Jessica Jones: AKA Marvel Can’t Stop Being Awesome

Jessica Jones: AKA Marvel Can’t Stop Being Awesome
Courtesy Photo

Courtesy Photo

Marvel’s Jessica Jones premiered on Netflix on Friday, and as is my usual habit with things on Netflix, I was up most of the night watching it. Then watching it again the next day. And again as I’m writing this.

While it’s true that Jessica Jones takes place in the same universe as the Avengers (who get vaguely name-dropped a couple of times), and even the same neighborhood as the other Netflix superhero, Daredevil, Jessica (played by Krysten Ritter) has her own thing going. Owner and proprietor of Alias Investigations by day, and fighting off her P.T.S.D. by night using (multiple) bottle[s]. Jessica Jones is the definition of hard-boiled, and from the score to the running monologue, Jessica Jones feels more like old-school film noir than a superhero property.

It makes it oddly perfect, then, that for a good chunk of time, the powers Jessica has take second stage to her abilities as a P.I. When her powers do get shown off, there’s nothing too flashy about them. She can jump really high, fly in a way that equates to ‘falling with style,’ and has super strength. She’s not bulletproof, and she’s nobody’s hero. When she meets someone else with abilities, Luke Cage (played by Mike Colter, who will get his own series in 2016), their origin stories are glossed over in one beautifully simple line: “Where’d you get your powers?” “Accident. You?” “Experiment.” In a world so full of origin stories that most people don’t need, it’s nice to see them not waste time and get to the good stuff. Luke Cage taking a buzzsaw to his abs was probably the coolest showcase of his Unbreakable Man state in the beginning of the series.

It’s a common trope that the hero is only as good as their villain, and if that’s the truth, then Jessica is at the top of the Marvel tier. David Tennant, the hero of so many (myself included) as The Tenth Doctor, becomes the most vile, disgusting, disturbing, hideous monster to ever crawl it’s way out of the comic book refuse. Kilgrave, known as The Purple Man in the comics, but here just shown with a Samuel L. Jackson affinity for the shade, is a man who can compel people to do whatever he wants, whenever he wants, with just a word. He uses this power for everything from winning a high stakes poker match, stealing a family’s apartment and dinner, and yes, to imprison women and rape them. He doesn’t see it that way, of course. “How am I supposed to know!?” He screams at Jessica when confronted with the ugly truth of what he did to her. It eerily echoes real world defenses rapists make, and it makes it all the worse coming from a man I admire as a hero. It seriously doesn’t help that he essentially wears a purple version of Ten’s outfit, and speaks in the same British accent (Tennant himself is Scottish).

Don’t take Jessica Jones for a victim, though. She’s anything but. When Kilgrave made her do something so bad, so evil and so outside of who she is, his control was broken, and she got away. But she couldn’t get away from the memories, and when a mom and dad show up at her office asking her to find their daughter, Hope, she quickly learns that Kilgrave didn’t end up as dead as she had assumed. She finds the girl in a hotel room, on a bed in lingerie, Kilgrave’s control so great that she hadn’t been able to get up to use the restroom, and fights Jessica like her life depended on it when she tries to get her up and out of there. Hope is unique, because Kilgrave tried to use her as a replacement for Jessica. “Can you jump?” she asks her, after a series of events too spoilery to recap. “He made me jump. For hours. He said I was never as good as you.” It’s a scene that gives chills, among many.

That doesn’t even touch on the plethora of side characters that bring something fantastic to the table. Patsy Walker (the future Hellcat), Jessica’s best friend and adoptive sister. Malcolm, the neighborhood junkie who is worth more than anyone gives him credit for. Hell’s Kitchen is becoming a lively neighborhood, full of wonderful characters, and what’s most exciting is they are all destined to come together for the future Defenders series.

All 13 episodes of Season 1 of Marvel’s Jessica Jones are now streaming on Netflix. It should definitely be noted that this is not the family-friendly Marvel fare. This practically requires a trigger warning to come along with it. It is worth the watch though, as it’s one of the best things to come out of the Marvel wheelhouse in a while.

Categories: Commentary