Stranger Things: Season 2 (2017)

WARNING: SPOILERS!  (There are definitely some specifics spoiled here, so come back to this when you finish watching it, or if you just don't care about spoilers.)

Admittedly, a follow up to last year's break-out Netflix show Stranger Things was always going to be in a tough spot. So much of the fun was how little anyone knew of it. The discovery and subsequent ability to pass it onto the next unsuspecting victim helped build an organic hype machine. That is inherently lost here, particularly since they chose to stick with the same cast of characters in the same town. Of course, that social aspect has no real bearing on the overall quality of a show.

It's probable fans will love this as well. Yet the second season follows a lot of trappings that most sequels fall into - too much rehashing of the first, unsatisfying explanations of past events, a little too much attention spent on comic relief, a problem with scaling, and some ambitious writing leading to inconsistent pacing. At the same time, it's the same trip down Nostalgia Lane (complete with some brilliant and subtle homages), with the same great characters, and surprisingly dark sci-fi elements mixed with in for good measure. Bears noting that the score might even be better than the first season's (which says a lot about S U R V I V E's capabilities).

The aforementioned sequel trappings are very much present, and it could be considered a problem depending on your stance. If you're inclined to believe that the Duffer Brothers trying to mimic their favorite sequels means something positive, then this won't be a problem. Conversely, if you think copying the worst aspects of Hollywood isn't exactly...great, these issues might stand out.

The ultimate weakness with the second season is in the structure and writing. It isn't that the dialogue is worse, although there is a bit too much comic relief at times and it is occasionally ham-fisted and corny beyond what it should be. It's just the amount of disconnected filler. Season 2 suffers from the the "More Problem."

Almost always, sequels try to improve upon the popular original material by going bigger and doing more. For example, how do you top the terror of a single xenomorph in Alien? Well, obviously, just throw in an entire swarm of them in Aliens! Just add more aliens! That is certainly the case here (instead of one humanoid creature to terrorize the town, they go with a hoard of canine-like versions). Additionally, there is just more stuff in general. Where season one was eight episodes at forty-five minutes a pop, season two is nine episodes that are all nearly an hour long. More space to fill, especially in Netflix shows, has generally meant a fair amount of dead air.

It isn't necessarily fair to compare the two seasons, but it is worth taking a moment to note the structural changes that weaken it. There are several different branches of story in the inaugural series. You've got Hopper doing his thing. Joyce does hers. The boys do their thing with Eleven. Nancy and Jonathan have their story. It's a splintered narrative, as most shows are. What makes it work so well is how connected they inherently are. All of the separated plot threads revolve around finding Will. So, when it comes time to have all plot lines converge on a single point, it happens pretty organically. This is entirely because each story is separate, but related.

Season two, however, has a lot of fat. Some of the story lines are connected, to be sure, but they hardly line up as well. Everyone is going after a different objective. Dustin, Lucas, Steve, and Max are trying to contain their Dart problem. Hopper, Joyce, and Mike are trying to figure out what's going on with Will and his visions. Nancy and Jonathan are searching for a way to expose the secret government lab in town. Eleven eventually ends up on a journey of self-discovery. It's all disjointed plot threads. By itself, that is not so much of a problem. It becomes one when all plot points try to converge on the same moment in the larger narrative. The organic melding of threads from the first season is abandoned for some contrived reasons to put everyone together at the end.

Even more, there are secondary story lines that hardly get any attention beyond set-up. They are abandoned, ignored, or - in some instances - lack any actual conclusion. Take, for instance, the character story arc of Mike and his animosity towards Max. This gets set up pretty early. There isn't much explanation for it. And by the end, Mike never has a moment of recognizing Max's worth, or acknowledging that he has been a prick to her. Another great example is the Lucas/Dustin competition for Max's attention, which gets set up early, is almost never explored in any depth, and then has one of the strangest "conclusions" (in that it makes no sense why Dustin would even think of Max romantically by the end, but apparently he still does). Worse: the Max/Billy relationship has an air of mystery around it, gets almost no exploration, doesn't answer some of the questions they ask, and all builds to just a small character moment for Max, who doesn't really add that much to the overall story in her own right (which is a shame since she's a solid character). It winds up feeling like a distraction. The entire Jonathan/Nancy plot seems to exist exclusively to pacify fans dissatisfied with both the fact they didn't wind up together, and that Barb had seemingly been forgotten.

Eleven suffers the worst in the new season. She is literally forced to the sidelines for the first two-thirds of the season. Her story is not inherently uninteresting, but it also has nothing to do with the central plot. She serves the season primarily as the deus ex machina. With no bearing on the story, she is brought in literally at the end just to save the day because she's the one with the powers. Her detour in episode seven is completely unnecessary, disruptive to the pacing, and causes a strange tonal shift. An entire episode away from the intense action episode six ended on, it winds up feeling like something out of an '80s UK comic book. While the whole season is likely to be viewed fondly, it might not be so unexpected if that episode winds up being a bit polarizing.

None of this is to suggest there aren't interesting or well-executed elements. Easily the smartest thing they did was re-shape Steve into an actual person, with redeemable qualities. His relationship with Dustin comes out of nowhere, but works surprisingly well. On top of that, everything they did with Paul Reiser's character was clever and subversive. A doctor at the secret evil government facility, it is easy to keep expecting the moment revealing his true intentions. Turns out, he doesn't really have any. He has moments that lack awareness, but he does seem to genuinely want to help these people. It puts a spin on the "evil government agency" trope that is actually pretty refreshing. The dynamic between Hopper and Joyce also serves as a strength. (There should be no question that the Duffer Brothers clearly think of those two characters as their bread and butter for pushing the larger story.) Splitting the kids up even breeds interesting elements to the narrative.

