Luther, Series 1

DCSU Cornish:
So, he's back.

DSU Teller:
From outer space.

DCSU Cornish:
You do know the man is nitroglycerin?

DSU Teller:
With respect, sir, a comprehensive investigation under your edict cleared him of any wrongdoing.

DCSU Cornish:
Not least because the only other witness is in a coma, measuring three on the Glasgow scale.

DSU Teller:
And Mia Dalton's in school today, and not in the ground.

DCSU Cornish:
Rose, if you bet too heavily on Luther, then you stand or fall with him and with you goes this unit, and my credibility as its architect. Haven't you worked too hard for too long to take that big a risk on such a wild card?

DSU Teller:
I don't consider him a risk.

DCSU Cornish:
Then what is he?

DSU Teller:
An investment.

DCSU Cornish:
And if Henry Madsen wakes up, gives his account of what happened that night? Will Luther drag us all down? Let's hope not.

DSU Teller:
So where's the gun? It's got to be somewhere. Everything's somewhere.

DCI Luther:
I don't know.

DSU Teller:
Say that again. That was special.

DCI Luther:
[chuckles] I don't know where the gun is.

Alice Morgan:
Are you trying to beguile me?

DCI Luther:
[chuckles] No, I wouldn't be so foolish. But I will tell you this, Alice. You can revel in your brilliance for as long as you like, but people slip up. Happens time and time again.

Alice Morgan:
Well that's just faulty logic postulated on imperfect data collection. What if you only catch people who make mistakes? That would skew the figures, wouldn't it?

DCI Luther:
Yes, it would. But criminals aren't as smart as they think they are.

Alice Morgan:
Oh, that must get monotonous for someone as brilliant as you.

Alice Morgan:
You'd degrade the law you serve just to protect some woman who cast you aside like offal?

DCI Luther:
[puts his wedding ring back on] In a second.

Alice Morgan:
And you think I'm the monster. Love is supposed to dignify us, exalt us. How can it be love, John, if all it does is make you lonely and corrupt? [Luther turns and walks away] Answer the question! Don't turn your back on me!

DCI Luther:
I'm coming for you.

Alice Morgan:
Not if I come for you first.

[Luther walks from the crime scene into a cluster of reporters to get to his car]

DCI Luther:
Morning, Corinne.

Corinne Day:
Any suspects, John? Off the record. [Luther keeps walking past her without comment] You got my number.

DCI Luther:
Yeah, memorized: 666.

Corinne Day:
Direct line.

DCI Luther:
[answering his mobile] Stop stalking me, Alice, you're yesterday's news.

Alice Morgan:
Yes, I heard about the dead policeman. I was worried about you, John.

DCI Luther:
About what, that someone else might get me?

Alice Morgan:
I know how hard men like you take the death of fellow officers. Must be like losing family.

DCI Luther:
I'm not discussing cases with you.

Alice Morgan:
Not even interesting ones?

DCI Luther:
This isn't interesting, all right? These are good cops, doing good jobs, being gunned on the streets like-

Alice Morgan:
Like what? That's something we all do, isn't it, in the end? Judge who's worth more than whom? Hitler or Gandhi? The very young, the very old?

DCI Luther:
Though, to be fair, most of us don't do it to the extent that you do.

Alice Morgan:
But it does mean the difference between us is one of degree, not category. Ask Henry Madsen.

DCI Luther:
All right, you win, okay? You're too clever for me, Alice.

Alice Morgan:
Flattery to appease a malignant narcissist. That's a frivolous tactic.

Alice Morgan:
I've been wondering, why do you think he does it?

Zoe Luther:
Why does who do what?

Alice Morgan:
John, his job. It takes such a toll. Why does he put himself through it?

Zoe Luther:
I don't see how this is relevant.

Alice Morgan:
Well, it is. Right this second, you might actually be helping him. What do you think compels him to do it?

Zoe Luther:
He believes one life is all we have, life and love. Whoever takes life steals everything.

Alice Morgan:
And do you agree?

Zoe Luther:
I don't know. I think if he'd read a different book by a different writer at just the right time in his life he'd have been a different man. He'd have been happier as a priest than-

Alice Morgan:
Than what?

Zoe Luther:
Than what he is.

Alice Morgan:
I did this because I don't like you and because I wanted to toy with John. Ah, it's a bit like pulling legs off flies.

Mark North:
Why are you here now?

Alice Morgan:
Because I'm sorry.

Mark North:
No, you're not.

Alice Morgan:
No, no, I'm not. I was just trying to empathise. I'm here because this has gone just far enough, and what I need you to do now is pick up that phone and withdraw the complaint.

Mark North:
And if I refuse? What if somebody actually stood up to you and refused?

Alice Morgan:
Hmm, well, then, I'd have to leave… and then one night I'd have to come back.

Alice Morgan:
How do I know you're not playing a double game? One stone, multiple birds, trying to make me speak carelessly in order to entrap me.

DCI Luther:
That would be illegal. Plus I really need to catch this man.

