So, we are officially one week away from the premiere of
Marvel/Netflix second venture of the year as well as this year’s second, solo
female led Marvel production: Jessica
Jones. As the premiere rumbles
towards us there’s been a steady drip of teasers, trailers, photos and more so
I’ve compiled everything we know about the show so far in one easy spot. This will cover all of the important
photos and trailers you might need to watch and break them down to get an
overall sense of the tone and content we’re going to be getting from Marvel’s
big Thanksgiving release. So,
let’s talk about Jessica Jones.
In case you haven’t put it together, Jessica Jones follows Jessica Jones, a one time superhero turned street level private investigator on the mean streets of Hell’s Kitchen. In the comics she has superhuman strength, endurance, and flight though it’s unclear if that last one has made it to the show or if she’s only got the power to jump really high as seen in this teaser clip. Keen observers will note that the Avengers Tower is visible in the background of the scene, implying the show will be set sometime after the events of Avengers: Age of Ultron as well as Daredevil which took place before the instatement of New York’s latest landmark. This has given rise to the theory Daredevil will make an appearance on the show but currently nothing has been confirmed. The other major reveal this clip gave us and has appeared in most of the full trailers is that Jessica will be keeping her detective agency under the name Alias Investigations, an homage to the MAX comics series she originated in: Alias.
She also gets a lot out of her jumping and super strength abilities and the Jessica’s PI services in the first full trailer along with a lot more information on just how much of the Alias plot is making it into the final version. The comics were some of the most adult content Marvel had printed at the time within their continuity, revolving around Jessica’s fall from superhero life after being raped by the mind controlling villain Zebediah Killgrave AKA Purple Man. Based on this trailer a lot of that seems to still be here for the Netflix. It’s still very unclear if Marvel is going to be willing to pull the trigger on featuring an actual sexual assault as part of their cinematic universe given how much they’ve sold themselves as the public’s cinematic guardians but we definitely know the two have some pretty terrible history. Even still, I wouldn’t be surprised if her past relationship with Killgrave was retconned a bit to avoid the more adult content but given the overall tone of this full trailer it’s at least within the realm of possibility, which is a pretty major step for Marvel.
The best evidence for its inclusion is the way David Tennant
is playing Killgrave, this creepy and obsessive stalker, there’s actually a lot
of depth to his delivery in this trailer.
It’s an off-ness that only serves to get amped up to the extreme in this
short clip. Purple Man in the
comic has always suffered from being one dimensional, either as a petty
hedonist or a petty rapist so I like that here he seems to be transformed into
an obsessive stalker. There’s a
decidedly blurred line between the obsession of hatred and infatuation and
Killgrave is right on it.
In the clip, he also happens to mention Jessica’s friends by which he most likely means Luke Cage. Created in the ‘70s as Marvel’s blaxploitation character Luke Cage is a fellow superhero with unbreakable skin who fell out of popularity in the comics for a time before returning to active continuity in the pages of Alias. He had a budding romance with Jessica that seems to have translated to the show though whether his powers will be present is a bit more unsure. Luke Cage is slotted to get his own Netflix show in 2015 but Marvel has also stated they don’t plan on doing anymore origin stories so it’d be a little strange for him to get his powers in the interim after meeting Jessica but before the events of his series.
Some have speculated, based on this picture, which seems to show Cage on fire, that he will have his powers on the show but currently nothing is confirmed. However, in this second full length trailer for the show Luke does say that Jessica doesn’t have to face the Purple Man alone, which might imply that he does have powers and could help her if she asked. This second trailer also seems to feature the first time we’ve ever seen Killgrave and Jessica directly interact rather than over the phone, which is actually pretty telling. In the comics’ Killgrave’s powers are based on pheromones, he needs to be in physical proximity to actually control someone, so it seems like the phone tag might be Jessica’s way of trying to keep safe from his mind control tricks.
Additionally there’s this actual picture of Jessica and
Purple Man squaring off in what seems to be a cathedral/concert stage that
Killgrave has outfitted with a ton of amplifying equipment. This ties into the idea that maybe his
powers are based around his voice this time around or some kind of psychic abilities
rather than pheromones and physical proximity. Alternatively the microphone could be to ensure he’s heard
as heroes have beaten him on numerous occasions by just plugging their ears so
that they couldn’t hear his commands.
Another major part of the books that seems to have
translated directly to the show is just how hard boozing a superhero Jessica
Jones is. The basic pitch of the
comics and very much the show is that Jessica’s a damaged person, hence the
literally fractured logo, but at the same time her personal drama never kept
the series too serious or dour, there was room for a lot of fun to be had with
the audience in/through Jessica’s indulgences. All of that seems to be here in full, especially given the
two other teasers dedicated to those lighter elements. We see Jessica in the aftermath of what
looks like a drunken brawl and, in my favorite teaser clip, we see her smashing
her alarm clock with her super strength.
Of all the clips and trailers for the show this one is the most indicative
of a lighter tone lurking somewhere bellow the surface of the series. I like the dark and seriousness of what
we’ve seen but it’s nice to know that won’t be the only thing the series is
offering.
Finally, there’s the opening sequence for the show, which is just amazing. Firstly it’s just spectacular that the show will actually have opening credits as most superhero shows like Flash or Gotham just slap the title card on the screen with nothing else. More than that I like that the tone of the open sequence is actually a lot less intense than the Daredevil opening though they both utilize a great blend of defining color, visual splash, and CG animation. Like I said the big difference is in tone, as forged through the visuals and the music. Daredevil’s opening was rife with grand symbolism for the city, order, justice and more with a swelling score punctuated by this pulsing beat that runs through the whole credits. Whereas Jessica Jones’ intro sequence is all personal, the places and events we’re seeing are important to her and her life and situations but nothing really beyond that.
It’s a scaling down of scope that I like as it suggests a greater faith in our hero and a departure from a lot of the worst of Marvel’s crutches. Far too often Marvel will lean on big, all encompassing stakes to drive its films and TV under the thinking that the broadness of the stakes will get us to invest even if we don’t care about the hero’s personal struggle. It’s one of the most backwards filmmaking decisions there is and I’m glad to see the opposite of it happening with Jessica Jones. Everything about the show and the story at hand is personal, Purple Man isn’t going after the whole world or even all of Hell’s Kitchen, he’s here for her. It’s not about the end of the world or even making a ton of money, just plain old fashion revenge and obsession, everything is grimy, gritty, broken, and brought down to the purest, lowest level. That’s what’s really selling the show to me, that even though we’ve lost the scope and splendor of fighting in the skies it’s been traded out for a deeply personal narrative driven by passion, it’s a human story.
Jessica Jones is
scheduled to premiere on November 20, 2015
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