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chuckroJessica and Trish have been understandably estranged following the events with Jessica’s mother, but a man with evil-sensing superpowers draws the attention of a serial killer to them, and the status quo gets seriously messed up.
Critical to these stories is that most superpowered characters, despite their abilities, are not super-tough. Jessica isn’t even shot, she’s hospitalized by a knife. For that matter, though Trish is really excited about her Hellcat powers, they seem to consist of being particularly spry and having good night vision. This is not a story about flying bricks; this is a story of spies and detectives who just happen to be able to punch really hard. There’s a reason Luke Cage seems to jump in strength on his own show, and I suspect that’s driven by tone more than anything else.
This season took the line between hero and villain and blurred it a lot, and never really had a “big bad.” Sallinger is so much the “angry white man” stereotype. He defines everyone but himself as a “cheater” to explain away the possibility he could do anything wrong. And he thinks he’s the antagonist in Jessica’s story, but he’s really just a macguffin in Trish’s. Hogarth, on the other hand, just looked death in the eye and went completely out of her fucking mind. Did you think maybe she had morals? Let’s remind you that she very clearly does not. Malcom and Erik dance across various lines and the fact they end up on the “redemption” side is just luck of the draw—Dorothy did a similar dance, but for all that she helped, she was an abusive asshole. And Trish, oh Trish. The seeds of Trish losing control were present from the very beginning of the series and her arc made total sense, sadly.
Bold of them to kill off a major supporting character, which was a decision that had to have been made before they knew the Marvel-flix universe was getting canceled entirely. (For that matter, I wonder if Luke Cage’s cameo was a last-minute addition.)
This show in specific and the Marvel-flix universe in general died how they lived: Stretching out their stories over too many episodes. In this season, the point where Jessica stopped Trish from killing Sallinger was that, “And they’re going to drag this way too long” point. The thing is, it would have been a just killing at that point—Sallinger is an unrepentant murderer who has evaded justice a dozen times already and will very definitely kill more if left alive—and Trish is psychologically in a place where she’ll recover just fine from it. Trish has already killed one mass-murderer, and this one just tortured and murdered her mother. If she’d killed him, we could have an episode of getting her into to therapy to try to walk back the vigilante thing, reconcile with Jessica, call it all a day. Instead we have five more episodes of Jessica twisting in circles to work within the system for no justifiable reason; so that Trish can snap and commit unjustifiable murders.
(There comes a point where you have to acknowledge that the system—whatever system it is, from high school popularity to the job market to greater-scale politics—is never going to let you win no matter how well you play by the “official” rules. At which point your options become losing or playing a different game.)
I’m happy with the wrap-up: All of the antagonists are either dead (or will be very soon) or locked up, and Jessica isn’t giving up. That’s pretty much all you could hope for.
Overall: This was a very strong show because it had a lot to say and it said it well; with very little black-and-white and a lot of gray. That said...it could always have stood a bit more editing down.
Critical to these stories is that most superpowered characters, despite their abilities, are not super-tough. Jessica isn’t even shot, she’s hospitalized by a knife. For that matter, though Trish is really excited about her Hellcat powers, they seem to consist of being particularly spry and having good night vision. This is not a story about flying bricks; this is a story of spies and detectives who just happen to be able to punch really hard. There’s a reason Luke Cage seems to jump in strength on his own show, and I suspect that’s driven by tone more than anything else.
This season took the line between hero and villain and blurred it a lot, and never really had a “big bad.” Sallinger is so much the “angry white man” stereotype. He defines everyone but himself as a “cheater” to explain away the possibility he could do anything wrong. And he thinks he’s the antagonist in Jessica’s story, but he’s really just a macguffin in Trish’s. Hogarth, on the other hand, just looked death in the eye and went completely out of her fucking mind. Did you think maybe she had morals? Let’s remind you that she very clearly does not. Malcom and Erik dance across various lines and the fact they end up on the “redemption” side is just luck of the draw—Dorothy did a similar dance, but for all that she helped, she was an abusive asshole. And Trish, oh Trish. The seeds of Trish losing control were present from the very beginning of the series and her arc made total sense, sadly.
Bold of them to kill off a major supporting character, which was a decision that had to have been made before they knew the Marvel-flix universe was getting canceled entirely. (For that matter, I wonder if Luke Cage’s cameo was a last-minute addition.)
This show in specific and the Marvel-flix universe in general died how they lived: Stretching out their stories over too many episodes. In this season, the point where Jessica stopped Trish from killing Sallinger was that, “And they’re going to drag this way too long” point. The thing is, it would have been a just killing at that point—Sallinger is an unrepentant murderer who has evaded justice a dozen times already and will very definitely kill more if left alive—and Trish is psychologically in a place where she’ll recover just fine from it. Trish has already killed one mass-murderer, and this one just tortured and murdered her mother. If she’d killed him, we could have an episode of getting her into to therapy to try to walk back the vigilante thing, reconcile with Jessica, call it all a day. Instead we have five more episodes of Jessica twisting in circles to work within the system for no justifiable reason; so that Trish can snap and commit unjustifiable murders.
(There comes a point where you have to acknowledge that the system—whatever system it is, from high school popularity to the job market to greater-scale politics—is never going to let you win no matter how well you play by the “official” rules. At which point your options become losing or playing a different game.)
I’m happy with the wrap-up: All of the antagonists are either dead (or will be very soon) or locked up, and Jessica isn’t giving up. That’s pretty much all you could hope for.
Overall: This was a very strong show because it had a lot to say and it said it well; with very little black-and-white and a lot of gray. That said...it could always have stood a bit more editing down.
