Well, that was a sucker punch to the gut, wasn’t it? The final two episodes of the season in Lucifer pulled the carpet from right under our feet, and then kicked us while were down. Hard.
With an unexpected death, Episode 15 made me cry like I hadn’t cried in a really long time. Then the finale made my head explode on so many levels that had me asking myself, “What is happening?” throughout most of the episode while being completely blown away by the brilliance of this show.
A sucker punch
Did anyone see that coming? Seriously, when Lucifer season 5B started, did you ever stop to think that Dan might not survive until the end of the season? That we would be crying inconsolably about his death within a few episodes?
I sure as hell didn’t.
In hindsight, I feel like I should have seen it coming. “Daniel Espinoza: Naked and Afraid” basically spelled it out to us, but I didn’t connect the dots until it was too late. And it took me so much by surprise that it took my breath away. For the first time in a really, really long time, a TV show made me cry and grieve as if I was losing one of my own.
Chloe announced to everyone that she was retiring as a detective and that her next case would be her last case. So when they catch a murder, Dan is all about helping her in honor of her last case — a tech from the medical examiner’s office was murdered, and it turns out that he was part of a scheme with a fake psychic to steal valuable objects off of the bodies he worked on.
So they divide and conquer: Lucifer and Chloe go after TJ, the fence, while Dan tracks down possible buyers that might be in danger. When Lucifer and Chloe find TJ, they’re surprised to find a guy with superhuman strength, who nearly flattens Lucifer and then gets away.
Meanwhile, Dan tracks down one possible buyer and he has the bad luck of finding the killers there. The woman he was trying to warn ends up dead, and Dan is kidnapped. Up until this point, I thought it was business as usual. He would be kidnapped, Lucifer and Chloe would find him in the nick of time and all would be well.
So imagine my surprise when Dan was shot. And then when his body was riddled with bullets. When Chloe finally finds him, it’s almost too late. There’s only time for him to tell Chloe about someone named Caleb and that he wanted her to tell Trixie he loved her.
This was about the halfway point in “Is This Really How It’s Going to End?” From that point forward, I sobbed as if I had just lost someone myself. Scarlett Estevez broke my heart in a million little pieces, and I wept along with her as Trixie discovered her father would not be coming home anymore. When she turns to Lucifer and begs him to tell her it’s not true because he can’t lie, and then her anguished “I want my daddy”…
Yeah, I was not okay.
When I thought I didn’t have any tears left, there was Dan’s funeral where I sobbed even more. When I tell you that I was a blubbering mess from the moment Dan was shot until the end of the episode, I am not lying. To have Ella and Lucifer singing a beautiful song intercalated with Lucifer and Maze killing all the criminals that were responsible for Dan’s death just made it all the more painful.
And then, just to twist the knife in my heart a little bit further, Amenadiel reveals to Lucifer that Dan is not in Heaven, which can only mean one thing: he’s going to be tortured in hell for all eternity.
We end the episode with Lucifer talking to Linda about how unfair it all seems. How he and Maze killed everyone involved in Dan’s death, but it still didn’t make him feel any better. When Linda points out that Lucifer is grieving, we see just how far this amazing character has come. How beautiful his journey has been.
Now that he’s suffering and feeling this insurmountable pain of losing a friend, knowing that his friend is stuck in hell, Lucifer is even more determined to become Job. Because, according to him, pain shouldn’t exist. Dan shouldn’t be dead. It’s not fair. So now it’s not a matter of wanting to be God. He has to be God. And if Michael wants a war, he will give him one.
Lucifer vs Michael in a stadium full of angels
Lucifer season 5B finale “A Chance at a Happy Ending” finally gave us the Lucifer/Michael showdown we’ve all been waiting for. But before that, Lucifer found out that Michael was behind the whole thing and was ultimately responsible for Dan’s death. Not only that, he’s trying to assemble the flaming sword and the missing piece was Amenadiel’s necklace.
It turns out that the Caleb Dan mentioned before dying was that kid Amenadiel helped a while back, who ended up getting shot. The angel had given Caleb his necklace, and TJ stole it in the morgue. That’s where he got the super strength from, and that’s why Michael enlisted a bunch of criminals to find it for him.
Speaking of Michael, he decides to pay Lucifer a visit where he tells his twin that he thought his brother would be happy Dan was gone. Then he proposes a compromise: he’ll take Heaven, Lucifer will take Hell and they can all go on living their lives. After all, Chloe is consumed with guilt over Dan’s death, so she’ll surely end up in hell with Lucifer where they can live happily ever after.