On a technical level, it holds up to the first season - minus a few things. The obsession with psych-out "jump scares" is incredible! Few shows have so heavily relied on the fake out. In fact, one scene uses the fake out to build up to...another fake out scare. There is a lack of genuine terror in season two that season one managed to pull off with the single demogorgon. Loud, startling noises are the bane of modern horror. Stranger Things uses the fake out quite excessively.

[As an aside: can writers please retire the old schtick of a character saying something like, "This isn't (insert fiction)! This is real life!" Every time a character says that, at least have the decency to have them turn to the camera, nod, and wink at the audience. Seriously, it wasn't that clever the first time someone did that "meta" joke. They use that line and a variation of it twice in the same episode.]

All in all, it'd be hard to argue season two was anywhere near the level of season one, but that should not be mistaken to mean it wasn't enjoyable. At times, it almost seemed reminiscent of Attack the Block, with a pretty obvious The Exorcist vibe by the end. There's a lot of stuff that really works.

It is probably worth noting that I was born in '87, which means I grew up in the '90s. I don't have the same nostalgia for all things '80s like a lot of other people seem to. The showrunners handle it well (although at times, a little clunkier than in season one), but occurring in that time period doesn't fill me with any deeper emotions. I understand that this aesthetic will touch others in a more personal fashion than it can for me. It's easy to see why some would gravitate towards the show's aesthetic and allow that to do a little more lifting than the writing. For me, personally, the comfort of nostalgia doesn't quite cover for the structural issues.

It's one of those things that, for me, the more I think about it, the more mediocre I think the second season is. However, the worst of Stranger Things is still better than a lot of things - especially from Netflix. I suspect I'll be in the minority on this. I liked it, but I do think when I revisit the show, I'll probably just stick with season one. I liked the ideas put forth by fans as to what the end of that season meant a lot more than what the Duffer Brothers actually did with it.

REDUCTIVE RATING: It's...fine.  (But I presume everyone else will think better of it.)

Stranger Things (2016)

Netflix has a funny way of handling content sometimes. They'll make a hard push to promote things like Orange is the New Black, Daredevil, or House of Cards. Then they sneak in something like Lady Dynamite or, in this particular case, Stranger Things. For a show that got next to no real hype prior to dropping, the '80s nostalgia trip and Stephen King's Greatest Hits compilation almost immediately struck a chord with audiences, becoming one of the most talked about shows of the year.

In many respects, it's easy to compare Stranger Things to something like the original Star Wars. The creators were clearly influenced and inspired by many things that came before. Using that, they've essentially remixed many of those elements into something fresh. Though it maybe doesn't add too much new stuff to the table, Stranger Things largely succeeds by adequately bringing old things back. So many elements are either lifted from other works or are amalgamations of them, but they feel very fresh in modern times. It doesn't hurt that the Duffer brothers happen to have excellent tastes, subsequently taking from a wide array of films, television, and video games.

There's a lot one can talk about when breaking it down. Following a group of young, nerdy boys as they search for their missing friend, they stumble upon something incredible and terrifying. What makes Stranger Things feel even more refreshing is that they have practically abandoned the "mystery box" formula popularized by J.J. Abrams. There is a mystery in Hawkins, Indiana, and while not everything is spelled out for the viewers, we are not wholly ignorant to the goings-on. We watch D&D group Mike, Dustin, and Lucas search for Will. They don't know what happened to him. We the viewers, however, saw him get attacked by a monster, and get clues from another plot thread that tell us he is alive. Similarly, police chief Jim Hopper investigates unusual circumstances that we know the government is involved in.

It strikes a happy medium between unknown mystery and allowing us to watch how the characters deal with it. The trouble with shows like Lost is that the "what comes next?" and "what's going on?" questions often supersede the characters. It would have been easy for the show runners to hook people by revealing very little, ending each episode with enigmatic cliffhangers. Instead, they make sure to give viewers just enough that the driving factor for coming back to the show is concern or love for the characters.

(As an aside, a friend of mine pointed out that keeping the viewers more informed than the characters actually functions to relate those watching to the character of Will. Trapped in the parallel dimension known as the Upside Down, Will knows what is going on with this horrifying creature, but he is almost powerless to do anything about it. Occasionally, he can flick some lights, but other than that, he can't do much. It's an interesting take, and one that I find worth bringing up.)

Though references and influences of The Goonies and E.T. are pretty obvious (Episode 1 starts and finishes with nearly identical shots from E.T., for example), the show isn't just one of those kids-on-their-own adventure films. You've also got Chief Hopper trying to solve this unique mystery. It's sort of an X-Files, Twin Peaks, Jaws type of story. Plus, you've got Will's mother Joyce (the very enjoyable Winona Ryder) in this "Is she right or insane?" type of tale, fulfilling a Richard Dreyfus/Close Encounters of the Third Kind role. Then there's Nancy, Jonathan, and Steve who are essentially in an '80s rom-com at the start.

So much of the show excels when all these differing stories and genres start to converge onto a single point. At just eight episodes, it moves quickly. There isn't much time to dillydally, and these plots all begin to meet at almost exactly the middle. Being well paced dramatically impacts the effectiveness of the mystery, rewarding viewers in such a timely fashion so as to never feel like we're being reeled in by creators who would reveal that they used a lure instead of real bait.

