Jessica Jones: AKA Smile

November 25, 2015 10:14 AM - Season 1, Episode 13

It's showdown time.

Jessica rushes Luke to the hospital, where the medical team can't stick needles in him. But hey, here comes Claire Temple from Daredevil to the rescue! Jessica begs Claire (who's about the only one not afraid of one of "those people") for help, saying that while she's an asshole, Luke's a good person. "You don't scare me. And you're not my first," Claire says. Jessica gives Claire her business card with her address to Luke to Jessica's hellhole--Claire already lost her lease for bringing injured dudes to hers. Claire suggests using ice packs and oral meds to reduce his swelling, but it's a crapshoot.

"Guilt makes people do stupid shit...I want everything to be my fault. Good or bad. It means I have some control." --Claire.

Meanwhile, Kilgrave's got the hospital cameras and he announces on the PA that Jessica is Patient Zero and everyone in the hospital should go get her. Happily, this is easily fended off by scrubs, a hairnet thing and a surgical mask.

At Jessica's, Claire injects a needle into Luke's eye AND I AM NOT WATCHING THAT. It's five in the morning and Jessica needs a drink and to have her own injuries looked at.
"Take off your pants."
"I usually like a little more romancing."
"Don't we all."
Clearly, these two need to hang out more often, especially when Claire muses, "It's hard to believe someone would call themselves Kilgrave. Why not just Snuffcarcass?" That joke twice?! She mentions her friend who "makes things hard for bad guys," possibly isn't a good guy himself, and questions every move he makes probably like you do. Jessica doesn't think she can risk anyone else getting involved though--which is reasonable after what she just went through with Luke. Left alone with him, she actually snuggles(!) with him, saying things like "Picture us on an actual date. Bowling. Normal shit. You're the first person I actually pictured a future with. You're also the first person I ever shot in the head." Jessica declares that when Luke wakes up, she won't be around to screw with his life any more--probably because she'll be dead, but maybe Kilgrave will be dead too. She kisses him goodbye. "I would've liked that future."

Albert injects Kilgrave with something that will either boost his powers or kill him. It makes him scream a lot. I gather later that came from the fetal tissue. I don't want to think about this.

Jessica tracks down Kilgrave's new victims (the gay couple's apartment that he stole) with the phone he called from. She asks Claire to be there when Luke wakes up and calls Trish for a ride. While in the car, she asks Trish to tell her what she didn't say in the last episode and Trish explains about that. It might connect to how Jessica got powers. Jessica says she gave up looking for answers on that a long time ago, but Trish says she didn't. Jessica says that Trish has an iron will and "hold on to it for me, will you?" They agree that Jessica will text Trish, and agree that they need some kind of code word to prove that Jessica hasn't become a minion of evil. "Something I never say. Like I love you." That'll do.

Jessica goes over to the apartment and finds one corpse that drank bleach, Arnold with his arms cut off on the floor, and the other guy is attempting to stuff his arms down the disposal because he got told to dispose of the body and then kill himself. Jessica locks that guy in a closet after knocking him out. Checking a convenient photo of the dudes that Kilgrave left on the table (subtle, right?), she notes the guys had a boat called Goldfish, which means Kilgrave is at Hudson Ferry. Somehow Arnold briefly wakes up (!) to tell Jessica that Kilgrave is stronger, don't look at him, he'll make you kill. Then he dies.

Malcolm sees a strange chick in Jess's apartment and asks about what went on. Is she some sort of special nurse? "I'm not special. I just keep running into special." Me too, says Malcolm. They talk about wanting to help people, about not being a sidekick, and how Luke and Jessica are separate from everyone.

Jessica calls Jeri, who's not happy. Pam won't talk to her and her partners want to force her out. Suck it up, you're gonna represent the remaining guy pro bono, Jessica says. "Doing something good. It helps with the self-loathing. Trust me."

