Den of the Cyphered Wolf

Monday, October 23, 2017

Storytelling by Reveal: The Network Skinner Box: Thoughts on Lucifer

I just got caught up in Lucifer.



I lik....don't hate it.

There are lots of good ideas a couple of interesting characters but the show is primarily framed around a rote standard police procedural. In short, it has the same problem as Grimm, the early seasons of Once Upon a Time, and a lot of network television.

Storytelling by reveals.

The show has a big story to tell but is afraid to tell it. So instead it features a supernatural police procedural.  I don't hate those. There quite a few that manage to keep things interesting. Haven, Eureka, arguably any supernatural monster of the week show including the Buffyverse..

But Lucifer seems to load all the interesting stuff into either the last five minutes of each episode or the last episode of each season.

And there isn't much excuse for it.

I understand why the police procedural is so prevalent and why even genre shows try to wrap themselves around its skin. It's a relatively easy way to have the characters do different stuff each week without much explanation in a flexible way.

And for writers, that's an invaluable tool. But  in a lot of shows it works against the premise so that one show becomes two fighting each other. And that's Lucifer.


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