Spoilers Luke Cage - Netflix (Season 1)

I'd suggest not watching such shows if you clearly don't like the genre.

 

Agree with all about the performance by the actor who played "Shades". That is who we're talking about, right? Anyway, he was great. Also, I'v gone on record in this thread about my dislike of the performance of "Diamondback" so we're in agreement there as well.

Why do you think having Luke and D'back as brothers was lame?

 

It's cliche and amateur-ish. It's the hack way to give the hero and villain some sort of deep, monumental connection. It happens on every B-rate soap opera every day of the week. Hell, even Austin Powers eventually turned out to be Dr. Evil's long lost brother because how how easy it is to make fun of it.
The Shades character was fine in and of himself. I liked Domingo even more. He was funny and had a charisma even though he was a bad guy. There were some great individual performances. It didn't salvage the whole of the story.

 

Part-way through episode 9, and I think I'm done.

*reads spoilers*

... yep, I'm done. I liked Pops, and Cottonmouth was a mesmerizing villain, and the early eps actually had bystanders walking around, before all of New York's streets became weirdly empty following Cottonmouth's death. Meanwhile, Misty and Mariah are playing their same two notes over and over and over and over, and I could not give less of a shit about this new guy being Luke's old high school buddy from small-town Georgia and the secret "author of all his pain" all along if I tried.

These Marvel/Netflix writers really need to take some introductory classes on blocking out a season-long story. With the exception of Jessica Jones, which was, like the others, 3-4 eps longer than it needed to be, but still managed to maintain interest and build to a wholly satisfying conclusion, these seasons have stalled out hard. DD S1 ended with a random and uninteresting fistfight in a dark alley with a completely unconvincing villain who was far too socially awkward to be a plausible crime boss. DD S2 became a total freaking fiasco during the Punisher trial, and its finale rooftop battle and least-shocking-death ever was laughably lame. Don't think I'll be giving that show a third chance, unless they really turn things around.

And now we have Luke Cage, which starts very strong, but apparently goes abso-blooming-nowhere. It's one thing to start a network season not sure how it'll end due to the demands of making 20+ episodes year after year; it's another thing entirely to fall completely apart when you're filming a whole season at once, and can release it pretty much anytime. (I know Netflix can do better, because I've seen both seasons of the excellent Bloodline.) And after the storytelling vacuum that is DD's treatment of The Hand, I'm supposed to be excited about The Defenders? Well, I'm not.

I acknowledge that in its emphasis on spy caper-style action and network restrictions, Agents of SHIELD doesn't ever dig nearly as deeply into raw feelings of grief, abuse, and fear of losing loved ones that these Netflix shows do, but ever since The Winter Soldier, it's been an unstoppable storytelling freight train, barreling through one compelling villain and gripping story arc after another, with no letup or weak spots at all. With these Netflix shows, however, JJ is the only season out of four I can actually thumbs up and/or recommend as a whole.

Do better, writers. A lot better.

 

I'm hoping to get back to this either this weekend or next week. I got sidetracked by the network shows after I watched the first few episodes, but now that most of them are on break I plan on working on finishing this up.

 

Finally finished watching it. Liked it, but like others, I'll agree that it wasn't Marvel's best effort. The whole Diamondback plot really didn't work out, though I did appreciate the unfortunate believeability of everyone watching a streetfight in the end. Though as we saw at the very end, the whole Diamondback story may have just been a setup for an actual super-powered Diamondback story.

I'll jump in on the love-fest for Shades. He managed to be both cool and smart, and was damn scary while doing so. Hopefully he gets a good significant role in season 2, and isn't quickly written out in favor of Diamondback or Black Mariah. I think one of my favorite scenes in the show was Zip wearing the sunglasses.

The music was awesome. A lot of the characters had some great development. Not a bad effort, just not Marvel's best. Looking forward to seeing what happens in Defenders and Luke Cage season 2.

 

Having him keep the headpiece on long after he escaped just so they could do an homage felt forced.