At the ferry: Jessica walks into the building with huge headphones blasting rock music and a hoodie over her head. As Kilgrave calls in a shit ton of cops, he tells her to show her face--and that was Trish, not Jessica! "PATSY!" Jessica runs around the top floor of the building, getting shot at. The girls get outside and find everyone on the dock all mind-controlled. Kilgrave yells at them to start hitting each other, and J&T try to break it up, but Trish loses her headphones in the fight (which is why that doesn't solve everything). Kilgrave yells at everyone to stop, and gripes that maybe the problem was that Jessica is incapable of love--but with one exception. Perhaps he chose the wrong sister, eh? He grabs Trish to be his plaything and slave, and he'll program her to kill herself if Jessica gets near. "Kiss me, mean it," he says to Trish. As Jessica watches this all expressionless, he deduces that if Jessica would let him take her sister, he must have finally upped his powers enough to work! You're finally mine now! She'll feel what he feels...eventually. Smile!, he commands, and Jessica does a big smile...watch out. "Tell me you love me," he says. Jessica looks over his shoulder at Trish and says, "I love you," and then grabs Kilgrave and breaks his neck.

Woooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooot!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

After all of that, it just seemed so...easy?

Luke wakes up, Claire fills him in that it's on the news that Jessica was arrested for killing Kilgrave. She mentions the cycle---she saves you, you save her, she has to save you again and neither of you wants to be saved. Sum it up, Claire! Luke is afraid the cops are after him, but Claire thinks they're pretty occupied, she's the only one that knows and she can keep a secret. Luke asks for water and walks out while Claire does that. She drinks it herself.

Jeri is now Jessica's lawyer, defending her with the "This man forced Jessica to snap his own neck" defense. Wait, what?! And this worked?! Jessica walks out of there to get picked up and hugged by Trish. Later, Trish's mom sent over the files from her house.

Back at her apartment, Malcolm's waiting for her, along with a bunch of phone messages from people needing help. "Maybe it's enough that the world thinks I'm a hero. Maybe if I work long and hard, I could fool myself." Malcolm answers the phone saying, "Alias Investigations, how can we help?"

posted by jenfullmoon (39 comments total)

Claire injects a needle into Luke's eye AND I AM NOT WATCHING THAT.

I have no idea what they actually showed on screen here, because I didn't watch that bit either. For all I know they could've cut to Teletubbies or something while keeping the audio track going.
posted by asperity at 11:43 AM on November 25, 2015 [11 favorites]

Pretty sure I regret watching this show. The second half of it felt flailing and gratuitous.
posted by milkweed at 12:25 PM on November 25, 2015 [3 favorites]

Or maybe I just shouldn't have watched it pretty much all at once. That is also possible.
posted by milkweed at 12:37 PM on November 25, 2015 [2 favorites]

The end of this series was disappointing. They tried to shove too much into one season. Crazy cop escalation was too fast along with the defeat of Kilgrave. They needed to make the cop the big bad of s1 and Kilgrave a longer villain arc. The fact that this show was bingeable made that flaw more obvious than if the show was on a weekly basis.
posted by miss-lapin at 2:36 PM on November 25, 2015

Wait, what?! And this worked?!

I thought that it was more the threat to put the cops on the stand that convinced the detective to drop charges. Probably also combined with a lot of already weird testimony.

Also, major dramatic irony that Jess gets her just reward for being a hero. A cell phone full of messages from people who need a hero. Fuck.

One major thing left unresolved- we really don't know how Luke feels about Jess at this point. Was everything he said to her a lie?

I don't know how they're going to follow this up with another series. What can they do that would have as big an impact on Jessica?

Also as far as impact, I was wondering why I suddenly got all tensed up at the store yesterday- until I realized the two people in front of me were wearing purple. Now that's effective use of color.
posted by happyroach at 2:53 PM on November 25, 2015 [3 favorites]

I didn't really understand what Trish going in pretending to be Jessica was intended to accomplish. Jessica didn't come at Kilgrave from behind, IIRC she just went up in the balcony and, anyway, the ruse was revealed quite quickly and Trish had to run away from the police.

