So the Netflix Marvel train keeps on chugging, and now we’re finally starting to get continuations
of shows other than Daredevil even though yes, honestly I would probably take Daredevil
season 3 over all of these.
Where is it Netflix?
Anyway, Jessica Jones season 1 is probably my favorite Marvel Netflix show behind Daredevil,
so I was excited to see what they’d do with season 2.
Now that it’s out, let’s talk about it.
*clip* And look, the show’s been out for a while,
so I’m saying full spoilers.
And there are some pretty big twists and turns in this season, so yeah, you’ve been warned.
So, was this season as good as the first?
*sigh* well….sort of but not really.
To be honest I found parts of this season, especially towards the end, quite frustrating.
Because I loved the first 7 episodes so much and then it sort of dropped off and it was
just frustrating to watch play out.
This was incredibly similar to Luke Cage season 1 in that way.
Luke Cage I loved the first like 5 to 7 episodes, then a big twist happens and the show takes
a dramatic turn, and then the rest is ehhh not as good.
Pretty much the exact same thing happened here.
I mean the rest was good, quite good actually.
And it had some really satisfying character moments, and Kilgrave showed up, which we’ll
get to, but just significantly not as good.
Let’s get some structure here though.
Firstly Krysten Ritter as Jessica Jones, I mean the Netflix shows in general have been
pretty perfect with their casting, mostly, and this is one of the best examples.
Also just on a side note, watch any interview with Krysten Ritter in real life, she seems
nothing like Jessica Jones.
Jones is also an incredibly interesting character but also a character that could easily become
very unlikable, so props to Ritter and the writing for keeping that from happening.
The returning cast is great, Hogarth, Trish, the new additions like Oscar are pretty great.
I’ll get to Jessica’s mom in a bit.
The one I wanna give a special mention to though is Malcolm, I quite enjoyed him in
season 1 but I thought he was phenomenal here.
His character has a really interesting arc this season and I loved the performance.
I also love him and Jessica together, so the ending where he quits and goes to work for
Hogarth and that rival PI, I like seeing him change and getting his act together properly
but I’m gonna miss Jones and Malcolm together.
Seeing him go up against her could be fun though.
The show is well shot, everything is well made, the music is great, the writing’s
pretty fantastic for the first half and some of the second.
And I gotta say, despite me not loving the second half as much, I never found this show
boring or even too long.
My biggest complaint with these Netflix Marvel shows is that they’re 13 episodes when they
really could be 8 to 10, however this one, while yeah there’s some stuff that could
be trimmed, I didn’t really feel that.
Now full disclosure, there’s a big chance that’s cuz I made the choice to watch all
of these one episode a day instead of binging it in one weekend.
And I know people’s experiences differ, but I gotta say it is so much better and more
enjoyable for me at least, and that’s how I’m gonna be handling these shows going
forward.
The show entirely is entertaining.
I also thought it was fun to get back to this way more grounded corner of the MCU, like
yeah there are some supernatural elements but it feels more like how Marvel Netflix
originally was, there are no ancient organizations or dragon bones or magic ninja fists, and
yeah I like some of those aspects but seeing this very gritty side again was cool.
The conflicts and plot lines here are great, and I felt the show did a really good job
of balancing a lot of plot lines.
I found them all interesting and entertaining, mainly cuz the characters are so good.
The main internal conflict with Jessica, dealing with being a killer and balancing the life
of a hero and all that was particularly fascinating.
And that sort of ties into Kilgrave coming back for one episode.
I mean of course I was gonna love seeing one of the best villains in the entire MCU and
in any superhero property ever in my opinion come back, but I thought they handled it well.
They didn’t bring him back fully and negate that whole big plot point of the first season,
it didn’t feel super cheap or like cheating with the rules of the world.
To be honest the show was mostly good enough that I never really felt a big missing presence
from Kilgrave, but it was so much fun to see him again.
David Tennant is awesome as always, and as well as being fan service it did actually
serve a story purpose and fit into the whole conflict of her feeling like a killer.
So yeah, I loved that.
The mystery is very good, the action and special effects are few and far between, but when
they’re there, yeah they’re solid.
Nothing really to speak of though.
There are some very funny moments, and also some surprisingly emotional moments.
Especially with Hogarth at the end, like I wasn’t crying but you just feel so bad for
her, like these people do like the worst thing to her and seeing her breakdown it was a pretty
powerful moment.
These Marvel Netflix shows sometimes have some political commentary int here, and this
one I thought handled it pretty well, with stuff like Me Too and illegal immigration.
It was interesting, wasn’t too heavy handed, and fit with the story.
In terms of if it connects to the MCU or the Netflix world….not really.
There’s a Rand mention, there’s a Captain America toy, Foggy showing up was fun, and
the biggest one probably is the mention of the Raft, which really solidified this as
a post Civil War MCU thing.
But there aren’t really any big tie ins, and I like that, I like that you know it’s
in that world but it’s not beating you over the head with it.
Also I continue to love Turk Barrett as like the Stan Lee of these Netflix shows, I always
smile when he pops up.
