We’re running down to the final episodes of Jessica Jones, Sallinger looks set to get away with murder, minus a scar or two, and Trish is beginning to set down a dark path in the wake of her mother’s death.
AKA Hellcat
Once again, we rewind the clock a bit, this time to Trish
being coached by Dorothy into acting. Apparently, it’s a last gambit since
they’re short of money. We cut back to Trish seeing Dorothy’s body. She knows
Sallinger did it and is intent on making him pay for it.
We see the masked vigilante head into Sallinger's apartment
building, knocking out the two officers outside. She bursts down the door and
gives him everything she’s got, having her dead to rights until Jessica comes
in to stop her. We see a few scenes from the aftermath of it all from Trish’s
perspective.
We see Dorothy taking Trish to her audition, giving her red
hair instead of the advertised blonde, Dorothy uses a gambit to get them to the
front of the line. She warns her to look interesting rather than just smiling.
In the less distant past, Trish is woken up by some violent-sounding noise next door, Malcolm arrives with her clothes. And again, this is
a rehash of a scene from earlier. Trish bangs on the wall to stop the noise and
one of the guys arrives at her door, she beats the crap out of him, having
apparently ignored the caution from episode 2. Still, at least this time you
could argue self-defence more easily.
She’s beginning to work out again when she gets the scene
with Jessica and Erik explaining what had happened and that Sallinger is going
to get away. Coming out of the room, Erik is reverting to his old gambling habit.
We then see Trish in the hospital, eyeing where Sallinger is, Sallinger lets her visit and the two have some back and forth and Sallinger reveals he left his latest work
in ‘the most obvious place’ hence her looking at the photo album when she goes
to the house.
In the flashback, Trish did get cast, but as the best friend
and Dorothy isn’t happy. Fortunately the girl who was cast to lead is sick, so Dorothy
convinces, with a pinch, Trish to offer to read her lines whilst she’s absent.
Trish reluctantly agrees. Trish eventually does find the photo much to her
horror. She comes to Erik, wanting to use his gifts to help her. A particular
target in Nussbaumer springs to mind and I think you can see where this is
going.
She gets Erik to have Nussbaumer meet him in a secluded location.
In the shadows, Trish taunts him about all the people he’s killed, gaining his
confession but when Trish confronts him directly as the masked vigilante, she
can only see Sallinger’s face. She hits hard and he hits his head on something,
causing him to bleed out. She rips off his badge before realising that he’s
dying. Erik can’t help but laugh upon realising that his death has relieved his
headaches.
We’re back at the funeral home with Trish waiting for
Jessica to show up, she’s of course indisposed with the police. Something Trish
soon discovers reading the NYB article. She leaves and is soon accosted by the
detectives.
She comes to Erik and their plan of action is to hit another
marc from his list and mention Nussbaumer to him, they ensure Jessica has a
tight alibi and clear her of suspicion, the consequence being that she’ll
likely work out it was them. The table read is a major success for Trish and
they give her the lead. Dorothy is there to offer some rather aggressive
advice.
Montero is their next mark. And they begin staking out his
operations, they spot him at a trailer park. The first performance is a major
success and now Dorothy starts pushing to give Trish even more of the spotlight
by changing the show’s title. Trish in the present gets ready for the funeral
when she gets a visit from Hogarth.
Hogarth shows her the footage and promises to delete it if
she helps her with the Patseras situation. Trish begrudgingly agrees to that
but warns Hogarth she may be next. We cut to after the funeral, Jessica now has
a warrant for her arrest and Trish decides they need to hit Montero quickly but
if she’s in the wind, she doesn’t have an airtight alibi. Trish plans to use
Nussbaumer’s badge to further solidify the narrative they want to pull.
Erik notices Jessica tailing Trish and calls the cops on
her, in police custody she has an airtight alibi for what happens next. Trish
confronts Montero and beats him into a confession. You know it’d be useless in
court, right? Still, she brings up Nussbaumer as required but the old Sallinger
face crops up again and she beats him to death.
Erik’s headaches go away briefly before Trish realises that
killing is in fact effective and plans to continue doing so.
