I believe that the concept of classical and colorful crime-fighting super-hero simply doesn't exist in the MCU. So....
She didn't want to be the first one?
Jessica Jones-- Marvel/Netflix
- Thread starter Turtletrekker
- Start date
I believe that the concept of classical and colorful crime-fighting super-hero simply doesn't exist in the MCU. So....
She didn't want to be the first one?
Well, not since WWII.
Captain America was plenty colourful.
Captain America was plenty colourful.
Yes, but he wasn't a crime-fighting super-hero (like Spider-Man). He was a soldier. A colourful one, but a soldier.
I believe that the concept of classical and colorful crime-fighting super-hero simply doesn't exist in the MCU. So....
She didn't want to be the first one?
I think it existed in theory, at least, from fiction if nothing else. When Kilgrave first met Jessica and saw her use her powers, one of the first things he asked was what her superhero name was.
Speaking of which, I found it odd that in the few occasions where characters discussed superheroes, nobody mentioned Daredevil. I mean, we saw the newspapers cover him in his season finale, and he's a local operator in the same neighborhood where Jessica and Luke live, so you'd think they would've brought him up.
(Speaking of which, while Hell's Kitchen seems to be the focus of the Netflix foursome, I wonder if the Luke Cage series will shift its focus more toward Harlem, which is his traditional stomping grounds.)
Depends if it's a prequel?
Oh god.
The final scene in that project would be Jessica killing his missus?
Oh god.
The final scene in that project would be Jessica killing his missus?
I am reasonably certain that Luke Cage will indeed take place in Harlem.
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I just finished the show. Honestly, it was.......good. Not great. Just pretty good. I suppose I liked it more than Daredevil because I haven't even managed to finish that one yet(DD is just very slow). I actually like Agent Carter and Agents of SHiELD more.
Some random thoughts.
Some random thoughts.
Hogarth was a complete waste of screen time. She played such a minor role in the whole thing that she probably should have been cut to just a bit part on par with Clemens. I kept thinking through all her boring divorce crap that they had to do something really important with her later on but all she did was cut a wire and save the fetus. Both of those things probably could have been done without her even being in the show.
Neighbor girl was alright for a bit as she really helped us realize that her brother wasn't just some guy. He was a real human being with a life and his death was a tragedy. Then she became an annoying psycho. She incites a mob to attack Jessica(?!) and then even knocks her out(?!) with a baseball bat? Very strange. Very embarrassing. Jessica Jones the first superhero to get her butt kicked by not just security guards, and doped up cops but by a small, untrained young woman.
If Jessica is so concerned for Hope why didn't she, you know, save her? She had Kilgrave willing to do whatever she wanted. He would have walked over to the DA and had the whole case dismissed if JJ asked and she decides to kidnap him and film some kind of forced confession. As if a kidnapped, and tortured confession would help anyone. No court is gonna touch that and even if she could prove Kilgrave is a mind controller it's a big so what? How she going to prove that he specifically forced Hope to murder her parents? Dumb, dumb, dumb.
Jessica being immune to Kilgrave felt kinda lame. The original plan to nab him and drug him up was much more exciting than what we finally got. I wanted them to really out smart him in some way. He should be practically unassailable which would make the victory so much sweeter. I like the idea that even with all her(supposed) strength she was just as vulnerable as the rest of us.....until she's not for some reason. Her immunity, to me, would be even more devastating for her. She smiles and looks genuinely happy, but wouldn't you immediately question everything he "forced" you to do? If resistance was impossible than you aren't responsible. Now she has to live knowing that, very possibly, she could have done something. It wasn't impossible.
Neighbor girl was alright for a bit as she really helped us realize that her brother wasn't just some guy. He was a real human being with a life and his death was a tragedy. Then she became an annoying psycho. She incites a mob to attack Jessica(?!) and then even knocks her out(?!) with a baseball bat? Very strange. Very embarrassing. Jessica Jones the first superhero to get her butt kicked by not just security guards, and doped up cops but by a small, untrained young woman.
If Jessica is so concerned for Hope why didn't she, you know, save her? She had Kilgrave willing to do whatever she wanted. He would have walked over to the DA and had the whole case dismissed if JJ asked and she decides to kidnap him and film some kind of forced confession. As if a kidnapped, and tortured confession would help anyone. No court is gonna touch that and even if she could prove Kilgrave is a mind controller it's a big so what? How she going to prove that he specifically forced Hope to murder her parents? Dumb, dumb, dumb.
