The Defenders--Marvel/Netflix

Do they eventually address the big hole from Daredevil Season 2? I had been assuming that would be a major part of the Defenders story, but up to episode 4 we haven't seen or heard anything about it.

 

You've actually heard all about it - and if you're up to Episode 4, you've even been to the same location.

 

Yeah.

Spoiler

The Hand HQ at Midland Circle is built directly over it. And the hole, why it was dug, and what is at the bottom of it drive the entire final act of the show.

Finally finished up this afternoon. On the whole, I thought this was really well done. The dynamics between the characters were all really well handled. I was impressed by how much the respective side characters got to do, especially Colleen and Misty, obviously.

After all the, perhaps inevitable, comparisons to the Avengers, I was really pleased that this maintained the same level of character work that we've come to expect from the Netflix shows, and wasn't just a series of huge fight scenes. It wasn't perfectly executed, certainly, and the villains end up being mostly limp, yet again, but it was quite good.

The Iron Fist stuff here really did a better service to Danny than his own series, both in terms of action and in terms of actual character growth. But it also felt like a logical outgrowth of what we saw in Iron Fist.

Also, kudos to the writers of the first few episodes, I was super impressed by how much each character's path to their inevitable teamup at Midland Circle felt like something out of their individual shows. They really managed to make it feel like we were cutting in between scenes of Daredevil, or JJ, or Luke Cage. And I loved the early cinematography, with each character's respective color palette permeating each scene. You could pick out each character's story just from the color and lighting, even down to Alexandra's white tones. Really solid work![/SPOILER]

 

Yes, they get to the bottom of it. (Already answered, but I couldn't resist.)


I totally missed the color-palette thing everyone else seems to have noticed.

 

Agreed with all of this. Solid writing allowing for each character's story to still stand on its own merits.

 

I'm two episodes in, and its pretty good. That said, if I have to hear one more hero hating side character on this show I'll scream. Foggy makes Alfred from TDK trilogy look like a supportive person by comparison. Is it too much to want a hero who accepts the role without everyone in their life constantly complaining about them being a hero? Right now Luke is the only one that fits this, since Claire isn't trying to stop him from doing the right thing.

Basically, can't Matt just wear a damn costume and fight crime without people trying to get him to quit or him going back and fourth with whether he should be a hero or not? Can't I just enjoy Daredevil being Daredevil without this nolanesque "You shouldn't be a hero" BS? Sure, Daredevil's solo show had some of this (which is why I've never liked Foggy), but at least in his show he ignored Foggy's idiotic comments and stayed Daredevil. Now he's randomly quit sometime between season 2 and now and it feels really unnatural. Its like the show just desperately wanted to keep him out of the costume so its having him act all conflicted when he was fairly solidly going to stay a hero before.

This is just a bit of venting. Outside of that stuff, Danny being bland and Jessica being extremely obnoxious (neither of which were unexpected) I'm enjoying the show so far.

 

"Trust me, I'd face a dragon over Jessica Jones any day."

I watched the whole season today and I thoroughly loved it, especially how well it managed to weave all four shows into one coherent storyline. I saw critics and early viewers complaining about the slow pace of the first half of the season, but after the second episode, I was left wondering what show those people were watching. The first two and a half episodes was all about character development and these characters, primary and secondary, deserve the respect to properly progress organically. Instead of rushing to the inevitable team up, I much preferred seeing the natural continuation of these characters' lives and seeing what lead them to meet up for the first time. I particularly liked how it wasn't all four of them converging at once, but instead having Matt rescuing Jessica from the police and Luke and Danny coming to fisticuffs as their first meetings before the team up.

In fact, my favorite part of this show was the character development for the big four plus Elektra and Stick, although most of the supporting characters aside from Claire and Collen (and to a lesser extent, Misty) were largely short-changed. Still it was great to see Foggy, Karen, Trish, Malcolm, and Jeri, even in a limited capacity, as well as demonstrating the importance of loved ones in our hero's lives.