Not everything is perfect, of course. While the internet appears to have a love affair with Barb, she's ultimately not much of a character worth noting in terms of the narrative. Her brief arc is tiny, slightly disappointing, and even highlights that sometimes the writing is a tad distracted - occasionally unsure of how much time to dedicate to each area of the story. The conclusion also has some anti-climactic moments that felt like they could have either used more of a build up or more clarity. The series starts off with the boys playing a Dungeons & Dragons campaign that spells out what is going to happen in the series (a structural tactic I always enjoy - see every Edgar Wright movie). The finale sees them finishing the campaign, with each friend objecting to its end with a series of questions related to the show's plot. Their questions about the campaign, and its lack of satisfying answers, all connect to the viewer's questions about the conclusion of the season. This is one of my favorite techniques in media. However, I'm not quite sure the fantasy aspect of the Dungeons & Dragons game ultimately connects that well with the sci-fi/horror elements that dominated the show. It's a neat way to spell everything out, but it doesn't quite connect as well as other aspects of the show, and feels a tad bit like a way to build their "nerd cred" by showing that they know something about D&D.

The acting is top notch for a show reliant on young child actors. Each one really stood out, right at home with all of your favorite kid-centric movies. The teens are also surprisingly believable characters for an '80s era set. There's been some strange criticism of Ryder, but frankly, she nails the understandably distraught and disheveled mother with the Dreyfus-esque "might be losing her mind" trope. Even David Harbour excels at the nuance of Chief Hopper, a character who starts off seeming like he's going to be unlikable, but winds up the most interesting part of the show.

Of course, no discussion of Stranger Things can be considered complete without mentioning the original score as well.  Composers Kyle Dixon and Michael Stein nail the '80s nostalgia, John Carpenter-inspired soundtrack. It's arguably more perfectly recreated than Disasterpeace's amazing soundtrack for It Follows, itself a throwback to Carpenter films.

Even if you're not a big fan of the '80s, or don't care about all of the references, Easter eggs, and nods to all those things thirty-somethings cling to out of an often misguided sense of unwarranted nostalgia, Stranger Things is still great. It's incredibly well structured, intelligently written, excellently paced, and one of the more visually intriguing shows to grace the Netflix platform.

Although, can we please agree to stop talking about its title fonts? Really, it's not that interesting...

REDUCTIVE RATING:  Amazing!
(Rating Scale - Terrible..., Pretty Bad, It's Fine, Pretty Good, Amazing!)

Daredevil - Season 2 (SPOILERS)

SPOILER WARNING: Heads up! Though I will try to not get into too many specifics of the show, proceed with caution. It's hard to really break down the entire season without getting into at least some spoilers.

The first season of Marvel's venture into a series of Netflix shows was something of a revelation and breath of fresh air. Daredevil was darker, more violent, and more intense than anything we had seen in their cinematic experiences, or in their rather lackluster attempts at network television. Netflix serves as a place where they can change up the tone from the typical light-hearted, easily accessible to a wider audience content. In essence, Netflix has become the MAX imprint. Jessica Jones took it further with more mature themes as well. Both shows have been well received both by fans and critics, showing that Marvel is just at the top of the game come the comic book superhero genre on screen.

The much anticipated second season improves on a number of things in many ways. The action somehow manages to be even more fun, dramatic, excellent, and exhausting. The plot moves more briskly. We actually get some actual chemistry between Matt Murdoch and another character, especially Frank Castle. Similar to the inaugural season, the Daredevil (and Elektra) costume and dialogue aren't great, but they're improved a bit. Fortunately, while Vincent D'onofrio's Kingpin isn't heavily featured, we still get one totally gripping performance in Jon Bernthal's take on the Punisher. Ray Stevenson's Punisher in the under-appreciated Punisher War Zone might be the most accurate capturing of the comic book character we've seen on screen, but Bernthal's Frank Castle is arguably the most interesting Punisher there's ever been. It's a bit telling that so far through two seasons, Daredevil has been one of the least interesting characters in his own show. Part of that is inevitable, given his black and white moral code, and how - like Spider-man before him - that whole guilt complex can get a bit tedious and annoying after a little while. Still, a lot of it has to do with stellar performances from both Bernthal and D'onofrio.

And of course, all of the ninjas! In fact, the action of Daredevil is probably the best action in any television show. The choreography is great and entertaining, but the coordinators have done a great job defining each character with their own traits and styles. Even in the poor lighting, you can tell who is who based on their stances, the way they defend themselves, the kinds of punches or kicks they throw. It's pretty cool to see such choreography used to further define characters.

The show picks up about a year after the events of last season. One thing the show's creators have done well is use previous events as the set-up to the current ones. In season one, the devastation caused by the aliens in The Avengers is the backdrop for Wilson Fisk's rise to prominence and his ability to take over the city during reconstruction. Here in season two, it's the power vacuum created when Daredevil revealed Kingpin's illicit activities and put him behind bars. Several gangs had taken up arms to fill the space, which gave birth to the Punisher. Similarly, the events of last season allowed the Hand to operate in the shadows more fully, as they were trying to keep out of Daredevil's metaphorical sight.

The pacing of the show could be described as break-neck through the first four or five episodes. There's the obvious juxtaposition of moral boundaries between the Punisher and Daredevil, where the former puts the bad guys down for good whereas the latter has faith in the justice system. This is the source of their conflict, and it's the big theme for most of the show. This is how they thematically connect the Punisher story line with the Elektra line too.

