edge of a high rise and pondering taking a leap . In the first episode of series two , after Alice Morgan executes detective Ian Reed for murdering Luther ’ s wife , the viewer finds Luther sitting alone , on the sofa of his apartment , putting one bullet into the chamber of his gun , spinning the chamber , putting the weapon to his head , and pulling the trigger . Luther ’ s thoughts of suicide reveal an intense self-loathing that likely springs from his fear that he may be very much like the sociopathic killers that he must track down . Indeed , Luther shares with Manfred a terrible darkness that suggests the presence of the demonic .
In his on-going battle with his own terrible darkness , John Luther feels compelled to repeat a behavior — tracking down yet another sociopathic killer — that has become almost pathological . In a psychological thriller that contains element of Gothic horror , Luther ’ s motivation to stop yet another killer from taking yet another life surely springs from a lingering obsession that is fueled , quite possibly , by his guilt over a past failure ; by the terrible darkness that often verges on consuming him ; and by a seemingly unending supply of sociopathic killers that arise to terrify the average citizen . Indeed , Luther ’ s almost obsessive reenactment of this behavior is clearly in accord with traditions that link Gothic literature to horror cinema and suggests the existence of buried memories that have become Luther ’ s own personal demons . As Steven Bruhm has observed , “ What becomes most marked in contemporary Gothic — and what distinguishes it from its ancestors — is the [ protagonist ’ s ] and the viewers ’ compulsive return to certain fixations , obsessions and blockages ” ( 260 ). Thus , caught in what Freud termed “ a repetition compulsion ” ( Bruhm 272 ), Luther tracks down the killer again and again , purging society of yet another homicidal sociopath but bringing only a temporary restoration of order not only to the world around him but to his own troubled psyche . Not surprisingly , the obsession exacts a tremendous price by the end of the yet-to-be-finished series : Following the murders of his wife , his partner Justin Ripley and his girlfriend Alice , John Luther verges on becoming a monstrous creature himself whose only thought is to avenge the death of Alice Morgan , a brilliant but sociopathic killer with whom Luther develops a powerful romantic bond .
The Shadow Self , the Monstrous Feminine and Alice Morgan
To the viewer , Luther ’ s confrontations with some the most monstrous elements of humanity certainly suggest a heightening of cultural and social anxieties that have a basis in the oft-terrifying world beyond the script . This is a level of anxiety evoked by a series that , at first glance , seems to lack unity . But closer examination reveals that what holds this series together
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