All that in addition to no one apparently being aware of the advantages of sound-blocking earplugs in addition to the headphones. I mean, really, just blocking one's hearing of Kilgrave is a pretty big weakness for him if people actually made a real effort to exploit it. Granted, they also talked a lot about just looking at him being a danger -- and not just when his powers were boosted, but earlier, I think. The hermetic room was supposed to work because of the virus, I think; although that is problematic for a whole other set of reasons. I guess I should just chalk this up to typical comic book incoherence about powers and vulnerabilities.

I didn't have any problems with the last part of the season or with this episode, for what it's worth.
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 4:56 PM on November 25, 2015

I agree that the show seemed to stagger down the stretch (though the last 2 episodes were an improvement over some of what led up to them). I too wonder whether binge-watching it added to that effect. Do netflix-style shows that drop an entire season at once need to be structured so as to take their binginess into account?

I wonder whether Simpson will reappear for the Daredevil second season? We definitely haven't seen the last of him.
posted by axiom at 8:16 PM on November 25, 2015

I was hoping Jessica would die at the end :/ I didn't paticuarly like her, in any sense, I hope there's a Hellcat spinoff for Trish, she was swell.
posted by FallowKing at 8:18 PM on November 25, 2015

Jessica doesn't need your approval!
posted by Justinian at 10:31 PM on November 25, 2015 [34 favorites]

I forget where I read it but someone said the show was badly served by making Killgrave the sole focus for the entire thing, because the back-and-forth between him and Jessica over 13 episodes got tedious, which it never should have. I thought that was about right. Netflix seems to feel that making Substantial Television means stretching series out to 13 episodes when the story they're telling only requires 9 or 10. It's too bad, because there was a lot of good stuff here that got saddled with a badly padded central conflict.
posted by mediareport at 6:46 AM on November 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

I didn't really understand what Trish going in pretending to be Jessica was intended to accomplish. Jessica didn't come at Kilgrave from behind, IIRC she just went up in the balcony

Yep, that was a big part of why the final confrontation felt so anticlimactic for me. Neat twisty set-up for absolutely no strategic gain. Jessica isn't that stupid, and it was hugely disappointing to see the writers make her that stupid in the final episode.

Would've been a great moment for Killgrave to realize it was Trish, turn around and see Jessica's fist coming at his face, say. He escapes by ordering the cops to shoot and we still have the final, final confrontation, but the hero doesn't come off like such a dolt with ridiculously bad planning.
posted by mediareport at 6:55 AM on November 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Really enjoyed the show as a whole but would have preferred a tighter ten eps over these thirteen.
posted by Iteki at 4:17 PM on November 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

The show definitely got a little soggy in the middle but I still have to love a show that features a woman going toe-to-toe with the physical embodiment of patriarchy, and winning, while also being a flawed and multi-dimensional human being.

The series may have wound up being more important than strictly speaking good, but it's light-years ahead of the DC universe cotton candy.
posted by zjacreman at 7:56 PM on November 26, 2015 [22 favorites]

Y'all make a lot if good points, but i don't, loved the show and the characters.

13 episodes of Kilgrave felt about right, based on his powers and complete asshole prickishness. Killing him when he thought he'd won was perfect. Telling him to smile? More perfect.

Of course it was easy to kill him in the end. Like any dude bro, there really wasn't much to him in the end.

Can't wait for Luke Cage!
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 9:56 PM on November 26, 2015 [12 favorites]

It hits me that the best MCU stories are about consequences and dealing with them and Jessica Jones is about nothing but dealing with the consequences of abuse and the ways people move on from there (or don't) so while I thought the end half was a bit soggy, partly cause it had to set up future events and context, I'm really happy we have it.
posted by The Whelk at 11:02 PM on November 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

And for the record, I wanted her to rip out Kilgrave's tounge.

