In Marvel’s Jessica Jones, Krysten Ritter’s Jessica (left) is best friends with Rachael Taylor’s Trish Walker. Credit: Myles Aronowitz/Netflix
Marvel’s Jessica Jones uses the color purple as a thematic element for David Tennant’s Kilgrave, who in the comics has purple skin. Credit: Myles Aronowitz/Netflix
Mike Colter plays Luke Cage in Marvel’s Jessica Jones, a character scheduled for his own Netflix show. Credit: Myles Aronowitz/Netflix
By Andrew A. Smith
Tribune Content Agency
Just like the comic book on which it is based, Netflix’s Jessica Jones is a revelation.
The 13-episode first season, all of which became available Nov. 20, is based on a 2001 Marvel Comics series that was no ordinary Marvel Comics series. It was the first in Marvel’s adults-only “MAX” line – and as if to punctuate that distinction, the first word spoken on the first page was the F-bomb.
That original Jessica Jones series was named Alias, which wasn’t an option for the TV series. (Jennifer Garner, also known for her role in the Daredevil and Elektra movies, starred in an ABC series named Alias from 2001 to 2006.) Marvel still managed to name Jessica’s business “Alias Investigations” as a nod to the comics.
But that wasn’t the only reference to Jessica’s original medium, as the whole series was lifted almost whole from print to screen. In addition, there were a lot of comics references that weren’t in the original series, but fit in nicely.
But the most impressive aspect of Jessica Jones is just how daring both the comics and the series are in their depiction of the lead character. Never before had I seen a series offer me a lead character who was so unlikable that she didn’t even like herself! Jones, at the beginning of both comic book and TV series, is a bed-hopping, self-loathing alcoholic with a traumatic past who is slowly circling the drain.
And sure, detective noir is chockablock with male characters who answer, in varying degrees, to the description above. But for comics to offer a leading lady who wasn’t a paragon of virtue was pretty daring in 2001.
Moreover, the reason that Jessica is so unlikable is the real thunderbolt. Although writer Brian Michael Bendis strung out the mystery in the comics longer than the TV show did, the trauma was due to a minor Daredevil villain named Killgrave (Kilgrave on TV) who has the power to control minds. He can make anyone do anything, just by telling them to do it. No one can resist.
Despite this incredible power, Killgrave was minor because he was a lazy jerk. He didn’t want to control the world, he just gratified all of his petty and selfish impulses. So he lived in five-star hotels or mansions, and ate only gourmet meals, leaving in his wake mystified employees who got fired or homeowners who couldn’t account for weeks of time. He would force pretty girls to have sex with him, while ordering their boyfriends to commit suicide. It’s all pretty stomach-churning, but his destructive acts were on a personal, not global, scale. He fought Daredevil, after all, not the Avengers.
But minor villain or not, his effect on individuals is catastrophic. One such was Jessica herself. In the comics, she was under his control for months, forced to do all sorts of terrible things. In the end, one of Killgrave’s orders resulted in her attacking the Avengers, of which she was a member (as the superhero “Jewel”). She was saved from critical injury by her close friend Carol “Captain Marvel” Danvers, but that pretty much ended her superhero career.
That wasn’t the worst part. The effect of Killgrave’s repeated rape – of both mind and body – was to traumatize Jessica so badly that she could barely function. She built up walls around herself emotionally, chased away people who tried to help, engaged in rough sex to punish herself and drank to forget. She was haunted by Killgrave – an abuser from whom you could never be safe – and suffered flashbacks of her torture.
Now, a very good article on Salon.com by Sonia Saraiya makes the case that Jessica’s experience and resulting terror is a huge metaphor for domestic abuse. I admire the premise and the conclusion, but don’t feel qualified to comment further.
I can only comment on my own reaction, which was to see Jessica as a victim of post-traumatic stress disorder. Jessica Jones is, as Arthur Chu phrases it on Slate.com, “one of the grimmest, darkest, boldest shows out there: a TV show that’s essentially 13 hours of PTSD related to the aftermath of sexual assault.”
Chu also goes on to make the point that Kilgrave, played by the amazingly watchable David Tennant, is a metaphor for a Doctor Who gone bad. Since Tennant played the Tenth Doctor, that’s an easy leap to make.
While a genuinely clever observation, my reaction to Tennant’s performance was something else. I saw him as a guy who thought he was the hero of the story. And not just any story, but a love story. Kilgrave was romancing Jessica in the misogynistic way that always works in rom-coms, but in real life we call “stalking.”
Interestingly, Kilgrave is one of the few men of any note in the series. There’s also Malcolm, a junkie cobbled together from various comics characters. And Luke Cage, a superhero(ish) character who is pretty much the same on the show as he was in Alias. There was also Sgt. Simpson, who turned out to be part of an experimental military group who can take red pills to become more-or-less superhuman – and out of control. This mirrors a comics character named Nuke who, once again, was a Daredevil villain.
So much for the men. On to the women:
* Patricia “Trish” Walker (Rachael Taylor) takes the place of Carol Danvers as Jessica’s best friend, probably because Captain Marvel is scheduled for a movie in 2019. But Trish works even better, because she’s not a superhero (yet).
Back when Marvel Comics was called Timely Comics, they had a teen comedy series called Patsy Walker that turned into a romance book when the titular star graduated from high school. “Patsy Walker” is remarkable in that it lasted from 1945 (the Golden Age of Comics) to 1965 (the Silver Age of Comics), which puts it in a rarified club.
Amusingly, Patsy is Trish – the TV show even alludes (usually for laughs) to Walker’s career as a child TV and comic book star. And in the comics she eventually becomes the superhero Hellcat – which is still possible for the TV version, which I wouldn’t mind at all.
One further note on Trish: She is a true female friend, a rare bird on TV. Trish and Jessica don’t compete for men, don’t trade cute barbs and don’t spend all their time talking about boys. They obviously care for each other in genuine, non-sexual way. They crush the Bechdel Test.
* Jeri Hogarth (Carrie-Anne Moss) was a male in the comics, and it’s possible that this role was originally written for a man. Nevertheless. Moss’ steely performance as a legal shark is powerful. And whatever the provenance, points to Netflix for having a lesbian character who A) isn't played for male tittilation, and B) not very nice.
* Claire Temple (Rosario Dawson) is a combination of two comics characters, a nurse who was Luke Cage’s girlfriend in his early days, and a character called Night Nurse, who attends to superhero injuries. As a comics fan, it was surreal to watch a Claire Temple talk to a Luke Cage, as characters who did not know what I knew, about the relationship enjoyed by their doppelgangers in the comics. Anyway, since Rosario is destined to also appear in the next Netflix series Luke Cage, it’s likely she will be the element that draws these characters together for the last series Defenders.
Marvel is reprinting the original 28-issue series in four volumes titles Jessica Jones: Alias. Two volumes are already out, volume three arrived at comic shops Nov. 25 and volume four is scheduled for January, 2016.
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