While I liked how the show subverted the expectation that Claire would be the one to bring all four together as a team (although she did bring Luke and Danny together), I was disappointed we never got a proper scene with all four of them with Claire and them realizing how she kept popping up in the lives of powered individuals despite her attempts to the contrary. While we did get a touching denouement between Claire and Foggy, I wished she had at least a couple of scenes with Matt one-to-one at some point during the season.

The Macguffin of the series was fairly straight forward, but it was nice to see the Big Hole finally explained (even if it was to be expected that it was set-up for this series). I didn't mind the simpleness of the Macguffin so much because I loved the aforementioned character development and interactions between our heroes, particularly between Matt and Jessica, so much.

Sigouney Weaver's Alexandria was a fascinating character brought to life only in the way she could. I loved her commanding confrontational relationship with the rest of the Hand leadership, her silky baiting of our heroes, and the maternal care for Elektra. Because of that maternal bound, her death was a bit of a shock (although not entirely considering Elektra was already visibly turning). However, that shock felt a little hollow considering it was odd that the Hand (or at least she) didn't know that the Devil of Hell's Kitchen was Matt Murdock. Still, despite that conceit, it was beautifully chilling to hear Elektra say "His name is Matthew."

Less surprising was Stick's death. Even though I didn't give it much thought at the time, but as soon as he lost his hand, it should've been a given that he wouldn't survive the season. However, that idea didn't click with me until Elekra stabbed him in the leg during his final fight. It's sad that, aside from flashbacks, we won't see anymore of Scott Glenn's Stick. He was one of the best things about Daredevil.

Unsurprisingly, the weakest leak of the show was Danny Rand, although he wasn't as bad as I feared he would be after the rough Iron Fist. In fact, seeing his blatant flaws being regularly called out by the core cast, especially Luke and Jessica, made it a lot easier to accept Danny's fecklessness, occasional outright stupidity, and even his white privilege. Hell, I even yelled out "Danny, you idiot" when Elektra goaded him to punch at her so close to the wall before easily maneuvering his fist directly into it, but I also laughed after yelling that comment.

For all of the callbacks for each of the four series and past events, it was odd that the Kingpin and Frank Castle were never name checked. Not a big deal, but their omissions stood out, at least to me.

During that final church scene, I had hoped Father Lantom would show up to give comfort and words of wisdom to Foggy and Karen, perhaps even letting on that he was in on the secret. Still, it was great to have Peter McRobbie in the first episode, so I can't complain.

If I had to rank the seasons:

Jessica Jones
Daredevil, season 1
Luke Cage
The Defenders
Daredevil, season 2







Iron Fist

 

I'm not reading through this thread. But I've actually watched three episodes in one day. I love the use of the classic trope where there are separate investigators who are all coming at the same problem from different angles. I also thought that the meeting of Danny and Luke was very well done. I normally hate that heroes fight before they become friends but this felt organic and true. I enjoyed their first conversation in the Dojo and Danny really listening to what Luke had to say. It is a great beginning to a future friendship.

Also, it was very nicely done how the team comes together. These Netflix adaptations really use the long game of the format to their advantage.

 

Ah, of course! I was trying to think if "Maggie" was suppose to be someone we should know. Thanks for that.

I also hope we get a proper explanation for his escape instead of a hand wave a la The Master (Doctor Who). I expect Elektra and Madame Gao got out as well.

 

Spoiler: overall impressions and questions

- "The Hand" really didn't seem to have a purpose. They want to live forever and to have power and influence. But why? To what ends?

- Bakuto being from South America doesn't really make sense if they are as old as Alexandra claims.

- If they were so low on their dragonbone substance you'd think they wouldn't be handing it out willy nilly the last few years. Maybe put Bakuto and Nobu and some of your ninjas on ice for a few years until you have ample supply again?

- Jessica is still apparently pulling her punches 99% of the time even when she really shouldn't be. The inconsistency of all of their strength is really frustrating because it makes it most fights just drag on without any real tension. Sometimes Jessica can knock a goon across the room with a punch, sometimes she can barely hold her own against one, likewise with Luke and Danny.