Would've been so. Satisfying.
posted by The Whelk at 11:03 PM on November 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

I have to disagree with anyone saying it was too drawn out, or that Jessica's actions didn't make sense. I mean, seriously, she does not have the same point of view as the audience of the show, and the writers were trying really hard to show that her actions were constrained, especially because of her previous trauma dealing with Kilgrave. She knows what he is capable of doing to other people (giving them compulsive orders to smash their own heads in, or "put a bullet in your head"), and how, even if she kills him, that compulsion does not go away for hours, and by the end of the season, days. It is never good enough to try and just kill him. If that was all she needed to do, when they had him locked up in the soundproof room, she could have just ended it all there. No, she had to use him to undo everything he had done, and get him locked away (or executed by the state, more likely her goal). She had to be able to have him on hand to undo the messes he created, because her sense of justice is not just about killing the baddy, it's getting the mess he created fixed.

And that was the beautiful thing about this show. It has a distinct sense of justice and value for the lives that have been messed up. It was about trying to show that the victims of a crime continue to suffer from the trauma of that crime days, weeks, years after the fact. It puts a cost on the actions of everyone involved. And Jessica is the payment collector. That's where her sense of morals and justice stem from. Collecting the debt owed.

Also, up until Kilgrave was fooled into believing that Jessica was no longer immune to his powers, he kept her at a distance, enough that he knew she wouldn't kill him. And he assumed (correctly, at first) that she wasn't going to try and kill him, she was going to try and make him follow her sense of justice and morals (which, of course, he repeatedly laughed at. That whole scene where she makes him break up that hostage crisis is a prime example of him going along petulantly and arguing that his way is better). His mistake was believing that she wouldn't break from her morals, that after all the things he had manipulated her into doing (from leaving her neighbor dead in her own bed, to forcing her to fight with Luke, etc, etc), eventually the cost/benefit analysis is going to tip way past the point of her trying to win on her terms, and for her to just end the game. And that's kind of the worst part of the whole story. She ended up having to finally give up on doing what she felt was the right thing to do, and just do what had to be done. To take someone's life. Remember, she feels responsible for her family's death. Death is the end, death is the last thing she wants to face, and especially be knowingly responsible for. It is a huge theme in her whole modus operandi. She is trying to save the girl from the first episode because she feels responsible for it, in some way, because of Kigrave's obsession with Jessica.

I really liked this show because it was not simple, and it did involve a lot of very different motivations for every character, from Jessica and Trish, to Simpson, Kilgrave's parents, Jessica's neighbors (and man, I really loved the whole interaction between Malcolm and the sister. Some people did not think that she was a realistic portrayal of a person, but I have known so so so many people who are exactly like that. Damaged and angry and incapable of interacting with people because of something in their past, and left to deal with the world without support. That was actually one of the more heart rending characters for me, because she was so believable as a flawed and broken person, dealing with things the only way she knew how), Luke Cage (with the dead wife trope, but still). I mean, this is definitely something I am going to re-watch several times, because each time we have these characters intersect each other in the various combinations, you get a different side of every character. How they deal with Trish, how they deal with Jessica, how they deal with Malcolm (man, when he was in full-blown, trying to kill himself through drugs mode? That was also a brutal, if simplistic, characterization of a particular mindset. Up until it was revealed that he was working for Kilgrave, the way everyone just wrote off his addiction and behavior was so, so, so common, and then the confrontation where Jessica has to lock him in the bathroom and gives him the ultimatum? That was mostly fantasy, but also a great character turning point, which really led to a whole lot of amazing character development, especially for Malcolm).