I also liked the ending where she goes back to being a PI and starts trying to have a
normal life with Oscar and Vido, that was sweet and felt like an actual good development
for her character.
Now as far as what I didn’t like, let’s get some small things out of the way first.
Didn’t like the Whizzer in the first episode, the effect just looked so weird and campy
and cheap and maybe that was intentional but it just did not fit in this show at all.
Again though, he’s there for like 5 minutes so it's not a big deal.
There are some face prosthetics that are pretty bad and look sort of hilarious and not terrifying
as they’re supposed to.
The end reveal of Trish having powers felt very Spider-Man 1 and again was sort of just
more cheesy than this show really otherwise was going for, but I kinda enjoyed that.
Or at least I’m interested to see where it goes next season.
Now let’s get to the big thing that kinda made this show worse for me.
Or really, it’s not the reveal itself that made this worse, it’s just the reveal and
then how things developed afterwards.
Now to be clear, I liked episodes 8-13, some very much so.
They’re still entertaining and they’re nowhere near say Inhumans or even Iron Fist.
But comparatively, they do not stack up.
So if you haven’t seen it and are watching this for some reason, it’s revealed that
this crazy woman with super strength who Jessica has been clashing with is actually her mother,
who didn’t die in that car accident when she was a kid but actually was given powers
as well and also given insane mood swings.
And look, before that, I loved this woman as the villain.
I thought she was genuinely terrifying.
Those powers mixed with that anger mixed with the performance, I was uneasy everytime she
was ons cren.
And the reveal itself, I didn’t hate, although it did kinda give me PTSD to Luke Cage.
But then afterwards, just ugh.
Firstly the next episode stops the story dead in its tracks to do a flashback episode, also
kinda like Luke Cage except I enjoyed the Luke Cage flashback episode more.
It’s already annoying that the story is being halted to show us this, but I mean some
of this we need to know like about Jessica’s mom and the doctor, but then there’s stuff
like the origins of her leather jacket, it’s like do we really need to see this?
It started to feel a bit like Wolverine Origins.
It also felt oddly more dumb and less subtle than the rest of the show, and mre cliche.Like
her mom talking to her while she’s in the bathroom and Jessica having this tragic backstory
on top of her already tragic backstory of her first love who her mother killed, it gives
this a lot more kinda destiny stuff rather than just, bad things happen to this person
and now she fights crime.
And I just wasn’t really a fan of that.
Then after episode 7 or so we get more of this mother storyline,a and there was some
of it that I liked and some that I didn’t.
For one the actress who plays the mom is good sometimes and sometimes is a little too over
the top.
It reminded me of Daisy’s dad from Agents of SHIELD, if anyone remembers this guy, it’s
like sometimes hey that’s pretty nuanced or terrifying and then sometimes it’s like,
alright, there’s a little too much scenery chewing here.
Jessica teams up with her mom at points and they start to bond more and that should be
really nice and interesting and maybe even emotional, but the thing is I didn't’t like
her mom at all.
Like you’re supposed to hate her and then gradually start to like hr like Jessica does
but I didn’t.
With her character and the writing for her and the things she does and even sometimes
the performance, I just didn’t end up liking her, which is a problem cuz a big part of
your enjoyment of those last few episodes relies on that.
So if you did end up liking her, I’m sure you enjoyed those more.
But like they team up at the end and Jessica choses to go with her mom nad it’s supposed
to be like a happy and emotional and sweet moment, like ohhh she chose her mom, but the
whole time I was like, no, go back, go to Malcolm.
Character wise and just plot wise she’s not as compelling, so I was just mildly annoyed
watching those scenes.
Also the finale with the hero stuff where they save this family was sort of fun but
also a bit too on the nose, especially for this show.
Like they just happen of ind this perfect happy family and then they just happen to
get into a car crash similar to Jessica’s family’s right afterwards.
It kinda felt like the flashback episode, where it felt way too obvious for what this
show otherwise was.
It’s all still alright, but watching it I was just slightly frustrated, cuz clearly
the people involved in this show have a lot of talent and clearly they were putting effort
into this plot line, I just found it much less engaging than what was going on before.
I will say it picks up a bit at episode 10 when the mom goes to jail, there was some
stuff there that I quite liked.
And the very end with Trish shooting her mom in the head at Jessica’s childhood amusement
park was a pretty good intense moment.
I know it sounds messed up, but I was kinda hoping her character would die just cuz I
really didn’t want a Jessica Jones mom teamup for another entire season.
So on the whole, Jessica Jones season 2 is fantastic.
In a lot of ways it lives up to the first season, and I didn't feel it drag as I have
with some of these other shows, even the ones I like.
But how much you love this season sort of depends on how much you get behind one particular
character and the plot line that goes with her.
And personally I didn't love it as much as the rest of the show.
Still it’s a well written exciting show that I would totally recommend and I’m absolutely
looking forward to seeing these characters more, whether in Defender's season 2 or Jessica
Jones season 3.
I’ll give this season an 8.6/10.
So those were my thoughts on Jessica Jones season 2.
What did you think of it?
Let me know all of your thoughts down below in the comments.
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Thanks for watching and I’ll see ya next time.