LUCIFER 3x03 "Mr. and Mrs. Mazikeen Smith"

"Mr. and Mrs. Mazikeen Smith" is the first of four standalone episodes peeled from the season 2 roster and implanted into season 3, but it's a very difficult episode to unpack because a lot of the time I spent watching it I spent asking myself just where in the chronology it was intended to fit. It lacks a little continuity to have seamlessly slid into season 3 where it did but, billed as a standalone, it has a thrilling cliffhanger that might have prepared us for the season 2 cliffhanger if it had aired in that season. Or it could be that the cliffhanger is intended to link to the Sinnerman arc which has begun this season.

Maze is underdressed for cold Canada
Image: FOX

   It's very difficult to judge what this Maze-centric episode achieves, beyond altering the primary character focus, which so far has always been Lucifer. That's as much to this episode's credit as not; despite its release from the shackles of the typical Lucifer episode format, it doesn't feel very Lucifer. And that is a direct symptom of the character shift. I can best describe it by comparing to Castle episodes wherein even when Ryan or Esposito had a centric episode, the show never lost sight of the fact that Castle was the titular character and needed to be everything he always usually was. And Castle, much like Lucifer, is a character who often aimlessly sails through cases on his own time, with his own theories - even when another character takes the limelight. Lucifer did not do that very much in this episode, and perhaps that's why it feel so distant from what we're used to. Perhaps this is also because we had nothing of Amenadiel or Ella, either.

   And yet, as I say, this is also to the episode's credit. Maze, missing from the first two episodes due to actress Lesley-Ann Brandt's pregnancy, has been long overdue this type of limelight. It's a brilliantly executed window into the character of a soulless demon still coming to terms with herself even after finding a profession she thoroughly enjoys and assimilating to co-habitation with Chloe and Trixie.

   The simplistic plot helped with that, for we were able to focus on Maze rather than invest in a convoluted murder plot. Ben Rivers was ultimately proved innocent of murdering two children, and a corrupt police lieutenant named Herrera was found guilty. It was that simple; everything between the hunt beginning and Herrera being arrested was fun but unassuming.

Maze takes down the bad guys
Image: FOX

   Cue the cliffhanger: the man for whom Herrera worked, from whom Rivers and now Maze may be in danger, knows not only of Maze but of Lucifer, Amenadiel, "Charlotte". There's a divine link between these characters - but this is where the lack of synchronisation befuddles: is this a random, standalone episode after all, or does this link to the Sinnerman or some unrelated storyline? Will we see more this season or not?

   For all the good work this episode did given the staples it lacked, I'm left with an overwhelming feeling of confusion more than anything else.

RATING: 7.5/10 

POINTS OF NOTE

• "Have you ever been to Canada?"
  "No."
  False. You spent two seasons filming there, Maze.
• Twice the show copped out of saying "bitch" early on only to revisit the insult later. And I almost thought FOX had implemented a swear jar by which some sort of budgetary sacrifice is made every time an expletive makes it to air.
• Trixie and Maze's secret handshake was the best.
• Dan's Hawaiian shirts. 'Nuff said.

LUCIFER 3x04 "What Would Lucifer Do?" PROMO