 

Finally finished the season this morning, and overall I enjoyed it. I don't know if I liked it quite as much as Daredevil or Jessica Jones, but it was still really good overall.
The cast really did a great job all around, with Mike Colter, SImone Missik, Mahershala Ali, and Alfre Woodard giving especially strong performances.
Of the two male main villains, I do agree that Cottonmouth was better. I didn't really dislike Diamondback, but he definitely wasn't as interesting as Cottonmouth.
Shades was awesome, and I kind of hope they don't bother bringing back Diamondback and just focus all of next season on Mariah and him.
I wasn't as bothered by Diamondback being Luke's brother as a lot of people seem to be, even if it was a bit cliched. I liked that it gave us a chance to explore Luke's history more.
I was surprised how big a role Clare ended up playing, I was expecting just a couple of quick appearances in a couple episodes. I liked the relationship that they set up with her and Luke. It'll be very interesting to see what happens when we get her together with both Matt and Luke in The Defenders. I do have admit though, her constant references to knowing a good lawyer got annoying after a while. Yes, we know she knows Daredevil, they didn't have to keep beating us over the head with it. I did get a kick out of the Hammertech stuff though, that was a nice connection to the movies.
The ending really caught me by surprise, I was expecting a something much cleaner with Diamondback and Mariah permanently out of the picture, and Luke turning Pop's Barber Shop into the Heroes for Hire office for him and Misty. It will be interesting to see how they get Luke back to NYC for The Defenders. I have admit, that last shot of Luke being taken away by the US Marshal's does lose a bit of his tension when you know he's going to be back in NYC when Defenders starts.

 

I can only speak for myself but for me it wasn't so much that he had a brother but how totally out of left field it came.
On the one hand, Diamondback was mentioned throughout the first half of the season, though only in his dealings with Shades & Cottenmouth. Absolutely no connection to Luke was even hinted at beyond Luke unknowingly and indirectly screwing with his business.

On the other hand, through all of that backstory in the prison no mention is made of a brother or even a close friend. They do however make pains to make sure there's a prior relationship with Shades....which goes exactly nowhere other than his knowing his real name.

So when Diamondback shows up and is all "I'm your brother" it just feels like a total arse-pull. Even more so given the little road trip down south in which Luke stares at an empty room for 10 seconds, has a flashback and despite previously claiming to have no clue, suddenly fully accepts and understands who Diamond back is. This is poor story construction.

 

Ah, I didn't realize there were no references to Willis/Diamondback before he popped up. I watched the series with a couple gaps of several months, so I just figured there were references to him earlier in the season and I just forgot.
And thinking about it more, there really was no need to make him Luke's brother, other than the whole "daddy liked you more" angle. They probably could have just had them as close friends who had a falling out, and still done a lot of the same things.

 

I liked this show, but as soon as Lily from Star Trek kills off the antagonist and that guy from his past pops up with the magic bullets, it kind of goes a bit bad. I also burst out laughing when he turned up in that suit that looked like a bad cosplay of a Borg and the show lost me there.

 

Finished it this weekend. I think the actual comicbook superhero elements were the weakest parts, but overall I think this is the best of the series for characters and good, human storylines. And damn good music! I can't say enough about Mike Colter's powerful presence and likeability.

I've always pictured a Theresa Graves type as Misty Knight - Gotham's Jessica Lucas would have fit perfectly - but Simone Messick was outstanding in the role. Her self-confident air won me over instantly.

Cottonmouth was an amazing, complex antagonist, well-played, and Alfre Woodard is, well, Alfre Woodard!! But yeah, the whole Diamondback thing was kind of disappointing. Nevertheless, I think Luke may be my favorite of the three Rosario Dawson shows .

 

You didn't by chance just finish watching First Contact, did you?

 

I wish the costume he turned up in looked like a FC Borg and not a S2 TNG Borg!

 

Like Jessica Jones before him, Luke Cage has been nominated for a Peabody!

 

Nice! However, even though I haven't watched it yet, I expect Atlanta will win the award.

 

A little pre-mature for a season two thread, so I'll just drop this here...

Lucy Liu to direct the season premiere episode.

 

First picture of Misty with her bionic arm in season 2

http://ew.com/tv/2017/08/29/misty-k...l&xid=entertainment-weekly_socialflow_twitter

 

Damn, that was sooner than I expected. Looks good.