[spoilers] Lucas. Just Lucas.

[Logsie]

I'm afraid, hardened cynic that I am, that I believe the reason John and Lucas had noticeably seperate wardrobes was rather more simplistic. I think the producers wanted a simple visual delineation between the two characters, making it easier for the audience to tell when he was being Lucas as opposed to being John, because they underestimated their audience's intelligence (always a mistake!) or worse still for me, they didn't have enough faith in Richard's ability to tell us who he was by his acting skill alone (shame on them). I had no difficulty telling them apart. The way RA behaved, moved, spoke - all were noticeably dfferent for J/L so anyone with half a brain could tell them apart. I think this was his greatest triumph in this series.

Someone pointed out in an earlier post about the increasingly impersonal quality of Lucas's living accommodation as the 3 series progressed. I admit I had thought along those lines myself at the time but had completely forgotten about it until someone else pointed it out. Now that I think about it I become convinced that they had planned Lucas's disintegration for some time, they just hadn't decided how to write it. They probably threw it out to the writers to see what they came up with. Sadly, they should have sent them back to the drawing board because what they came up with just didn't work.

There were elements of the story which could have gelled with what we knew about Lucas from S7 and 8. I could totally buy the idea that he had done something shocking and stupid in his youth and had covered it up. His subsequent loyalty to MI5 wouldn't be inconsistent with someone who had seen the error of his ways. The zeal of the convert etc. What I can't accept is that he would jeopardise it all for Maya. He has never shown any signs of a tendency to betray his principles for personal reasons. I know he said to Sarah "take me with you" but surely that was just to buy himself time so she didn't shoot him. Once he realised the full horror of her belief system he was disgusted by her.

The whole John arc would have worked better if it had been applied to a newly introduced character with no established back story. Lucas had too much character development which was then contradicted by John. What the writers were allowed to do to Lucas was just plain dishonest.