Jessica being immune to Kilgrave felt kinda lame. The original plan to nab him and drug him up was much more exciting than what we finally got. I wanted them to really out smart him in some way. He should be practically unassailable which would make the victory so much sweeter. I like the idea that even with all her(supposed) strength she was just as vulnerable as the rest of us.....until she's not for some reason. Her immunity, to me, would be even more devastating for her. She smiles and looks genuinely happy, but wouldn't you immediately question everything he "forced" you to do? If resistance was impossible than you aren't responsible. Now she has to live knowing that, very possibly, she could have done something. It wasn't impossible.
But that wouldn't have been saving Hope at all. She would have only been freed at Kilgrave's indulgence, and there would've been nothing to stop Kilgrave from doing some other horrible thing to Hope later on. Jessica wanted to make sure Kilgrave had no more power over Hope or herself, and asking Kilgrave to get Hope out for her would've had exactly the opposite effect. Kilgrave was an abuser and a serial rapist, and you do NOT save women from a man like that by asking him to make them even more dependent upon his power. That's just feeding his egomania and desire for dominance.
I was wondering if maybe there was a link between the experiments that gave Kilgrave his powers and whatever IGH did that gave Jessica her powers. If both their powers came from the same source, that might explain her resistance.
That's what Jessica did do at the end. She took advantage of his own blind spot, his need to believe he could possess her at last, and finally outmaneuvered him.
Although I'm disappointed that Tennant won't be returning for another season. And there could've been a way to deal with him nonlethally. Jessica could've... well... it's an icky solution, but she could've torn out his tongue. Or, given more controlled circumstances, had someone do surgery to sever his vocal cords. He couldn't command people if he couldn't talk. (At least, I don't think so. Could he control people by writing at them? Could he learn sign language and control people who understood it?)
Come to think of it, Kilgrave presumably had no power over people who couldn't speak English. They wouldn't understand what he was telling them to do. And New York is a very polyglot city -- surely Jessica could've found some people who don't know English, and an interpreter to relay instructions to them, and sent them to subdue Kilgrave. Although I guess she didn't want to put innocents in danger. He could still have ordered English-speaking people nearby to kill the non-English speakers for him.
My suspicion is it starts there. He loses his cool and goes to jail. Either episode two or by the second half of episode one would be him in jail. By the end, he gets his powers and is released.
I don't think Luke Cage will be a prequel, because the bit with Jessica giving Luke the thumb drive with the files Reva meant for him to have is probably intended to set up a story arc in his series. I expect the same formula as the other two -- set in the present, with origin flashbacks that the thumb drive's revelations will probably catalyze. It'll probably give Luke an arc from where he is now -- only concerned with protecting himself and the people and things he cares about -- to a finale where he decides to go into business as a Hero for Hire.
I thought they already said there are going to be moments that take place before and moments that take place after. The only question is if it'll be flashbacks or if it'll be both a prequel and sequel.
Well, I'm just going by precedent, both for the Netflix shows and for the MCU in general. Daredevil and JJ both gave backstory through flashbacks. And except for Captain America: The First Avenger and Agent Carter, and except for The Incredible Hulk, Iron Man 2, and Thor being treated as near-simultaneous, most MCU productions have pretty consistently been set in real time and have taken place in the same order as their release.
But it would have saved Hope. She wouldn't have spent twenty years in prison, and she wouldn't have killed herself. Once Jessica is living with Kilgrave the only thing that's forcing her to act quickly is Hope. Get Hope out of jail and she has all the time in the world to get Kilgrave. Hope doesn't even have to know. Jessica used Kilgrave to save four lives, why not one more? Get Hope out of jail and then kidnap Kilgrave for the(imo dumb) taped proof of his powers. Put him away for good and clear his victims names AFTER getting Hopes freedom, you know just in case the torture doesn't work.
