From ploughing through just over five seasons of Lucifer, the series inspired by Gaiman's Lucifer series, that seems to have more Easter eggs than actual relations to the original comic series, (Lucifer being adjacent to the Endless of the Sandman series), it's only now occurred to me which particular romance novel bullshit cliche this show's managed to turn on its head: He's a monster, but if I love him enough, he will change. I can change him.
This show sadly suffered from a string of other cliches: the classic Unresolved Sexual Tension that becomes irritatingly drawn out with Chloe and Lucifer, the "We can't reveal we're dating without pissing off the ex who's also a friend" cliche with Mazikeen, Amenadiel and Linda. Fake Lucifer shows up after thousands of years in Hell and tries to trick everyone he's legit. Thankfully that one was resolved in an episode because I cannot abide those storylines, especially if they take an entire season to resolve and you're infuriated with all those characters who keep missing all the giveaways, sometimes by a gnat's wing. Soap operas lean on this way too much.
I won't go into this much. Gaiman's interpretation of biblical stories did inspire something I wrote, to the point I thought maybe I borrowed a touch to much from his retelling thinking it was in line with the original texts. But Lucifer himself is, for all his irritating moments, more lovable than certain other bad boy personas in other stories that women seem to find attractive, the way someone who buys "fixer-uppers" to resell on refurbish, only she won't let another woman buy him even if he wants to leave. For all the tropes the show suffers from it's certainly addictive. A bunch of celestials and demons navigating the rigors of being human while trying to reconcile their own flaws makes for more interesting watching. You get a lot of Buffy/Angel vibes from the storylines and characters, however I've not fostered as much resentment for their actions than I did with those in Buffy. The writing and comic timing's slightly sharper than your average Buffy episode too. You could see a show like this really falling on its ass from poor execution and casting, if they've done anything right it's choosing their leads, especially in terms of chemistry.
Where it falls down the most is the crime drama aspects, then again, you can see a lot of stretching and poetic license in those shows as well, the Jerry Bruckheimer aspect really obvious. I don't know whether it's the every crime is a murder aspect that gets so dry you have to keep coming up with convincing plots and who-dun-its every episode and have every crime tie into something to do with Lucifer's motivations or character development. There's still a healthy amount of self-awareness and sass, and the drama doesn't feel too forced. I'm considering reading the comic series but my fascination with comics tends to wane after my initial interest, I have other books I've not even touched after wanting them for their art styles and possibly interesting premises. I don't remotely consider myself a Gaiman fan. I don't think he's a total rockstar but he has had his moments of arrogance. I get the question "where do your ideas come from?" gets tiring or irritating to a creator you feel the need to be passive aggressive and glib in your responses, but from the perspective of the not-so creative, you're better off indulging their question since they're dying to know how to be as imaginative as you.
Don't envy creatives, by the way. They're constantly comparing their ideas to others, which is what I'm also doing watching Lucifer. Just appreciate what they do because you're the lucky party in this. You get to enjoy the fruits of their agonising labour.
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