For some, the season might feel a bit disjointed. The specifics of the Punisher stuff and the Elektra stuff are completely separate. They aren't related. The conspiracy behind Frank's murdered family and the sting operation gone south doesn't connect in any real way to Elektra, Stick, and their war with the Hand. However, they do connect thematically for a while. The conflict between Matt Murdoch and the other players is the same. Frank Castle doesn't have the same faith in the system that Matt does. He tells him outright that he puts the criminals down for good, so that they can't hurt anyone else ever again, whereas Daredevil puts them behind bars where they may eventually get out and go back to a life of crime. Similarly, Stick and Elektra are preparing for a war with the Hand. They are going to have to get their hands bloody with all the ninjas they'll wind up killing. Both Elektra and Punisher view their crusades as a war, and both of them acknowledge that they're killers. Even Karen Page gets in on the action with her support of Frank, getting into an argument with Matt over the fact that she feels the Punisher's tactics are effective for keeping the city safe.

It is Daredevil that can't handle any of it. It pits him against Punisher. It creates conflict with Elektra. And it causes tension with Karen. Being the good Catholic boy he is, he firmly believes that it is not their decision on who lives and who dies. His Catholicism actually comes into play several times throughout the season, which is kind of nice as that has been something of an unexplored element of his personality.

The big crisis for him comes after the return of Fisk. When Matt finds out that Fisk is still exerting his power and influence from behind bars, he has a bit of a crisis of faith. Despite regularly arguing with Frank that people don't need to die, he caves late in the season and argues that maybe just this one time on this one case, they'll kill someone. Daredevil doesn't kill anyone, obviously, but it shows just how much he's lost of himself by that point.

In many ways, this is the most "Daredevil-y" thing ever to exist outside the comics. We've got the problematically self-righteous Matt pushing everyone he loves away while talking about how much they ground him. He preaches his moral code to a bunch of other vigilantes. There's a conspiracy occurring behind the scenes in which Fisk is involved. And then there's a ton of ninjas that he has to fight off. You don't get much more Daredevil than that!

Not everything works, of course. While they thematically connect Elektra and Punisher, their stories are completely separate. This results in something of a disjointed final act, wherein you've got Karen investigating the Punisher conspiracy and Matt hunting down the Hand. They don't cross paths on screen, and once the war with the Hand begins, thematic connections go out the window, creating a bit of a mismatch of tones. Some new fans from the last season might be a bit turned off by the absurdity of the ancient ninja organization with an affinity for mysticism, but the Punisher conspiracy and the Kingpin control elements are very much in line with the first season. As a long time Daredevil fan myself, I loved finally seeing the Hand come into play in full force. Halfway through the season, I tweeted about how Daredevil without ninjas is sort of like Iron Man without technology, so it was great to see so many ninjas show up! But it could be a bit too weird for fans of the previous season, and it feels a bit like a tonal mismatch with the more grounded Punisher story.

Even more, Elektra's story is a bit lackluster. Fans of the comic book character should tone down expectations going into it, as she resembles little of the source material. Still, other than that she fulfills one of my most hated plot devices (character with an inevitable destiny), she did grow on me eventually. Her being the secret weapon of the Hand felt a bit clunky and awkward, and the idea that she's just naturally a killer maybe allowed for a brief thematic connection to the Punisher stuff, but at some point just became a bit of a contrived means for drama between her and Matt. Additionally, the Punisher story - and his difference with Daredevil - doesn't get the amount of time and focus it deserved to be fully explored, in order to make room for Elektra and the Hand.

The final two episodes feel a bit rushed as well. It's vastly improved from the finale of last season, but there are a number of elements that come out of nowhere or make sudden jumps. Finding out that Clancy Brown's character is behind the Frank Castle conspiracy feels cheap, as he was never really in the show save for one brief courtroom scene. His motive also doesn't exactly make the most sense either. Then there's a strange series of events wherein we see Karen struggling to write her article, cut to Matt talking to a detective who reveals someone was looking into who Daredevil has saved, and then cut to Karen kidnapped by the Hand. It's a weirdly edited sequence that also comes out of nowhere. Doesn't help matters much that after the final battle with the Hand, we cut to Karen returning to her office to work on the article. They apparently had to just randomly interrupt that with a kidnapping.

And this is to say nothing of how awfully convenient it is that Foggy just happens to show up on the scene of the battle between Matt and the Hand. Or that Punisher - who has been off doing his own, totally separate thing for more than half the season at that point - shows up randomly at the end, just to shoot two ninjas and give a little nod to Daredevil before leaving. (We don't even really get to see his sweet armor getup that well, since it happens pretty quickly.) And then Stick shows up at the very end to finally kill Nobu (probably?) even though we last saw him tied up in Matt's apartment. There are just a lot of things that happen really quickly at the end. It feels rushed in a similar way to last season.

Fortunately, the final few episodes are also jam packed with awesome action sequences. In fact, most of the season plays out with enough redeeming qualities as to make up for the weaknesses. If Fisk were gripping enough of a character to cover for the poor dialogue and stilted chemistry among the cast in the first season, the action sequences and thematic connections between Punisher, Elektra, and Daredevil make up for some of the similarly mediocre dialogue, similarly stilted chemistry, and dangling or unclear plot elements (like Daredevil's loss of hearing through a couple of episodes, or what exactly was going on with his hearing in the tunnels, or what's the deal with those creepy kids?).  There might not be anything as instantly incredible and lasting as the hallway fight in episode two of the first season, but there's a ton of top notch, close-quarter combat in this season.

