Lightbringers: Illuminating the Deeper Meaning of the Crime-solving Devil TV Show Tracie Guy-Decker & Emily Guy Birken

Send us a Text Message.In the final episode of Lightbringers, the Guy girls still manage some significant overthinking. The storytelling leads them to some questions about how people who don’t feel remorse might be tortured in the Lucifer universe (in other words, what was the magic behind Lucifer’s whispered words to Lemec?). Additionally, the confines of telling a story with actors on a small screen lead to musings about the role our age plays in our identity (and a detour into Star Trek th...

Send us a Text Message.In this penultimate episode of Lightbringers, the Guy sisters continue to notice the moments and threads of season 6 that seem to point to a rushed (and self-amusing) writers’ room. From the unprofessional move of Linda’s book (why didn’t they just make it fiction?) to the disappointingly milquetoast Carroll, there are story and character beats that felt forced. At the same time, we deeply appreciate Chloe-as-audience-proxy in the conversation about how some people don’...

Send us a Text Message.With these two episodes we get some subtext about addiction and some supertext about racist policing. In “The Murder of Lucifer Morningstar,” the sisters realize on rewatch (especially in the context of our analysis of so many moments of mental health metaphors) that Chloe’s obsession with the super-strength the necklace provides is a stand-in for addiction. “A Lot Dirtier Than That” provides a big chunk of the story arc that serves as penance for the five seasons ...

Send us a Text Message.As season 6 progresses, the Guy sisters have some moments of joy and appreciation and quite a few quibbles for the writers. Though the cartoonified episode is in some ways delightful (Tracie wanted to be an animator when she was a kid), there are moments in the writing that feel either ableist or rushed (or both). The sisters note that it feels particularly hypocritical that the episode seems to judge Jimmy Barnes for being less-than rational/typical when the whole show...

Send us a Text Message.And so begins the Guy sisters’ rewatch of Season 6: Nobody’s favorite season.With these two episodes, the sisters spend considerable time lamenting the fact that there are no media role models for people who are childless by choice, including, it seems, Lucifer. We also are perplexed and perturbed by multiple details of these two episodes, from Lucifer’s assertion that he is a “wonder-seeker” to what the heck is sexy about all the broken furniture to how Ella Lopez coul...

Send us a Text Message.These two final episodes of season five pack and emotional wallup. With more than one major character death (though 2 don’t stay dead), the Guy girls both admit to shedding some tears, even in rewatch. The views we get of both Heaven and Hell have Emily and Tracie thinking deeply about the nature of punishment, the compatibility of justice with pain, and whether or not free will is worth the huge risk we face to have it. We help each other with head canon arou...