Tom Ellis thinks Lucifer is “a journey about redemption”

Lucifer has been on a long road. The show debuted on Fox and was cancelled after its third season at the height of its popularity, and then Netflix saved it following a massive worldwide push. Now heading into its sixth and final season, star Tom Ellis reflects on the journey in a new interview with awards site GoldDerby.

News that the show had been cancelled in 2016 hit Ellis hard. “I was gutted,” he said. “It was mind-blowing, and I felt awful about the whole thing until it was announced that the show was cancelled. That was the moment I started to feel better because my phone just blew up. It went absolutely crazy and it kept going for days.”

Tom Ellis: Working with Netflix on Lucifer has been “amazing”

As soon as Fox made the announcement, fans stepped in and started campaigning, using social media to make the show trend for days on end. This caught Netflix’s attention, and they stepped in. “It is amazing, because we feel so vindicated now.”

Ellis says that working with Netflix has been a very positive experience. “They’ve been amazing for us.” And it’s true. The streamer originally planned to save the show for one season, allowing showrunners to finish things up after the big cliffhanger at the end of season 3. However, the popularity of the series led to a fifth season, and now a sixth and final one.

“We haven’t really changed the show an awful lot, but there is a kind of freedom to the show, I think, that’s come with being on Netflix,” Ellis said. “Now everyone’s on the same season and it drops at the same time and it’s like this sort of global juggernaut and it’s quite an overwhelming experience when the show drops, to be honest!”

Lucifer’s story is ultimately about “redemption”

As for actually playing Lucifer, Ellis sounds like he enjoys it as much as we think he does. “It’s always more fun to play a baddie,” he said with a grin. “It is cathartic in a way, as an actor, to be able to play a character that says everything that you probably would want to say in real life, but can’t get away with saying.”

"I knew that if we had any longevity to this series, then he’s someone who was going to evolve as a person very much on a journey. I always thought the show was a journey about redemption, like the ultimate redemption story of the most irredeemable of characters perceived by humans over history."

The second half of Lucifer season 5 was released in May, and it’s been a hit with fans. Filming on season 6 has concluded and fans are eagerly awaiting news of a release date.

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