Anyway. I liked this show, I and really can't wait for more.
posted by daq at 11:20 AM on November 27, 2015 [28 favorites]

So, ultimately, how "sympathetic" (maybe the wrong word) do people feel towards Kilgrave? How much of his evil is his parents' fault? Yes, they were trying to save his life with the experiments (although, what was going on with those OTHER kids in the video?), but to a child, unbearable pain inflicted by your parents is going to be pretty incomprehensibly horrible, because you probably can't cognitively process that their doing it to save your life. Is he evil just because no one taught him to be good? If at 10 years old, you could suddenly demand anything from anyone and have it come true, how fucked up would that make you? I'd think you'd just be stunted emotionally as a child for the rest of your life. But would it make you sadistic? Petty and demanding and narcissistic, yes, but cruel and sadistic to other human beings? Was that just Kilgrave's evil? Did he choose that? Was he paying back the world for what his parents did to him?
posted by Saxon Kane at 11:49 AM on November 27, 2015 [1 favorite]

yeah, poor malcolm. caught in the middle like that. life is unfair.
posted by logicpunk at 12:07 PM on November 27, 2015 [5 favorites]

I have some sympathy for what Kilgrave the child went through. And it makes sense that he would be sadistic, as the only people who professed to love him were very sadistic from his point of view.

He might have been able to be something better than what he was, but frankly he had too much power, literally and zero guidance. He had no limits. How many people would it take to before he simply stopped thinking of people as people, but just things for his whims. 10? 50? 100?

And then when you meet someone who you can't control, what do you do? Try to find other means to control them, of course.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 12:13 PM on November 27, 2015

"I didn't really understand what Trish going in pretending to be Jessica was intended to accomplish. Jessica didn't come at Kilgrave from behind, IIRC she just went up in the balcony and, anyway, the ruse was revealed quite quickly and Trish had to run away from the police."

I think the goal was for Trish to draw Kilgrave out, so Jess could spot him and kill him. She was planning to fly over to him, but he spotted her first, ordering cops to open fire.

So yeah, not the best plan.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 12:39 PM on November 27, 2015

And for the record, I wanted her to rip out Kilgrave's tounge.

Big fan of a certain Wildstorm comic series, I take it?
posted by kewb at 3:23 PM on November 27, 2015

The Guardian has a really interesting analysis of the series.
posted by theseldomseenkid at 5:07 AM on November 28, 2015 [4 favorites]

The Mary Sue - 6 Things That Bugged Me About Marvel's Jessica Jones

Finished watching the show last night. Thought it was overall pretty terrific, and will probably watch it again someday. But I agree with being bugged by points 2 & 5 on The Mary Sue's list.

2. It was never fully explained why Jessica was able to break free of Kilgrave’s control

I was really confused by that reveal. At first it seemed like it had something to do with Reva's blood, or Jessica's blood, from the way the scene was edited, but then I saw someone's comment in the episode thread here saying it wasn't the blood. But then the only explanation we got was that the terribleness of being compelled to murder Reva was what allowed her to break his hold? But they'd shown us Kilgrave making so many people doing so much worse, I was like "Well, that can't be it", and kept waiting for the other shoe to drop, so it was kind of anticlimactic when I realized that was all we were getting. I was expecting some kind of sci-fi explanation -- that she'd built up an immunity to the virus over time because of her powers, and I guess that could be inferred, but leaving it as just down to Jessica's inner strength left me feeling like it was a disservice to all of the other victims rather than a compliment to Jessica's heroism.

5. The whole Simpson storyline, complete with killing Clemons

I liked the start of Simpson's storyline, but, there was a lot of whiplash and people carrying the Idiot Ball at the end. I was legitimately shocked by Clemons' murder, but, from that point on Simpson's actions yo-yo-ed around to whatever the plot required, as did Jessica & Trish's reactions to him.
posted by oh yeah! at 8:16 AM on November 28, 2015 [3 favorites]

AND I AM NOT WATCHING THAT.

literally held my hand between the screen and my eyes.
posted by sammyo at 9:27 AM on November 28, 2015

So, if Kilgrave's victims have to hear his commands to be controlled by them, what would have happened if Kilgrave ran into someone who was Deaf? Would reading his lips have the same effect, or would the Deaf individual just completely ignore Kilgrave while he's shrieking commands at them?
posted by spinifex23 at 11:53 PM on November 29, 2015

Or just someone who doesn't speak English.