- Danny is still insufferable and always does the dumbest possible thing.

- Is there any real reason they couldn't bring the cops in on this one? Having seen the other shows I know The Hand has infiltrated the police, but none of the characters ever bring that up as their reason.

- Did they kill everyone in K'un L'un or did it just vanish to escape them? I assumed the latter but dialogue here suggest the former.

- What happened to the Elevator they dropped?

- The Chaste are a pretty shitty counterbalance to The Hand if they were all taken out that easily.

- more to come as I ponder.

 

I didn't notice the color transitions in my first watch through, but watching the first episode again I definitely noticed it. In fact, it's rather obvious now that I've noticed it.

 

That did seem a bit strange to me as well.

Yeah, that really bothered me as well as the fact that the substance was supposedly completely used up for Elektra and yet they revived Bakuto and Harold after that fact with no problem.

They were effective for "a long time" because before they were just fighting off ninjas from the Hand. The Black Sky is who wiped the Chaste out.

 

I was surprised with how quickly everyone binged through 13 episodes until I realized there were only 8, oops.

What surprised me is how much I enjoyed seeing everyone team up. Somehow it felt more of an event than usual to see them all get together, maybe because their storylines felt so organic, it really felt like each character's normal plots crossed paths with each other. In a lot of team-ups it feels like character A wandered into character's B story. Jessica's snarky piss takes on the out there elements of the others was icing on the cake.

I would've liked to have seen more from Sigourney Weaver.

Spoiler

It wasn't Cottonmouth bad but I was still disappointed with that twist.

Though it was fun to see more of Gao in action, she's a fun villain, she seems to really relish being a baddie. You know how they often say the villain sees themselves as the hero of their own story, she seems to know when she's being a bit naughty and likes it.

You'd think The Chaste and The Hand would get along better.

 

Aren't there multiple "Black Skys" though? One presumes they've gotten their hands on one before if they've built up this whole thing around it. Electra's incarnation just happens to be the one that wipes out a millennia-old organization in a few months? She doesn't seem all that much more capable than she was before being resurrected.

 

Finished it tonight. That was not as bad as Iron Fist, but pretty meh. It's nothing special, and not up to the high quality of the earlier shows.

A lot of repetition. The same arguments over and over again for no reason than to instill artificial drama and pad the run time. I think they could have done this whole story in 5 episodes and it would have been much better.

Danny Rand still sucks (best part of this show is also the best part of Iron Fist - people calling Danny an idiot), powers are inconsistent (nerfed or beefed up often in the same scene), and the grand plan of the Hand is disappointing. Plot holes abound and characters appear and disappear randomly for no other reason than they were in the previous shows.

The best fight scene was the conference room/hallway fight in the middle of the series and it fails to live up to the previous hallway fights. The rest are there, not bad per say, but not special either - and they could so easily have been if more choreography was focused on the individual team members skills.

Spoiler

What I liked about the show was more in individual moments instead of overall qualities. Stick being unable to kill Elektra, and that leading to his death, was fantastic, showing that even he had a heart and real feelings for his pupils - although why Matt didn't know he'd try to kill Danny seems out of character since he's experienced Sticks preference to simply kill/destroy people/things the Hand wants instead of saving them. I'm sure everyone here was expecting that attempted murder.

The few moments of humour were excellent, even if there weren't enough of them. Jessica and Luke were responsible for most of it.

The acting was excellent as in the the other shows, and I didn't dislike Finn Jones as much as before, even though I still hated Danny Rand.

In the end, what was supposed to be the Netflix version of The Avengers was really more of an Age of Ultron.

 

If Stick is to be believed, back from DD Season 1, they've never successfully "activated" one before. Sounds like the Chaste have managed to prevent it prior to the Hand getting their dirty mitts on Elektra. Recall that we see Stick on one such mission, killing off the last candidate before the Hand could use him.

I also wonder if "activating" a Black Sky is more expensive than a resurrection, in terms of material. That would explain why everybody seemed so out of sorts over Alexandra using up "the last of their resources" on Elektra. If, instead of just using part of the normal supply, it took some kind of relatively massive investment of the substance.

