As part of Netflix's own Marvel Universe plans, Jessica Jones is show number two to come out, and it's every bit if not better than Daredevil. My knowledge of Marvel comics past the Avengers tiered heroes is tenuous at best, so I went in knowing nothing about either Daredevil or Jessica Jones, and I feel like I understand the characters now more than ever. At least in these incarnations I do. While I at least knew some stuff about Daredevil, I really knew nothing about Jessica Jones, her supporting cast, her villains or even her powers. While Season 1 of Daredevil (and later Season 2) made me believe Marvel could do true-to-life representations of their characters through Netflix, Jessica Jones made me believe Netflix should be the place to do all their characters.
The setup to this first season of Jessica Jones was pretty simple. Jones, played by Krysten Ritter is a New York private detective, working in the slums of Hell's Kitchen. The twist? She has superhuman strength and flight-like jumping abilities. It also just so happens that her life has been a living hell. We start the series with a small amount of P.I. work, but it mostly revolves around tracking down Kilgrave. Kilgrave, played by Doctor Who's David Tennant, is a man who has what I would ultimate power of suggestion, but the show calls it mind control. Essentially, anything he says as a command to someone, they must do. Their body will not let them stop until they think they've done the task he has commanded. Often leading to torturous, brutal results.
Kilgrave's power might be the most fascinating real-world application of a comic superpower I have ever seen. So many people, myself included, have wished we had the power to compell people to do things just by telling them to do so, usually just for the fun of the situation. But Jessica Jones takes that idea of wish fulfillment to a whole 'nother level, as it rounds out that idea with the notions that A, actions have consequences, and B, that the person who wields that power could be a psychopath. It's an evil form of the Jedi Mind Trick. You get to see the fun side of the power as Kilgrave uses it a couple times to have a guy give him a cool jacket right off his back, and able to get around police in a hostage situation to save the day simply by telling the bad guy to stop. But then you get the nasty, brutality of the power. Women being compelled to not move off a bed or leave a room for days at a time, being raped because he tells them they want it, forcing people to brutally injure or kill themselves just because he said so.
It's absolutely fascinating to me, and is what makes Jessica Jones Season One better than Daredevil Season One for me. As much as I enjoyed Daredevil, a lot of his show is wrapped around his personal conflict of what it means to be a hero and why as well as stopping comic book-y plots of violence, that are entertaining, but feel less grounded in reality. While you enjoy the ride and want Daredevil to win, stopping Kilgrave feels imperative, because a monster who has the power to tell people to do whatever he wants them to do affects everyone he comes near.
The only real disappointment I had with Jessica Jones was knowing that the entire season was going to be spend dealing with Kilgrave, because they set Jessica Jones up to be a series about a super-powered alcoholic New York private eye, and that's a show I want to see. I understood why they had to do it, I just wrote it myself, you can't let Kilgrave roam free because he is just too powerful. And much like Season Two of Daredevil, which addressed some of my story issues with the first season (being essentially one plot for a tv season) I assume Season Two of Jessica Jones will do the same. It really wouldn't even be that much of a disappointment if I had more Jessica Jones to watch, as it's a time sensitive criticism. I just want to see more of that world now that the impending threat is out of the way.
Jessica Jones was brought to screen by a woman and three of the main characters are women and it feels fantastic to see the Marvel brand get that kind of expansion because it has been severely lacking in the rest of Marvel's live action universe. Jessica Jones feels like a real person, Patricia Walker feels like a real person and so does Jeri Hogarth, Jones' go-to lawyer. They are all out there doing their own thing being characters who progress the plot, and that makes me so happy. Everyone gives a great performance, especially Carrie-Anne Moss as a razor-sharp defense lawyer, and David Tennant as Kilgrave, both being as charismatic and endearing as characters as they were evil and conniving. Seeing the introduction of Luke Cage as Jones' lover and bartender was fantastic, and the story was compelling through and through. I couldn't be happier than I finally sat down to watch this masterpiece of television.
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