Alice Morgan:
More than you want to catch me?

DCI Luther:
At the moment, yeah. I'm running out of time.

Alice Morgan:
Because if I thought you were about to lose interest in me, I'd be inconsolable.

DCI Luther:
I just need a way in, to know what it's like to be him, to not feel anything.

Alice Morgan:
I feel things.

DCI Luther:
Not mercy.

Alice Morgan:
Not sentiment. I can't empathise for this man's state of being any more than you can, because, disregarding a single, ah, alleged act, carried out for different, alleged, reasons, he and I might just as well be from different species.

DCI Luther:
[sigh] See, I disagree. Murder's murder.

Alice Morgan:
But it isn't, is it? Not even to you. This man Burgess, he's just a naughty child showing off. You already know his flaw - his compulsion to dominate, to be in control - and you already know how to exploit that.

DCI Luther:
How?

Alice Morgan:
Oh, come on. Change the state of play.

DCI Luther:
Yeah, well, I tried that with you and it failed.

Alice Morgan:
Only just.

Lucien Burgess:
It's a kink, a sex thing. Many many women fantasize about being tied up, strangled, raped, eaten.

DCI Luther:
You think so?

Lucien Burgess:
Oh, yeah. The more depraved the killer, the more women fawn on him. It's called 'hybristophilia'.

DCI Luther:
'Sexual arousal from thoughts of violence.'

Lucien Burgess:
It's his willingness to murder that attracts her. His murder becomes hers.

DSU Teller:
Three guesses why Zoe's gentleman caller was here.

DCI Luther:
To confess he's a dick?

Richard Henley:
[about Lucien Burgess] I wanted to kill him. I knew it would cost me, but I didn't care. To this day, uh, the biggest regret of my life is not killing the- Any idea what it's like to feel like that?

DCI Luther:
Yes, I do. I know exactly what that feels like.

DCI Luther:
Graham knows we're onto him, all right? And he'll try and kill as many as he can before we catch him, and if I have to terrify his wife to stop that happening, I can live with that.

DSU Teller:
Oh, thus spake John Luther, gentleman of the parish.

DCI Luther:
She knows what her husband is.

DSU Teller:
Yeah, but maybe not what he's done. There is a difference.

DSU Teller:
Do you want to know the real tragedy about marriage?

DCI Luther:
No, thanks.

DSU Teller:
Women always think men will change, but they don't. Men think women won't change, but they do.

DCI Luther:
Where'd you get that from, a fortune cookie?

[Luther is sitting in a chair surrounded by photos and maps in a circle on the floor]

DS Ripley:
What's all this?

DCI Luther:
Découpage, a cut-up technique. Take a bit of text, cut it up, randomise it, make new text, see new patterns.

DS Ripley:
Where'd you learn this?

DCI Luther:
David Bowie - it's how he wrote his lyrics.

DS Ripley:
Are you a fan?

DCI Luther:
Don't I look like a fan?

DS Ripley:
What, of songs about, like, aliens and that?

DCI Luther:
Well, there's a bit more to him than aliens. I'll make you a tape.

DS Ripley:
A-a what, sorry?

DCI Luther:
Do you have any sexual fantasies?

DS Ripley:
What? Yeah, not that I'm gonna tell you about.

DCI Luther:
Does the reality ever live up to the fantasy?

DS Ripley:
Well, I, um- well, no, no, not really.

DCI Luther:
Yeah, it can't, can it?

Alice Morgan:
No games, listen. I did what I did to Henry Madsen because I wanted to help you. I put my liberty at risk because I couldn't bear to see you hurt. So, what I did I did for wholly unselfish reasons.

DCI Luther:
I don't…

Alice Morgan:
Yes, you do. "The mind is its own place and in itself can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven." The universe isn't evil, John, it's just indifferent. That hasn't changed. It can't. But what I did for you, proved something to me. Something I hadn't believed until that moment.

DCI Luther:
What?

Alice Morgan:
It's you who's right. There is love in the world.

DSU Teller:
'The evidence won't leave our sight for a second'?

DCI Luther:
We'll get it back.

DSU Teller:
We'd better, 'cause, right this second, I'm pedaling thin air like Wile E. Coyote

DSU Teller:
[about Evangeline Nixon] Anything?

DS Ripley:
Not a word, no prints on record, no nothing.

DCI Luther:
You know, she may not have been our problem up until now, but she's been someone's. You don't start off at kidnapping, you work your way up to it. Why don't you send her details to Detective Munch in New York. He's Special Victims Unit there.

Alice Morgan:
In 1988, two psychologists published an article arguing that positive self-deception is a normal and advantageous part of most people’s lives. It turns out, people lie to themselves about three things: they view themselves in implausibly positive ways, they think they have far more control over their lives than they actually do, and they believe the future will be better than the evidence of the present can possibly justify. But, you’re way beyond that now. You’re on the other side of that particular mirror. Lying to yourself isn’t going to help anymore.