 

To live forever and to have power and influence. That would be more than enough for most people. If you think about it, most of the large-scale injustices and atrocities in world history have been done just so a tiny number of rich and powerful people could live cushy lives -- whether it's a royal dynasty conquering an empire and funneling its wealth and resources to the throne, or a few dozen greedy billionaires trying to scuttle American health care and condemn millions to death just so they could get a tax cut. So there's nothing unusual there.

It's not like they couldn't move around. They all lived in K'un Lun until Alexandra convinced them to leave, remember. So wherever they're based now is where they ended up, not where they were born.

We saw that the Hand has influence with the authorities when they killed Trish's story about the earthquake. It stands to reason that they could've shut down a police investigation that got too close. Also, the cops would've just been in over their heads and would've gotten themselves killed, as Misty nearly was.

The same thing that happens to most things that are dropped, I imagine. Why do you ask?

As we saw with Harold, once you get resurrected once, then you heal automatically from subsequent deaths. So the Substance is only needed for the initial revival. Harold's first resurrection was years ago, long before Elektra's, and Bakuto's was centuries ago.

Of course, this raises the question of why they need more of the Substance, but Alexandra's condition (and some of her dialogue) would indicate that it eventually stops working, so they needed a recharge.

 

Currently on Episode 3. There is soooo much filler at the beginning of this episode with

Spoiler: The defenders episode 3

Weaver and zombie Elektra. Its totally unnecessary. I get it, Elktra is back from the dead and brainwashed in some way. I don't need boring exposition about it, and I don't need to be reminded that Elektra can kill generic thugs. This was about 13 minutes that could have been done in about 90s seconds. Just show Elektra's body going into the resurrection thing, see it getting taken out of it, have Weaver say a line then go back to the present. This didn't need 13 minutes that are mostly Weaver's character giving a boring monologue to a mute, obviously mentally compromised Elektra.

Then, after the credits THEY GO BACK TO WEAVER. At this point I'm just hoping a Xenomorph pops up and eats her. It would be the first interesting thing to happen connected to Weaver's character. I swear, the only thing that saves the first 20 minutes of this episode is Stick. I mean, his complete nonreaction to zombie Elektra was weird, and I hate that he actually seems to think Iron Fist is anything but a whiny rich incompetent brat, but at least he doesn't act like's he's had a psychotic break like elektra or that he's downed a bunch of sedatives like Weaver's character. Sure, he should not have been able to escape where he was, but after 15 minutes of absolutely nothing but boring boring monologues from Weaver talking at a boring, mute zombie version of Elektra I would have been happy with almost anything to break up this bad chunck of episode. Stick could have grown wings and flown away and I would have accepted it.

Anyway, hoping the rest of the episode is better, and I'm also hoping that Weaver doesn't end up being the absolute worst villain in the MCU (right now she's making the MCU malekith look interesting by comparison).

 

I'd argue most of those things are driven by mortality. They only ever seemed to exercise their power to further their own plots. There was no grand scheme. They were stagnant and spinning their wheels for centuries apparently.

Sure they could, but considering the actor's ethnicity and any lack of effort to suggest otherwise, the clear implication is that he is Latino. Bakuto seems the odd man out in a lot of ways, I don't believe for a moment that he is centuries old, much less millennia. I'd be very surprised if his character was created with this role in mind.

Given the situation at the end in Midland Circle, a few dozen well-equipped SWAT officers could have been extremely effective against the goons that seemingly came from nowhere. Misty went in there without any knowledge, completely unprepared. All I wanted was some sort of acknowledgement of the problem, if it was such a problem, which would help drive motivations all around.

Because notNobu was laying on the ground at the end with no crashed elevator to be seen.

Bakuto's was presumably millennia ago, same as the others.

The lack of clear rules in general is part of the problem. You know that. It sets the stakes. They've brought back armies of expendable ninjas, spent their final doses on Nobu and Harold, etc. but never thought to set aside a backup supply?

It is just messy storytelling.