Luther The Fallen Sun Review: Is it worth watching?

Luther: The Fallen Sun is a good movie with stellar acting. Andy Serkis puts together one of his best performances in a chilling, dark movie that introduces Luther to the big screen.

After 5 mini-series, seasons, whatever you want to call it, Luther is back for his cinematic debut. Luther: The Fallen Sun is the next story in the Luther series, and it is the first time the series has been done in long form.

Luther: The Fallen Sun is worth watching. It’s a pretty solid movie that does a lot of things right. The plot jumps around a bit, and there are some parts that felt too long, but overall it is a good movie. Idris Elba puts on a great performance as Detective John Luther, and Andy Serkis was great as David Robey.

Is Luther: The Fallen Sun a Sequel?

This one depends on what you consider a sequel. Luther: The Fallen Sun does directly follow the stories told in the TV show, but it is also the first movie created. This isn’t Luther 2 or anything like that, but there are details from the show that connect into the movie.

Can you Watch Luther: The Fallen Sun Before Luther?

While I was curious about this movie, I was also slightly worried I would be missing blocks of information as I have never seen the TV show. I can safely say you can watch Luther: The Fallen Sun without ever seeing Luther. There are details like character introductions that are definitely missed., but these details don’t play a large role in the movie and I didn’t feel overly confused or lost at any point. Outside of missing some references and stuff, you are totally fine to watch this movie without seeing Luther. You can check out my full summary here.

Luther: The Fallen Sun Review

Alrighty, now that you are convinced you can watch this without having to go watch 24 episodes of TV first, let’s jump into the review. The plot of Luther: The Fallen Sun was actually pretty good. Maybe I wrote off some of the more confusing parts at the beginning as information I should have already known if I had watched the show, but after the first 20 or so minutes it flows well. A lot happens in this movie, and even though it was 2:20, it held my attention throughout. The story moves through a couple of phases, where we develop some characters as well as build the story that unfolds in the second half. The execution is somewhat sloppy at a couple of points, but overall I enjoyed the story. It was tense, dark, and was everything I was looking for out of a 14A-rated drama, mystery.

The characters in Luther: The Fallen Sun are really good. David, Luther, and Detective Raine, played by Cynthia Erivo, are all deep, well written characters. They have intriguing personalities and they continue to evolve as the movie goes along. None of them are perfect, and they all feel human. There is some level of relatability to a couple of our characters, not David Robey, but you get my point, and it makes their actions understandable.

There is a lack of memorable side characters, outside of Martin Schenk who looks to have played a big role in the TV series. Archie is an odd duck, and I get that it is the point of his character, but there wasn’t enough screen time for him to be memorable in anyway. I enjoyed our main characters, but the depth just doesn’t exist nor does it fit this movie.

On top of having some great leading characters, our leading cast is equally awesome. Cynthia Erivo is great as Detective Raine, and while she doesn’t have a huge role in the first half of Luther: The Fallen Sun, she makes up for it in the back half. The emotional scenes at the end were awesome, and while it wasn’t an Oscar worthy performance, I enjoyed it.

Idris Elba has been Luther for a while, and while I had never seen anything Luther related before this, I felt like this character matched his style well. The mannerisms, the voice, the actions, were all that of a detective always playing an angle or trying to read someone. I thoroughly enjoyed his character and it makes me want to check out the TV series at some point.

The all-star of this movie has to be Andy Serkis. He’s had some large roles over his career, but this is the best one I’ve seen. His character, David Robey, is so dark and vicious with his plan to create this real-life nightmare, and Serkis brings it to life. The lack of mercy, the covering cowardice with over-the-top actions and behaviours. The character has layers, and Serkis adds to those layers and brings them to life. His character is terrifying in idea, and frightening in actuality. A wonderful performance that was a high point of this movie.

Honestly, the CGI in Luther: The Fallen Sun was fairly minimal but it was awful at points. I don’t really want to touch on details as it occurs in a pretty meaningful scene later in the movie, but you can tell clear as day that there has been editing added after the face in a few scenes. Again, not a large part of the movie so it doesn’t hurt it that badly, but when it leans on editing it looks sloppy and feels very fake.

Overall, I thought the movie was pretty good. Noting spectacular, but it was an interesting watch with some really good thriller elements. I wouldn’t say it’s a scary movie, but it definitely has some intense moments and frightening elements. It wasn’t good to enough to make me run to watch Luther, but I would be happy to see a sequel releases in the near future.