Lucifer obviously says no, and Michael says it’s no biggie. They’ll hold an election here on Earth the next day and see who wins. After all, Lucifer was banished from Heaven, and can’t go back there without being incinerated.
Have I mentioned how much I hate Michael? Because I do. Very much.
When Lucifer tells Chloe all about Michael’s scheme, she feels even more guilty — especially when he tells her that she must not. That’s not how emotions work and she tells him as much. Then he drops the bomb on her that Dan isn’t in Heaven and that’s why he needs to be God, but before he can elaborate, Remiel — who was the only angel other than Amenadiel supporting Lucifer — shows up at the penthouse and drops dead.
After many twists and turns, Lucifer and Chloe end up finding Michael’s lair where he had been keeping TJ after kidnapping him. Michael ends up killing the poor guy and finally taking the final piece he needed to assemble the flaming sword.
All seems lost. Remiel is dead, Michael has the upper hand and Lucifer didn’t manage to convince one swing vote out of his angel siblings. But still, they have no choice but to try and fight this head-on, even if they’re ridiculously outnumbered. Chloe insists she’s going to fight whether Lucifer likes it or not, especially after Maze comes up with an excellent solution to find her a weapon that could kill an angel.
So when the time comes, Lucifer, Chloe and Amenadiel arrive at a stadium, where Michael decided to hold the vote. They need to stall while Maze gathers an army of demons to help them. Their stalling tactics are all hilarious, and surprisingly, Zadkiel changes sides and decides to support Lucifer. But they’re still outnumbered.
Lucifer proposes that this is something that they should deal with themselves and leave everyone else out of it. And then the fight of the millennium starts. Michael has the upper hand in the beginning due to the flaming sword, but Zadkiel offers Lucifer his weapon, which evens the fight.
When Lucifer has Michael right he wanted — and Chloe does her part and takes Amenadiel’s necklace from the sword — everything seems to be going their way. Lucifer manages to kick the sword out of his brother’s hands, but when he goes after it, Michael does the unthinkable: he comes up behind Chloe and runs her through with Zadkiel’s staff.
What followed next was possibly one of the most painful and intense scenes this show has ever given us. Lucifer is beside himself with grief and pain and anger. Chloe dies (!!!!) in his arms — and let me tell you, Tom Ellis gave the performance of his life in this scene — and Lucifer is completely lost and desperate. Before she takes her final breath, Chloe tells him that she doesn’t feel guilty anymore, which means she ends up in Heaven.
Michael, being the slimy bastard he is, is quick to point out that Lucifer will never be able to see her again because is banished from Heaven and won’t be able to go there without suffering a painful death.
Lucifer does not care. All he cares about is bringing Chloe back because she wasn’t supposed to die. It was not her time.
So he flies up to Heaven and arrives like a meteor falling from the sky. We see Chloe happily chatting with her beloved father, and she seems to be at peace. But the real surprise was that the person who welcomed Lucifer to Heaven was Sir Mix-a-lot, the guy Lucifer spent time within the premiere of season 5A, remember? What is he doing there, you ask? He is quick to explain that he faced his guilt and then boom. Heaven.
So that means there’s still hope for Dan.
But the important thing here is that Lucifer didn’t get incinerated because Lilith’s immortality ring protected him. So he finds Chloe and reminds her that she needs to go back. But Lilith’s ring only has so much juice and its protection on Lucifer is starting to wear off, which means it can only take one of them back to Earth.
That’s when Lucifer made the ultimate sacrifice. He told Chloe he loved her and gave her the ring — the symbolism, you guys! — and then got incinerated just as Chloe woke up back in her body on Earth while the battle between Lucifer’s team and Michael’s kept raging on.
And then, my friends, it was Lauren German’s turn to deliver her best performance to date, because Chloe is beyond furious and heartbroken.
Michael is all about killing her again, but she was still holding Amenadiel’s necklace when she died, which gives super strength. The way she screams in his face that he took the man she loved from her… Jesus Christ Almighty, it gave me chills.
She’s about to end Michael’s miserable life when a familiar voice stops her. Lucifer.
He is alive and well, and cuts off Michael’s wings with the flaming sword. No more killing, he says. Everyone deserves a second chance, even Michael. And then the battle stops and everyone kneels before him, Michael included.
Because a new God has been elected. And it’s Lucifer.