It’s a bit padded at the beginning, but this is another
strong character dive for Trish as her descent continues
Rating 7/10
AKA Lotta Worms
Their plan to get Jessica freed works and Jessica is allowed
to go. Jessica arrives home and Gillian says she found Erik passed out on the
floor. He explains everything that’s happened in thankfully brief detail.
Jessica knows she’s going after Sallinger, just as he’s about to discharge
himself from the hospital. They confront each other and Jessica mentions how
she didn’t destroy all the evidence, making her gambit for the episode. It’s a
solid gambit too.
Jessica catches her off guard and throws her to another
rooftop buying them enough time to escape. She’s ready to dump him off with
Hogarth but she doesn’t have anywhere to put him and Sallinger is ready to
leverage this to his own advantage and get Jessica’s protection.
Erik pays Malcolm a visit and it’s the awkward situation as
Brianna enters, Malcolm is sick of Trish’s games and thinks its time for the
cops to handle her but they have a plan. Jessica and Sallinger act as bait for
Trish looking over from across the rooftop. Jessica discovers the device
holding the photos that incriminate her and destroys it, removing some of
Sallinger’s leverage.
Malcolm and Erik tase Trish unconscious. She wakes up,
chained to a post, in her place. They’ve made it so everything is out of reach
so she can’t escape.
Jessica returns home and not unexpectedly is straight to the
bourbon but unbeknownst to her, it’s been drugged and she passes out. Sallinger
has her taped to the chair ready to reveal her truth. The sedative used also
paralyses her. Sallinger wants her to admit that she wants badly to be a hero
but she’s bad at it. Jessica tries to turn the tables, he claims to go after
the unworthy but it’s all a mask as he gains sick pleasure out of it.
Sallinger tries to deny it but Dorothy does not fit his
usual MO and he breaks. Jessica had a camera recording his confession and
reveals she could easily have broken out of the tape. She tosses him around and
calls in Costa, willing to testify against him for abducting and attempting to
kill her, but also with the recorded confession of him admitting to killing
Dorothy, helped by Erik keeping an eye on the camera.
Malcolm’s keeping a watch on Trish and she tries to explain
how she believes the ends justify the means, reciting a story about how she got
rid of her wife-beating father by telling a neighbour it was her that was being
abused. It really says a lot about Dorothy that she did not try to argue her
story. Malcolm tries to talk her down but its unsure if its working. Jessica
arrives and tells Trish that Sallinger is down as Costa arrives at her place to
find Sallinger gift-wrapped for them.
Jessica removes the chains, and the two hug, Trish heads back
to her job but it’s clear that she’s still not over it. Her co-star talks about
how he’ll probably use the legal system to his advantage and she says she’ll
take care of it. Jessica gets a phone-call from Sallinger who tells her she’ll
have to face up against Trish eventually, something she is not happy to hear.
Sallinger is about to be transferred to the courtroom, but
Trish as the masked vigilante knocks out his guards and attacks Sallinger.
Jessica arrives to give her testimony but soon sees, along with everyone else
Sallinger’s dead body. It’s not a pretty sight.
It’s the final nail in Trish’s coffin, now she’s crossed the
dark path, Jessica’s got the toughest choice of her life ahead, I like it. I
also love how she beat Sallinger in the end.
Rating 9/10
AKA Everything
Jessica walks out of the Courtroom, feeling somewhat broken
and not for the first time. Costa asks for her to do something. She returns
home to find new big man of Harlem, Luke Cage. He’s here to compare her dilemma
to that of him with Willis Stryker, his brother. The guy in the stupid power
suit who came after you. Apparently, it killed him to do it, fact is you barely
knew him until he started trying to kill you.
He tells her he hopes if he went too far, someone would take
him down. I think Misty Knight has your number but whatever, we’ll never know.
So, after his frankly superfluous cameo, Jessica’s got to make a decision.
Jessica pays Trish a visit and the moral dilemma is barely
debated and it’s a shame because law enforcement being useless most of the time
is a facet engrained into the Netflix shows’ DNA. Erik shows what she’s become
by standing right in front of her as blood comes out of his eyes. Jessica
needs Trish to turn herself in but like an idiot, she lets her go and clean
herself up. Naturally she disappears.