It's another strong outing from Marvel, improving on the success of the first season and of Jessica Jones. What has been really nice about the Netflix series is the way they handle world-building, or rather, don't do it. They generally work in references to the larger world more subtly or organically, but the lack of regular nods gives these series a more contained atmosphere. We all know there are other things happening, but those don't matter to the story these writers are telling. It allows these shows to be a lot more focused. It's also been rather refreshing to get away from the typical kind of origin stories we see happening all the time on the big screen or on the CW.

I said that they don't exactly do a lot of world-building. What I mean by that is in most cases, this world is already built. When Elektra shows up, Matt already knows who she is. They already have a history. Same thing happened with Stick in the first season. The Hand is already a thing with a long history. They've already been setting their plan in motion. Wilson Fisk is already a criminal mastermind when we first see him. Frank Castle's family has already been killed, and he's already determined to find who was behind it all. Even at the start of the entire series, Matt Murdoch has already been engaging in vigilantism. The same thing happens in Jessica Jones as well. She's already tried the superhero thing. She already has a history with Kilgrave. Luke Cage is already a character and already has his powers. What we as viewers are seeing is a world that is already built and established. What the creators do, often through effective use of flashbacks, is unveil it for us. It's a neat way to handle it, and quite different from the way the movies do things, where we have to kind of see everyone's origin story or they have to reference or slowly introduce each character. (That's been a bit different in Phase 2, which has seen a bit more of the Netflix style, but we didn't exactly see this approach on the silver screen until after we saw it on the small one. It's definitely a nice change of pace.)

Season two has, in my opinion, been quite an improvement overall. The lack of a strong centralized character maybe makes it feel a bit disjointed at times, particularly late in the season, but there's enough improvement everywhere else to mask it. Plus, the themes are a bit more intriguing and relevant to the Daredevil character. It is a lot more violent, which is to be expected given its heavily featuring of the Punisher and Elektra, so if you found that element of season one to be a bit much, then season two might not be for you. And the stuff with the Hand might get a bit too weird for some viewers as well, so if you loved the grounded nature of the first season incredible, you may be in for a bit of a surprise there too.

In my mind, though, this is the most Daredevil thing on screen to date in a number of ways. Working in the mystical element definitely opens the door more for Iron Fist which should be in production soon, I'd imagine. The promo for Luke Cage looks promising too. I don't want all of this stuff to be dark and gritty and brooding, but it's nice to have something more mature. The Marvel movies are a ton of fun, and I love them, but no one wants the same thing over and over again. Daredevil is proving to be a great counterbalance to the Guardians of the Galaxy's of their content.

Jessica Jones

Look, I still don't understand why we will never get a Black Widow movie. I still maintain they had the perfect opportunity for it too after Captain America: The Winter Soldier. Think about it. We know Natalia has history with Bucky (or at least, it's implied in the film). She's also part of Cap's team working to locate him after the events of the film. Plus, she's portrayed by Scarlett Johansson, who is one of the world's biggest actresses and had already started in an action film that topped the box office. Access to an actress with known box office draw, plus a story perfectly built in with the means to both explore Black Widow's history and actual character while bringing Bucky back into the fold more fully? You literally can't get a better opportunity than that for your first big female-protagonist work.

Jessica Jones is the first relevant female-lead effort from Marvel Studios, really. (Sorry, Agent Carter isn't really relevant to the current MCU.)  She's the first superheroine to get her own thing, and she takes place in the current Marvel universe. Though she doesn't really connect much to the other events, it's still a big deal that she's in this world.

More importantly, while it might be the second show to follow a female character specifically, it's the first of any Marvel Studios work to be helmed by an actual, living, functioning woman. Yes, the talented Maurissa Tancharoen was involved in Agents of SHIELD, but she shares creator credit with Joss and Jed Whedon. Jessica Jones is run and largely written by Melissa Rosenberg.

It's this embracing of a female perspective that makes the show stand out among the rest. Marvel's Netflix stuff is clearly designed for more mature audiences. It's a means to tell more serious stories and get away from the more fun-oriented and easy-going nature of their films and basic cable shows. Tonally, Jessica Jones shares much with its predecessor, Daredevil. They utilize a similar visual style, although Daredevil is visually darker and more noir-like. And there's a level of brutality in both that can be hard to watch.

But Jessica Jones is a show written and directed by a woman, focused on a woman, and dealing with issues largely pertaining specifically to women. At its core, it's still a really solid crime noir story. The mystery unravels at a fluid pace, though it maybe takes a little longer to really pick up than Daredevil. What stands out on this work though is that while the Man Without Fear was utilized to basically just be a cool comic book adaptation (although it's arguably warning against the nasty nature of gentrification - sort of), Jessica Jones tackles larger issues.

Rape, domestic violence, and abusive relationships are the central themes of the story. Everything functions to serve this core. In pushing those elements, choosing Kilgrave as the primary villain is the perfect choice. Better known in comics as the Purple Man, Kilgrave has the ability to command people to do his bidding. If he tells you to do something, you have no choice. He can basically mind-control you. Inherently, you can see a connection between that power and, say, drugging women.

