Luther: The Fallen Sun review – Idris Elba holds it all together | Films | Entertainment

The Fallen Sun is the first in a planned series of Netflix-produced movies for his renegade BBC detective John Luther.

Judging by the car smashes, fight scenes and helicopter shots in this one, Luther’s next raft of cases will be bigger, louder and a whole lot dafter than anything we’ve seen on normal telly.

It begins with a brazen rejigging of the final episode. In 2019, we saw Luther finally led to prison by his wonky moral compass. Here, his downfall was the work of evil computer hacker David Robey (Andy Serkis) who set up Luther to stop him feeling his collar.

After Robey foolishly delivers a taunting message to our hero’s cell, the disgraced cop breaks out so he can put him to rights.

Once he’s reunited with his trademark wool overcoat, we see the vigilante perched on top of a London tower block, surveying the crime-ridden city like a herringboned Batman.

But the Caped Crusader needed his butler. So Luther enlists his old boss Martin (Dermot Crowley) before forging an uneasy alliance with his replacement, Detective Superintendent Odette Raine (Cynthia Erivo).

If the plot sounds a bit ridiculous, wait until you see Andy Serkis’s barnet. Saddled with the type of luxurious bouffant you see in faded barber shop photos, Serkis has an impossible task of pulling off the requisite level of menace.

Still, somehow Elba holds it all together. Exuding the brooding charisma that made the BBC series so watchable, his detective is still a compelling anti-hero.

The ending tees up a new role for Luther in the next film. Hopefully, it will have fewer plotholes and a much scarier villain.

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