Also, I can not agree on her final plan being all that compelling. All she does is pretend to be under his control, so he gets close enough to snap his neck. If she had brought Trish's gun with her she wouldn't even had need to do that. It's more predicated on Kilgrave being stupid and not taking precautions. All he had to say was "Everyone if Jess kills me, you all go and drown yourselves in the water"
Another completely random thought I left out last post. Why wasn't Simpson taken to the hospital? The ambulance comes for Trish and they just leave injured Simpson on her kitchen floor?????
Superficially, perhaps, but that's not the point. She would still have been in his power, at his mercy. It would've given him more power over Hope, and over Jessica. Of course he would've taken advantage of that, because he got off on having power over people. The whole point of "AKA WWJD?" was that it was a dangerous mistake to try to harness Kilgrave's power for good, because it's a fundamentally abusive thing and encouraging its use is just becoming an enabler of his abuse. You need to look past the surface mechanics and consider the deeper psychological issues and rape/abuse allegories that are the actual point of the narrative. An abuser's victim cannot escape an abuser by asking him to let her go. It doesn't work that way. That just puts her more deeply under his power.
The only thing? Wow, that is just incredibly wrong. Jessica was playing with dynamite every moment she was in that house. She couldn't trust him to keep his word. For all his promises about not using his powers, about buying the house legitimately and paying the servants a salary, he still didn't hesitate to command them in cruel ways, or to take control of her neighbor. It wouldn't have been long before he killed someone on a whim or -- as far as Jessica knew at the time -- just stopped playing games and took control over Jessica again. What she was doing was like trying to coexist with a Bengal tiger without any means of self-defense or containment. You can try to work carefully with the tiger's psychology to stay in its good graces and manage its moods, but there's no way to be sure it won't just decide to maul you at any moment. Jessica had to deal with Kilgrave as quickly as possible, not just for Hope but for herself, the servants, the neighbors, and anyone else who might be hurt because Jessica couldn't control him 24/7. I mean, my god, look at the massive body count this guy left in his wake, and all the people he violated emotionally and caused to injure themselves physically. Everyone this man interacted with was traumatized by it. Every single day, he left more victims in his wake. Hope was in danger of being punished for what he made her do, but countless others were in psychological, physical, or mortal danger from him as long as he remained free.
Who said the plan was compelling? Compelling drama doesn't come from the mechanics of plans, it comes from emotions and relationships and acting. This whole story is an allegory for rape and abusive relationships. Kilgrave was the classic abuser and gaslighter who rationalizes his actions as loving and his abuse as something his victims brought on themselves, then pushes that narrative on the people he abuses until they believe it. He was a total sociopath, the ultimate user of people, but he actually believed that what he did to Jessica was love, and it was that delusion, that inability to distinguish control from love, that proved his ultimate downfall. Psychologically, thematically, it was an effective resolution. The plot mechanics were just there to set up the character dynamics and highlight the themes.
Well, for one thing, he was a uniformed cop, and they would've had to answer a lot of awkward questions that the other cops probably wouldn't have believed their answers to. So it was probably best to keep his involvement secret. For another thing, he was still under Kilgrave's control, and they couldn't risk letting him get another shot at Trish until the 12-hour window had passed.
Finally finished it, I thought it was a great show. It really reached high levels in the second half of the season.
I wonder what they would do with a second season if they got one. They left a number of questions hanging, most interesting to me was the future of Trish. But I wonder if some of the stuff they set up wasn't just for the Luke Cage show or a possible JJ season 2, but also for the Defenders.
Speaking of Trish, I really liked all of the supporting characters in this one. Hogarth wasn't just a lawyer, she was a lawyer who clearly had a real life and real problems. Malcolm was really impressive, the series used him in many different ways throughout the show, and I loved his final line there at the end. (Congrats to the junkie for making it through to the end too.) And of course everyone agrees Luke was great. Mike Colter is Luke Cage, and that's that. The real revelation for me was Rachael Taylor. Didn't have super high expectations for her, but by the end of the series, I knew who Trish was, I knew what she wanted, I knew was drove her, and I knew what shaped her. Yet another very nicely fleshed out supporting character. I'm all in favor of going full Hellcat.
And of course the two main actors on the show were brilliant. I was believing everything Kilgrave was saying, and Krysten completely nailed her very broken character.
I really hope we get a second season, but I'm not completely sure we need one. The story has been told.