So much of Jessica's struggle is breaking away from Kilgrave's control - an obvious parallel to abusive relationships. In the real world, people often shrug it off by just saying, "If he's bad to her, why doesn't she just leave him?" Well, it's not usually mind-control, but a lot of times, it's a lot more complicated than that. Even Jessica's best friend/sort of sister Trish deals with this a bit with her quasi-boyfriend Simpson. Both women, at some point, just want to get away from this guy who's "bad to her," but they can't.

Even more is the idea that Jessica can't really go to anyone for help. She basically starts off wondering what she's supposed to do. When she finds out Kilgrave is alive and after her again, her initial instinct is to flee. Others suggest she go to the police for help, but she's stuck wondering what that's supposed to do. What, she's supposed to tell them she was raped and abused by a guy using mind-control? Obviously, no one will believe her, not unlike many real life rape victims who often risk being mercilessly scrutinized themselves should they report a rape. There are a bunch of reasons why many women don't step forward to report it. This is manifested in the show through powers.

Given that both Trish and Jessica deal with sleazy, abusive, obsessive men, it would be easy to think of "men" as the villain, but that's not true. (Although I'm sure meninist morons are boycotting it anyway.) Jessica in particular is largely able to grow and overcome with the support of people around her, and that includes the aid of Luke Cage and Malcolm. The show might feature these men who don't understand that no means no as their primary villains, but it also presents other male characters as part of the solution. By all means, the show itself highlights what absolutely never actually needs to be said: "not all men." (The reason that's always annoying is that we already know that! No one has ever accused "all men" of being a problem or of being rapists or abusive or whatever. You don't need to say it. Jessica Jones similarly doesn't go out of its way to depict caring, forgiving, and helpful men. It just does it organically because obviously not all men are the wrost. Duh!)

Outside these surprisingly mature themes, the show is refreshing in its lack of "origin story" elements. To be sure, we do get some origin to the character. Through a series of interestingly composed flashbacks, we do learn a bit more about Jessica's history. Plus, one of the big plot points left hanging by the end of the season is the one involving how she obtained her powers. We even get backstory on her past relationship with Kilgrave.

Yet it's not an origin story. It just starts. Kilgrave has already gone through a period of time controlling Jessica. Jessica has already broken free from his grasp and assumed he was dead, making an effort to rebuild her life after. She already knows who Luke Cage is. She already has powers and uses them occasionally. This is an "origin story" in the sense that it's about her learning to step up as a hero-esque character, but she's already fully in control of her powers.

Jessica herself is one of the more compelling characters in the Marvel cinematic universe. Where most characters are simply pure good, Jessica is a bit more realistic. When she finds out Kilgrave is back, she doesn't immediately strap up to go out hunting him. No, her first reaction is to pack up her stuff and get the hell out of dodge. Sure, she ultimately decides to stay and track him down, but that's not her first reaction. Regularly, she describes this trait of "caring too much" to be a weakness. She's not like all these other heroes like Daredevil or Captain America who just inherently want to do good. She's not like Spider-man in that she inherently believes her powers mean she has responsibilities.

The show also doesn't seem to be full of references to other things. Sure, there are connections or references to the Avengers or other Marvel events, but they don't spend too much time cramming them in there. They also don't waste time stuffing scenes full of Easter Eggs. Yes, you get the lawyer Hogarth - gender swapped for the show (to further the female-centric perspective), but who in the comics, worked for the Rand Corporation. And sure, one of the main secondary characters is Simpson, who - despite the first name being changed - is clearly a D-list villain from the comics.

By and large though, Jessica Jones takes minimal elements of the comic it's based off of. It mimics one of the (few) strengths of The Walking Dead. I've admittedly never understood this about something like Game of Thrones. If you are already familiar with the book, why would you just want to see them copy and paste that story on screen? And if you're not, surely you know the books are out there and you can access them. Why would you want your episodic television shows to literally just do exactly what the book does with minimal changes? Though a pretty terrible show overall, The Walking Dead wisely recognized that the big appeal of the book was in its shocking and unpredictable nature (well, that is, before it got 150 issues in and started creating its own tropes you've come to expect). So, they use some key moments as tent poles, but largely avoid simply doing whatever happened in the book. Jessica Jones does that same thing.

It's probably a good idea to talk about how great the cast is. Krysten Ritter might not physically resemble the character of the comic, but she definitely nails the character. She's that distant, hard drinking, no nonsense woman from the book. Carrie-Anne Moss does a solid job as the cold and scheming lawyer Jeri Hogarth. Eka Darville is plays a compelling Malcolm, who goes from drug addict informant for Kilgrave to brave social worker trying to help the people who have also been controlled by Kilgrave. Wil Traval is fine as Will Simpson, but I keep thinking they should have just gotten Troy Baker.

But of course, you have to talk about David Tennant as Kilgrave, and Kilgrave as a villain overall. Funny thing is that Tennant sounds like one of the sweetest, nicest guys in the business. There's a reason he's been honored with a lot of awards in British television. He's great. Here, he plays a slimy, manipulative, heartless bastard that you just hate. It's natural to compare his villain to that of Wilson Fisk from Daredevil. It's a little unfair because they're different shows with different agendas, but it's hard to argue that Kilgrave isn't near the top of best Marvel villains so far (granted, not a tough feat to accomplish, really).