But I think the "don't look at him" and the "hermetically sealed" room stuff both are intended to imply that it's not just spoken commands. Of course the sealed room was about the supposed virus, but what makes the most sense is that the virus is the mechanism for the enforcement of will, but the communication of what Kilgrave wants is still necessary and flexible.

So Kilgrave was able to write on the glass and able to speak through the intercom without controlling them because the virus was blocked -- whereas when the virus is present, any clear expression of his desire will be effective (unless he wills that it not be somehow). For most purposes, expressions and gestures are too ambiguous ... but not always. So even looking at him can be a danger.
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 12:44 AM on November 30, 2015 [1 favorite]

It seems possible that at the final confrontation Kilgrave's increased power actually does stop Jessica and that the thing that breaks it is when he asks her to say the thing "she would never say."

In other words, Jessica's powers allow her to overcome the virus when he pushes her too far, the first time when he makes her commit murder, the second time when he tells her to say that she loves him.

I like this interpretation because I was very uncomfortable with the idea of Jessica standing there and allowing him to violate Trish with that "kiss me like you mean it" command just for the sake of trying to trick him.
posted by straight at 9:19 AM on November 30, 2015 [6 favorites]

Also, the most bitter part of Jeri getting the murder charges dropped for Jessica has to be that she has to lie and say she didn't beat Kilgrave, that he got what he wanted all the way to the end and used her to commit suicide.
posted by straight at 9:26 AM on November 30, 2015 [3 favorites]

I don't understand why Jessica rushed Luke to the hospital after shooting him, wouldn't he recover anyway? It seemed like a set up to introduce Rosario Dawson and exchange meaningful looks. Without knowing anything about any of the other series, I knew she must be a crossover character and the whole episode ground to a halt while she and Jessica stood around Luke's body. Maybe her role was to give Jessica a pep talk but it felt like pandering and those scenes lasted way too long.
posted by TWinbrook8 at 4:03 PM on December 2, 2015

It's a good idea to take someone to the hospital after you've shot them in the head. Its basic courtesy.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 5:05 PM on December 2, 2015 [7 favorites]

"I don't understand why Jessica rushed Luke to the hospital after shooting him, wouldn't he recover anyway?"

The only thing Luke has told Jessica or what the audience knows is that his skin is unbreakable. That wouldn't mean that his bones wouldn't break -- but from what we've seen, that's not a problem for him, either. That may be the show just ignoring that complication because it's been pretty specific about his skin being unbreakable and not that it's everything about him. That's part of the significance of going through his eye socket. Also, he made it clear to Jessica that his unbreakability wasn't unlimited and that it might not withstand someone like her trying to bite off a finger or something.

That's why the point-blank shotgun blast injured him. The show made it pretty clear that he had a massive, life-threatening concussion. Which makes sense. So at most his skin and his bones are unbreakable, but his internal tissues are otherwise susceptible to damage. But, again, that would mean that many not-extraordinary impacts to his body could be life-threatening to him from internal tissue damage. Ordinary bullet impacts to his abdomen and parts of his chest could kill him; falls and auto collisions that would be lethal to normal people could also kill him. That his skin is unbreakable doesn't mean that the energy of an impact just disappears -- in fact, it could mean that gunshots that would otherwise be non-serious would be life-threatening. That's probably not what the show intends. It's a comic book -- it's best to just think vaguely that it mostly protects him, but that his internal organs are still vulnerable. And anything that's not protected by his skin, such as his mouth or eyes and everything behind them, is also vulnerable.

Anyway, the point is that he's neither invulnerable nor has the show ever said anything about him having unusual healing abilities. So, no, as far as Jessica and the audience knows, he wouldn't have been any more likely to recover on his own than anyone else who'd suffered such a severe concussion.

