every time* that type of character gets killed off, there is a preceding episode (or even earlier in the same episode), that they get spotlit, and are as lovable as they’ve ever been.
So what did Lucifer whisper into that mercenary’s ear to make him completely break like he did? He didn’t even have to pull out his devil face to do it.