The thing I found most interesting about Kilgrave is that he isn't just a guy who knows he's powerful and doesn't care to abuse it. Sure, he doesn't care that he abuses it, but he's manipulative in other ways too. He's clearly an intelligent guy. It was always neat seeing that he doesn't always have to use his power to control you. He controls Malcolm by turning him into a drug addict and then promising drugs in return for snapshots of Jessica. And he twists his tongue and words a lot to avoid responsibility and culpability. For example, when Jessica calls him out for making her murder someone, he casually points out that he just told her to, "Take care of her." He notes that he never said anything about killing anyone.

He does this a lot. To the end, he denies having ever murdered anyone, even though he's told people to do things like jump off a building or kill themselves. He didn't kill them, he insists. They did. Even when you get his backstory and start to feel weirdly bad for him, it turns out later that most of what he said was a lie, or rather, an incomplete version of the story. Kilgrave is able to manipulate the audience just as badly as he can twist others. Kingpin was interesting in the way that he wasn't a pure bad guy and that, even though he did horrible things, you could at least see what he is trying to do, and what he's going for ultimately isn't "evil." Kilgrave is interesting in the way that he plays with words and how he often comes off as something of an immature child - which makes sense given he never really had a normal childhood, so he kind of is stuck in this juvenile mental state.

Even the reveal that he's obsessed with Jessica because he's in love with her is smart. Look, I can't blame anyone for finding that motivation to be cheesy and oversimplified, but it really fits the character and matches the function of the narrative. If Kilgrave is stuck in a rather childish mental state, then it makes sense that he would become obsessive over this woman. Plus, it totally fits in with the greater themes of the show. It would have clashed more if the show had been all about rape and abusive relationships, then have the main villain simply trying to control Jessica because he knows about her powers. Sure, domestic violence and rape is often about exerting power. It's not usually about expanding it. It might not be as complex a motive as Kingpin's was in Daredevil, but it fits perfectly with the themes and tone of Jessica Jones. 

Things aren't perfect, of course. I found that powers are sort of ambiguous. Jessica can hold a speeding car in place by holding it, or punch through brick walls, but she gets knocked out pretty easily. This has been a common point of contention. I agree it's kind of unclear - although that also matches the books - but I don't necessarily find those two points that unusual. If super strength comes from actively flexing your muscle, then it stands to reason that does not inherently translate to super durability. It's kind of like how competitors in the World's Strongest Man competitions can pull tractor trailer trucks with their legs, but they can get knocked out if you slam a plank into their head. You can't exactly flex your head muscles to absorb the impact.

However, I did find Kilgrave's powers a little unclear. They try to explain how it works by saying he emits some sort of virus that gets in your brain when you're nearby, which allows him to dictate what you do on command. But, that's kind of a strange explanation that doesn't really make sense, even with comic book logic. The rules of how it works aren't particularly consistent either. Sometimes, the powers only work when he issues a command. Suggestions and questions and casual statements sometimes don't result in the controlled person doing what he says. So sometimes it's implied that Kilgrave's inflection is the cause of the power. Sometimes it's implied that it's simply the words that hold the power.

The whole virus thing is strange too because they go back and forth on whether he needs to be actually nearby for it to work. He definitely needs to be near you to get the initial order into your brain, but then it seems like the virus is just there and he can go wherever the hell he wants and his powers are still in effect. This is evident when Hope kills her parents, or Simpsons tries to kill Trish. They never specifically state that Kilgrave was actually in those buildings at the time of these attacks, which implies that once the order or virus is in your brain, you can't stop until you do it. Yet the conclusion is to kill Kilgrave, and somehow that breaks the spell on everyone he's controlling. But...why would the virus stop affecting them? If Kilgrave doesn't need to be near people for it to work, why would killing him change anything?

Additionally, Jessica's powers look a little goofy on screen. The action gets better by the end, but it is a lot choppier and less fluid. A lot have compared it to Daredevil's action, but that's unfair. Matt Murdoch had ninja and boxing training. He is a trained martial artist. Jessica Jones is not. She's relied purely on her powers for fighting. She hasn't been trained, so it's only reasonable that her fighting style is almost jarringly undisciplined and unpredictable. The problem comes with when she uses powers though. The way she leaps, or lifts heavy objects, or throws people around looks like low budget television sometimes.

The show concludes with one of the most unpredictable finales. Left feeling like there were no alternatives, Jessica straight up snaps Kilgrave's neck to kill him, a la Man of Steel. The main difference is that A) Jessica Jones wasn't presented as having the power to save everyone and B) she's not flipping Superman and doesn't hold the same strict moral principles! Many have commented on this by saying there was really no other way for it to go. Kilgrave was presented as too powerful, and how else would Jessica have resolved it? I disagree with the idea that there were no alternatives. Surely, the writers could have figured out a way around this and presented other options. Jessica was even pretty close at containing him throughout the show. What I appreciate about this ending is that it really did feel like there were no other options. It felt like Kilgrave was too powerful. Though I disagree with people who've said this, it does suggest that the audience felt similar to Jessica.

Either way, it's a sharp contrast to what we see in the movies, where the good guys don't kill. (Well, they do, actually. Kind of a lot. But it's never presented as obvious killing. Even Tony Stark killing Obadiah Stane in Iron Man doesn't feel like Stark straight up murdered that guy, even though he basically did.)

The show ends as it begins: with a shocking scene in context of Marvel products. When Jessica Jones: Alias kicked off Marvel's Max imprint, the first panel featured Jessica screaming, "Fuck!" in giant, bold letters. Uncensored. This was huge! Marvel was producing a book that had uncensored F-bombs! We had never seen anything like this before! This established right away that this was not an all ages book. This was going to be different.