Her next job is dealing with Patseras for Hogarth. Speaking
of Hogarth, Kith pays Hogarth a visit, and Jeri finally confesses about the
ALS, Trish calls at this inopportune moment to ensure that Patseras is bad
enough of a person to make her list. Hogarth tells her that she’s a monster.
Jessica isn’t ready to out Trish just yet, feeling that making it public would
chase her out of town.
Speaking of Trish, and I was, she’s busy throwing Patseras
around. But holds back from killing him when his daughter intervenes. Malcolm
notices the link between Hogarth and Patseras and puts 2 and 2 together. Jessica confronts Hogarth and tells her she has an idea to bring Trish in, with Hogarth
providing the bait.
Malcolm and Zaya settle things as Hogarth announces on the
news that she knows the identity of the masked vigilante and plans to reveal
it. Kith pays a visit. Patseras or at least his family has agreed to drop the
lawsuit and despite the fact that what’s just happened should horrify her, she
feels relief for it all to be over.
Trish arrives soon after and falls into Jessica’s trap,
problem is, Trish takes Kith hostage. This, incidentally, is the first time
Kith has crossed over into the A-plot. Desperate to save Kith, Hogarth offers
another alternative. Kith’s life for getting her out of the country.
Making her life harder is the fact that Jessica has decided
to out her identity to the public, in a video that quickly goes viral. Hogarth
has to go to more extreme lengths. Basically, she’s gonna have to lay in a
coffin for 17 hours. Thankfully, Jessica and her team are very good and quickly
track her down. As soon as Hogarth’s safe she calls Jessica but Jessica’s
already there and quickly manages to find her. I swear I heard the music cue in
Breath of the Wild.
Trish dims the lights to try and even the playing field. But
Trish is no match for Jessica in a fight, and despite Jessica taking a knife in
the hand, she does take down Trish and she's arrested. In custody, Costa reads out the charges against her and
it’s finally dawned on her that she has become the bad guy. Kith decides to
leave Jeri, feeling her life is not for her, however short it may be.
Erik pays Jessica visit and offers to work with her, but
Jessica says she doesn’t trust him enough, he promises to do something about that,
taking it better than most would. Jessica’s packing up anyway, ready to head
away and leave it all behind. She hands Malcolm the keys to both her flat and
hence Alias investigations.
Detective Costa pays Erik a visit, Jessica arranges for them
to meet, believing Erik might be able to help him. Jessica watches as Trish is
transferred to the Raft Prison. Jessica still feels awful about it, hence why
she’s trying to leave it behind. Jessica is prepared to take the midnight train
going anywhere, at Grand Central, in the middle of the day.
But it wouldn’t be a season finale without another cameo.
Kilgrave telling her that she’s right, she turns around and walks out without
buying the ticket.
So that was Jessica Jones and hence the end of the Netflix
Marvel era.
The Netflix shows try to do the dark things the Marvel
movies couldn’t do. They discussed sex, got violent, showed blood and had more
bad language than Deadpool. Part of this is compensating for a lack of budget
as it’s a lot cheaper to do more combat orientated action than the explosions
and sparks a Marvel movie would. But it did allow them to carve out their own
unique identity.
The biggest problem, as I’ve made clear so many times,
is pacing. Netflix likes to drop an entire season at once, I don’t understand
why it makes a difference how many episodes there are. Iron Fist season 2 was a
breath of fresh air by being a shorter series, though don’t get me wrong, it
still had issues.
But to Jessica Jones itself, they were brave doing an ALS
diagnosis for Hogarth, unfortunately it never really felt like it went
anywhere, her main storyline is around a love interest, for the third season in
a row. I really like her character I just wish her radar was pointed at
something more interesting.
Trish’s descent felt inevitable given how season 2 left her.
I remarked that she became nigh unbearable last season and they took that idea and ran
to its inevitable conclusion.
It’s kinda sad that Oscar and Vido just kinda disappear
after episode 2, for that matter, wasn’t Malcolm supposed to be working for
Pryce Chang, he just kinda disappeared off the face of the Earth.
Sallinger was a compelling villain, I’ll give them that. And
the slower pacing of this show is more warranted as the characters are more
interesting. That being said, if a few things had been cut and we’d had 10
instead of 13 episodes, I wouldn’t have complained.
Rating 8/10
So, after this I feel I need something a little lighter,
with a Dragon perhaps?
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