That raises the question of what, exactly, was the treatment that Jessica thought Luke could receive. As we saw, IV medication is a problem. Opening the skull to relieve the pressure (which is a real treatment) is also a problem. But she's not a doctor. She rightly assumed that he was in deep trouble without any medical attention at all and she didn't have any real idea about what non-skin-breaking treatments were possible.

As far as it being a fan-service crossover -- well, I don't think that's fan-service so much as it is an organic part of the MCU and, especially, that it makes a lot of sense considering that Jessica and Daredevil are very explicitly in the same New York neighborhood.

But it also served a good narrative purpose. Luke really needed to not be involved with Jessica's final confrontation with Kilgrave and his injury is a natural consequence of their fight -- but, if he was so badly injured, he needed to be safely off-screen where he wasn't a distraction to Jessica. The character of Claire Temple solves that problem.

Personally, I like the idea of Claire being in the background of all four of these solo shows and possibly the Defenders series.
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 6:00 PM on December 2, 2015 [4 favorites]

Tor.com review/recap of this and the previous episode added to sidebar.
posted by Coaticass at 1:57 PM on December 4, 2015

And for the record, I wanted her to rip out Kilgrave's tounge.

I spent the last 3 or 4 episodes wishing someone would finally just take a sniper rifle and shoot Kilgrave in the face, turning him into Arseface. His power would still work, but nobody would be able to understand his commands.
posted by homunculus at 10:54 PM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

In the finale at the dock, when Kilgrave approaches Jessica and says "Smile!", that smile... heartbreaking.
posted by TWinbrook8 at 12:48 AM on December 10, 2015 [1 favorite]

Trish is fantastic and I can see why Jessica loves her so much. I really enjoyed the whole series, especially with all of the intricately created characters like Malcolm and Pam and Jeri. I actually thought Trish looked like Hope when she was in Kilgrave's arms next to the boat, looking back at Jessica.

I agree with the comment above that, in the end, it was so easy to kill Kilgrave. Shockingly easy, such that they all stood quietly still immediately after. All of that bluster and evil, in the same kind of fragile meat bag as the rest of us.

I'm glad that Kilgrave was just in this season, because multiple seasons of mind-controlled strangers would be too wearing.

You know, even though her apartment is totally trashed, as far as we know her childhood home is still intact (other than that small bomb at the sidewalk). Not that there are any happy memories left, really.

I assumed it was her fast healing that had made her immune to Kilgrave. They were together for so long, and it is a virus, so I think her fast healing created the antibodies quickly which allowed her to become immune. But the comment above that it was the killing of Reva - whereas she still feels tremendous guilt for "killing" her family - and saying "I love you" was so far from the real Jessica that it broke the spell ... that's an intriguing thought, too.

I loved this. It was the nitty gritty realities of super heroes, versus the glittering fantasy of typical superhero stories we usually see.
posted by jillithd at 11:07 AM on December 30, 2015 [3 favorites]

I didn't binge watch the series ... actually took a few weeks to watch it and just finished it up a few days ago (I'm so behind on TV shows)

I LOVED THIS ENTIRE SEASON from the first episode through to the finale. I got so tense and worried for Jessica (and Trish and Malcolm and Hope and Luke - pretty much everyone except Kilgrave) that final moment when she told Trish she loved her and then took out Kilgrave felt incredibly emotionally satisfying to me and my sister as we watched.


The ex-miltary / cop storyline did feel a bit crowded in, but I assume that storyline will continue into next season.
posted by Julnyes at 8:56 AM on September 21, 2016 [2 favorites]

blah blah blah how do powers work blah...

This is the episode where Trish walks into the Ferry Terminal full of mind-controlled cops armed with nothing but a hoodie and some Sleigh Bells blasting through her headphones. This fucking ruled.
posted by Navelgazer at 2:07 PM on April 6, 2022

Sloooowly working my way though the stuff that's recently added to Disney Plus. This series was great quality but a lot darker than I was expecting from recent MCU. Are the next two seasons lighter, grimmer or much the same?
posted by TheophileEscargot at 6:12 AM on April 29, 2022