Jessica Jones begins similarly, only instead of the F-bomb, we get a sex scene. Quick: count on your fingers how many sex scenes you've seen in a Marvel movie? Trick question. There are none. There's actually a fair amount of sex scenes in the show. Again, this is how it opens, letting everyone know right away that this isn't your Captain America or Iron Man movie. The show ends similarly, with Jessica straight up killing Kilgrave, further cementing that this isn't like your typical Marvel movie.


Overall, while not perfect, Jessica Jones stands out from the rest of the pack, including Daredevil. I think I might have liked Daredevil a tad more, Jessica Jones seemed substantially more ambitious thematically, and that is what I appreciated the most. It took a little while for me to be fully "hooked" to the point of marathoning the rest, but it might be more consistent overall. It features a better conclusion that its predecessor, at least.

I'm really excited to see more from Marvel's Netflix stuff, and it will be awesome to see Jessica and Luke continue to grow their relationship.

The Powerpuff Girls (1998-2005)

Preface: I don't really review much television. It's not really one of my go-to mediums. Not that I don't like TV shows; I just don't care about that many shows, at the end of the day. The Powerpuff Girls was such a pleasant time when I revisited it that I just had to talk about it a little bit. I'm throwing it in the "comics" category just because that seems like the closest fit. It's an animated superhero show. Seems to belong there more than "movies."




A few weeks ago, I was browsing the options on Netflix Instant hoping to find something I could put on and only half pay attention to as I ate lunch before work. After a minute, I came upon the Powerpuff Girls and remembered how each episode was broken down into two mini-episodes. That made it ideal for lunch-watching!

But I knew I was going to want to finish re-watching it all from the moment the opening theme song came on! Easily one of my favorite themes, it is very visual in its sound. It rocks out when Buttercup pops up on screen. It softens and becomes cute when Bubbles shows up. It gets menacing when the horde of villains appears. It's an awesome theme song! Here:



Pretty catchy. Stays in the brain.

A lot of people probably pass off the Powerpuff Girls as your typical animated kids show, but it is much more than that. Like all great "kids' fare," is really does cram a lot of stuff for the adults in there too. There are a lot of jokes that kids just wouldn't possibly get (and those jokes are actually pretty funny!)  Here's an example:



There's no shortage of adult-aimed humor. (I think my favorite was the episode where the girls are rewarded with candy and they wind up with a candy addiction. The way that they eat the candy and react to it...well...it's gonna fly over the heads of kids, for sure.) You can also see that they target an older crowd with episodes like "Meet the Beat Alls," an episode that essentially parodies the Beatles, while almost every line of dialogue is from a Beatles song. There are also a fair number of Star Wars references. (And here, my personal favorite reference occurs during a random conversation between the girls and the Professor where they keep rhyming. The Professor then says, "No 'buts' and I mean it!" Then Bubbles follows up with, "Anybody want a peanut?" It's a really funny, sick reference to The Princess Bride.)

Seriously. There are tons of references, from Scarface to South Park to Ocarina of Time to Planet of the Apes. There are all sorts of shout outs (including a rather random shout out to Mos Def). Then there is a lot of oddball humor, like when everyone is turned into a cat. We see owners allowing their cats to do all sorts of things like sleep on the bed and scratch up the curtains. Then we cut to a silent shot of the Mayor slowly licking his cat. It's really strange, but ridiculously funny.

The humor is one of the strengths of the show, but it's far from the only one. The Powerpuff Girls each have their own unique and widely differing personalities. Bubbles is cute. Blossom is smart. Buttercup is a badass. Everyone has their favorites (mine was Buttercup, but in the rewatch, Bubbles quickly became my favorite!)




 How can you not just melt watching that? Daaaawwww....

The rapport the girls have with each other and with the Professor feels pretty genuine (for a cartoon). They definitely seem like a family. They get along, but aren't without their fights and conflicts. The Professor himself is just as funny as the girls are too!

And of course, if a superhero comic is only as good as his/her villains, well, the Powerpuff Girls still hold up. Their cast of villains are incredible. You've got the troublesome Gangreen Gang. There's the rich and spoiled wannabe Princess. There's Fuzzy, the creature who only cares about his property. There's the inept Amoeba Boys. Then there's the gender-confusing devil known only as "him" (my personal favorite villain). And of course, their main arch nemesis: the super smart chimp Mojo Jojo. All of these villains - like the girls - have very well defined character traits and personalities. To me, this is the ultimate strength of the show and why they are able to do so well in the humor department. If these characters weren't as intentional in their design, or if they weren't so unique and odd, the show would probably fall in on its own cultural references.  These characters prevent the show from ever truly becoming dated.

The Powerpuff Girls is somehow more entertaining and more hilarious than I remembered it being.  If you watched the show when you were younger, then I definitely recommend you watch it again. Even if it's  just a few episodes here and there, odds are you will find yourself laughing more than you anticipated.

I don't think about life with kids. I mean, I'm so far removed from that even being a possibility! But I do know that if I have kids - boy or girl - that kid is watching the Powerpuff Girls. (Oh yeah, it really is a show for everybody! It really isn't "girly," but it also isn't a show you would think, "boys watch this" either.)

It definitely stacks up. Weird, clever, cute, touching, hilarious, and great characters mixed with an interesting and attractive animation style, it's as good an all-ages cartoon show as it gets. It has to be up there with the likes of Adventure Time.