Lucky Season 1 Episode 5 Review: Are We Bad People?

Lucky Season 1 Episode 5, “Are We Bad People?” asks an important question as indicated by the title. Is Lucky a bad person?

At the start of the episode, as she’s considering robbing a dying old woman and then lying to get a ride in her ambulance, you may be shouting, “Yes!” But, because she is the protagonist and we are meant to root for her, the show also makes a compelling argument that good and evil are flawed concepts.

In a flashback, that’s what John argues anyway when young Lucky starts to question their way of life. (Side note: I’m quite captivated with how they de-age Timothy Olyphant for these scenes, it’s not something you see a lot on television. Is it special effects or practical?)

She revisits the idea after grappling with the fact that she just lost her husband, and her first instinct is still to con the man she’s talking to at the bar. She doesn’t because she doesn’t want to be that person anymore, and there’s the catch.

Lucky may seem heartless and cold at the start of the episode, but she’s just in survival mode. You can’t judge an animal as good or bad for doing what it needs to do to survive. 

Given the chance to actually sit with her feelings, she’s devastated over Cary’s death. Her realization she can’t keep running leads to a good two-hander between Anya Taylor-Joy and Annette Bening, as Priscilla also deals with Cary’s death.

Here are the two women most important to Cary, and yet they can’t come together even in his death because Priscilla always puts business first. The later revelation that Wayne is actually his father just underscores how kind of terrible Priscilla is, willing to work for a man who would be willing to kill his own son.

Lucky’s biggest flaw isn’t that she’s a con artist, it’s that she’s too loyal to her father, who happens to be a con artist. Sure maybe it’s splitting hairs, but she doesn’t exist in the black and white. 

While the characterization on this episode is improved, the storytelling still relies on too many deus ex machinas. She’s just an average girl trying to escape a life of crime while also somehow being Ethan Hunt from Mission: Impossible.

Of course, Lucky just happens to talk to Rand’s daughter in the hospital bathroom. Of course, Lucky just happens to discover the codes to the crypto accounts are recorded inside the teddy bear she beats up out of anger.

Lucky is very clever, but she also has a lot of luck helping her survive. Which is cute because of her name but makes for some lazy storytelling.

Her decision to turn herself into the FBI hopefully means we’re done watching her miraculously escape deadly situations, but there’s no doubt she has one more trick up her sleeve if she’s willing to work with Rand. It’s important to remember Rand already betrayed her once, and she’s unlikely to trust her again.

At least Lucky and John are in the same place now, so there will be fewer phone call scenes. I hope.

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Lucky airs Wednesdays on Apple TV+.

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