Season one of Lucifer brings attention to an obscure DC comic

Lucifer, the new Fox network show about the Devil’s vacation in Los Angeles, recently aired its season one finale. The show is based off of a fairly unknown DC comic book that follows the first fallen angel after he leaves Hell for LA. It is certainly my favorite television show this year, and I couldn’t be more excited for season two.

The show opens with one of my favorite songs, “Ain’t No Rest For The Wicked” by Cage the Elephant, and Lucifer pulling up to his club, Lux, after leaving Hell five years earlier. After one of his good friends is murdered, Lucifer teams up with Detective Chloe Decker to punish those responsible.

Although the show follows the cop-show cliche of having a mystery per week, the overlying plot of all the episodes is interesting. The supernatural relationships between Lucifer, God, Chloe, and his fellow demons and angels is what really caught my attention, as the writers took some unexpected perspectives on the different characters.

One episode in particular, called “A Priest Walks Into a Bar”, is my personal favorite. It essentially explores what would happen if a priest asked the Devil for a favor, and the relationship between the two characters is fascinating to watch develop onscreen.

As for the cliches, it looks like the show is going to clean those up next season, as they introduced a new plotline in the finale that will probably take over much of the overused murder-mystery episode structure. I expect it will definitely be exciting to watch the human characters that after most of the season, still don’t believe Lucifer is actually the Devil, react to the in-your-face events coming as a consequence of the finale.

Despite being based off of a DC comic, the show does not follow the comic very much besides basic characters. The character of Lucifer first arose in the Sandman series, in which he also decided to quit being king of hell and take a vacation in Los Angeles. After some interest in the continuation of his story, a new comic was released titled Lucifer and chronicling his adventures after the Sandman series. Recently, there have been a new run of the comic that follows the Devil’s story after his original comic run had ended. The show however, follows Lucifer when he is still part of the Sandman story, and although it seems mostly separate from the comics, there could be appearances from comic characters like Sandman.

The show is brilliant as a stand alone though, and anyone can watch it without having any background knowledge on the comics or even religious knowledge. With high ratings and a great plot for season two, it looks like a fantastic up-and-coming show for viewers to catch up on before next season hits.

Lucifer premieres season two next fall on Fox Network, and season one is available to watch OnDemand and on Fox’s streaming website.