I mentioned in my review of Deadpool that with the waterfall of superhero movies over the past decade, there is finally a place for me, someone who is deeply uninterested in superheroes. But give me a hero with a filthy mouth, mildly perverted sexual tastes, and a thirst for booze and I'm sold. Oh, they can fly/heal instantly/punch through a wall too? Well, that's just the cherry on top.
Along with Deadpool, Jessica Jones emerges as a superhero for people who are goody two-shoes averse. Jones (played by she of the lovely and perpetual resting bitch face, Krysten Ritter) is not a goody two-shoes at all. She's a private investigator who is overly fond of brown liquor, lives in a squalid New York apartment, and harbors deep secrets and hidden shames.
Jones wants nothing more than to be left alone to do her PI business: photographing people cheating on their spouses. But when a missing person case comes across her desk with eerie similarities linking the girl's captor to her own past abusive relationship with a man known only as Kilgrave, Jones is reluctantly forced back into the world of supernatural powers.
Kilgrave (played with the right mix of vulnerable puppy-face and sociopathic evil by David Tennant) has the powers of mind control. He can make people do whatever he wants. Victims describe the feeling as not wanting to do the things he commands, but feeling irresistibly compelled anyway. Jones, for all her abilities (super strength mainly, with some flying abilities sprinkled in), was a victim of Kilgrave's. Once she broke free, Kilgrave became hell-bent on finding her and "winning" (i.e. forcing) her back into his arms, and he was willing to get her attention by any means necessary.
Thus, Jessica Jones is a superhero show like no other because the relationship between the baddie and the good guy is an abusive relationship. A deeply feminist show, Jones confronts Kilgrave and says "You raped me." He sneers at her and asks at what point was it rape: after the delicious dinner? When they got to the fancy hotel? Clearly, the audience knows that there was nothing consensual about Jones and Kilgrave's relationship because of his mind control abilities, but the metaphor is potent: even the most "romantic" relationships can be violent underneath it all. And not all violence is physical--it is just as often emotional and psychological.
A lot happens over the course of Jessica Jones' 13 episodes, but it leads to one place: a showdown between a woman who was abused and the man who abused her and continues to delude himself that she wanted it. Ritter and Tennant are perfectly cast: a strong, no bullshit woman secretly terrified of a dangerous man and a man who appears harmless--even charming--but whose deep insecurities lead him to violence.
The other players on the show are just as three dimensional: bitter, hardened lawyer Jeri Hogarth (Carrie-Anne Moss) whose motives are difficult to pin down and who would probably be considered "Lawful Evil" on the D&D alignment chart; Luke Cage (Mike Colter), Jones' sexy hook-up and fellow super person with indestructible skin; Jones' best friend, Trish Walker (Rachel Taylor), probably the purest of heart in the whole show; Trish's police officer boyfriend (Wil Traval), who comes off as a cross between hopelessly stupid and annoyingly macho.
That all the characters are written with such depths so that no one is 100% bad or 100% good helps Jessica Jones transcend a lot of the simplistic superhero junk. Also, the super-people's abilities are far more subtle than, say, in an Avengers movie. Jones, if anything, prefers not to use her super strength if she can avoid it. She is a hero who lives in the shadows and doesn't want glory, or fame, or eyes on her.
In an entertainment culture filled with super heroines in skintight outfits whose purpose is to arouse as much as it is to save the day, Jessica Jones stands out as an exception--she isn't interested in being a sex object. She isn't interested in being a hero. She is reluctant to get dragged back into the world of heroes and villains, but a soft spot in her hardened heart encourages her to confront the most terrifying demon of all: her own vulnerability. Jessica Jones is a hero for the average Jane, and we need more like her.
Grade: A
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