I wonder what they would do with a second season if they got one. They left a number of questions hanging, most interesting to me was the future of Trish. But I wonder if some of the stuff they set up wasn't just for the Luke Cage show or a possible JJ season 2, but also for the Defenders.
Speaking of Trish, I really liked all of the supporting characters in this one. Hogarth wasn't just a lawyer, she was a lawyer who clearly had a real life and real problems. Malcolm was really impressive, the series used him in many different ways throughout the show, and I loved his final line there at the end. (Congrats to the junkie for making it through to the end too.) And of course everyone agrees Luke was great. Mike Colter is Luke Cage, and that's that. The real revelation for me was Rachael Taylor. Didn't have super high expectations for her, but by the end of the series, I knew who Trish was, I knew what she wanted, I knew was drove her, and I knew what shaped her. Yet another very nicely fleshed out supporting character. I'm all in favor of going full Hellcat.
And of course the two main actors on the show were brilliant. I was believing everything Kilgrave was saying, and Krysten completely nailed her very broken character.
I really hope we get a second season, but I'm not completely sure we need one. The story has been told.
Just because it works allegorically does not allow me to ignore the mechanics. Hope doesn't know who is letting her go. For all she knows the DA bought her story and she is out. Ultimately it would have given him less power of Jessica. She had shown she was able to ask him for things before even though she hated it and it killed her inside. Asking him to save Hope would have given him power over her short term, but once Hope is out and can run that's one less thing he has to use against her. It even would have played well into gaining even more trust from him. He was enjoying their dynamic duo, and sorta liked the idea of saving that woman.
Yes, and she obviously should have done from the get go what she ultimately did and kill him. Her excuse for not killing him was that she needed him for Hope. although, I admit that this was obviously an excuse and she did not feel capable of killing him. I'm not suggesting she should hang out with him for six months or anything, only that by spending one extra day she could have saved many lives. She had already made the decision to enter the house. That was already done. The question was what to do next. Save the victim(who suffered in very much the same way she did) or ,ummm, screw it all up? If she had a half-way decent plan I could forgive everything going wrong, and Jess just expecting it to work. It wasn't that good a plan to begin with. Her friends already advised her it wasn't going to work. Kilgraves chance for escape is always going to be high. She should be aware that a lot of her plans don't work. Knowing the chance of failure, saving Hope makes sense.
Plot mechanics are important to me. Working thematically is great but it has to work with the mechanics as well. Jessica playing on Kilgraves delusion of the two being buddies again wasn't new. She had already used the same ruse at her house with the Chinese food. Yes, in the first case he thought she was under her own volition and the final scene under his control but it still acts out the same way. He thinks he has what he wants, Jessica, and she uses this trust to get him. I agree the ending works fine thematically, but it is not mechanically interesting. The plan is not interesting, nor is the action especially exciting, and it relies again on characters being kinda dumb.
I think we are referring to different scenes. I meant after Trish and Simpson had both taken "reds" and he was in Jessica's kitchen. He wasn't under Kilgraves control at this point, just drugs.
What's interesting is that Jeryn Hogarth is a man in the comics, and they could've cast a man in the role and had the character's relationships and storyline play out exactly the same way, but they chose to make Hogarth female. She wasn't a lesbian to be titillating or to represent some idealized image, but just happened to be as normal and screwed-up as any other character.
Yeah, a great way to end it. A note of optimism after all the darkness. Malcolm is one of the people Jessica succeeded in saving, and he's committed to paying it forward.
Yeah, I wasn't initially impressed with her acting, but she rose to the occasion, and conveyed a lot of strength.
I believed Kilgrave was an utter sociopath who was constantly making excuses for himself. He was a truly awful human being. But Tennant is an amazingly brilliant actor whose delivery is always engaging.
Some of Kilgrave's excuses were legitimate. He himself had a rough upbringing and didn't always influence people intentionally.
That's what I liked about the show. It wasn't black or white and we got two sides to the story.
That's what I liked about the show. It wasn't black or white and we got two sides to the story.
[yt]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vlq_c9czohc[/yt]
Except a lot of that was a lie. His parents were trying to help him, and he went on deliberately controlling and torturing them long after he figured out his powers.
Besides, most abusers are victims of abuse. There's nothing unusual about that. It doesn't excuse their actions, it just explains how they went so wrong.
