Dropping on Netflix on International Women's Day and just ahead of Mother's Day in the UK, I had to squeeze in watching episodes around visiting my Mum, but I was more than pleased to be dropped back into Jessica's weird little corner of the MCU. Krstyen Ritter has always been a highlight as Jessica and despite the journey she went through in Season 1, it was good to see her as her old hard drinking, barely-any-fucks-to-give self. Eka Darville shines, and I mean shines as Malcolm, still recovering from his addiction in Season 1 so much that you're never really cured of addiction. But in a brilliant turn we find him really throwing himself into the learning the private eye business and basically single-handedly keeping Alias Investigation's in the black with a steady stream of clients. Rachael Taylor is also back, obviously, as Jessica's adoptive sister Trish, further exploring the nature of celebrity including a deep dive with the pitfalls of teen-stardom in ways that honestly left me uncomfortable in a thought provoking way and trying to have a relationship with someone else in the public eye.
All gets off to a promising start as a seemingly paranoid nut-job brings his case to Jessica before he turns out to be legit and he's killed off for trying to warn Jessica to a wider conspiracy involving people exactly like her; powered people granted abilities by illegal human testing. As Jessica, Trish and Malcolm delve into the mystery that is the missing days on Jessica's medical records where she was presumably experimented on and the mysterious IGH organisation behind these events, a new enemy emerges in the form of Janet McTeer. Playing another enhanced woman with powers similar to Jessica's, but plagued — or should that be buoyed? — by a violent streak, she leaves bodies in her wake trying to tie up loose ends left up IGH.
This is where my first major criticism of this season comes in. I've never wanted JESSICA JONES to be a procedural detective story like any other network show – as much as I loved shows like CASTLE, I know that formula wouldn't work for JESSICA JONES. But she's meant to be a P.I. in a world where superpowers are a thing. This should give the show the opportunity to explore all kinds of stories and themes through that aforementioned superhero lens. The original Alias comics used such Marvel tropes as “the mutant problem” to represent teen alienation in the story of a missing girl and explored the meta-narrative of what happened to forgotten D-list characters and the show just... doesn't.
The show should definitely be driven by character, as strong as the character of Jessica is, but I'm not sure diving head first into the lore of Jessica Jones is what made the character that interesting in the first place. The only other case Jessica seems to take on whilst looking into her own backstory is the one given to her by Carrie-Anne Moss's Jeri Hogarth, who wants dirt on her legal partners to leverage against them as they try to force her out of her own law firm over her recent terminal diagnosis. And as brilliant as Carrie-Ann is, and compelling Hogarth is as a character, despite to my mind being a real piece of shit – the definition of character I love to hate – that sub-plot seems to be retreading old ground. Hogarth is in a bind but hears of research into superpowers that could help her situation. It's not only a rehash of her motivations from Season 1, but essentially the same plot as Sigourney Weaver's in THE DEFENDERS. Basically what I'm saying is, I don't think miring yourself in the past in the best way to take a show into the future.
Things were kept fresh enough, however, with developments into the mystery of Jessica's missing days involving a Cephalopod obsessed scientist as well as things taking a problematic turn between Trish and Malcolm as they both deal with respective addictions. Trish to the superhuman performance enhancers she first sampled in Season 1 and Malcolm's to no-strings sex, which is at least a little less destructive than heroin, though I can only see this all blowing up in their faces, which is a shame because all I want for them is happiness.
But just as I was getting over my concerns with this season's obsession with it's own lore, Episode 6 drops a bombshell that felt like it should have been obvious looking back now. McTeer's mysterious killer wasn't just a dark reflection of what Jessica could have become but is in fact her mother, long believed dead and presumably the recipient of a full facial reconstruction seeing as Jessica never recognised her.
Seems as though this show is truly on the track straight into Jessica's backstory whether I like it or not. It leaves the revelation that IGH had a boy on their books that could heal people, something that was very interesting to Hogarth in her current condition, kind of a bum deal as it now seems obvious that it's going to turn out to be Jessica's long dead brother, right? Perhaps the show still has some twists up it's sleeves for its second half? We'll have to see.
No spoilers please. A reviewer I may be, but a fan I am first and I'm still enjoying it, even if it's not as good as Season 1... so far.
Written by Nick Whitney, MCU Correspondent
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