Netflix Retrospective: Jessica Jones episodes 7-9 review

AKA Top Shelf Perverts

So that’s where the music from the title sequence is from, cool

Kilgrave makes his moves in this episode, and boy are they big. First off, he kills Ruben so that Robyn can have a larger part of the story. I hope my upcoming sarcasm tells you that I am so happy about that.

Jessica’s reaction to that is damn near perfect, she’s f*cking horrified but she isn’t a screamer, she expresses her horror with facial expressions and it’s a tribute to Krystin Ritter’s acting ability that this was pulled off so well.

Her plan is actually not a bad one. Use this horrific moment to her advantage to get herself locked up in a Supermax Prison. A prison Kilgrave would apparently have to infiltrate himself in order to get what he wants (go figure). The end result being Kilgrave being caught on security cameras that he can’t erase, unless he can.

The plan was a good one because going to rescue her is exactly what Kilgrave would’ve done, especially given another brilliant sequence later in the episode where he professes his undying love to her.

Her acceptance of her fate versus her friends’ desire to fight it made for some interesting drama. But Kilgrave made his second move, effectively putting the kibosh on her plan. But unfortunately, this is where a problem sort of surfaces with this. Kilgrave says he doesn’t want Jessica to come with him then because it wouldn’t be of her own free will, it’d be to save the lives of the policemen. When she eventually does come to him, it’s for the exact same reason (and we’ll see further proof of this next week) and yet he embraces her

Meanwhile. Jeri Hogarth isn’t having much luck with the divorce, intimidation lead to blackmail. Also, Trish found Kilgrave’s new private security, and Simpson is now investigating, mentioning several times that he wants Kilgrave dead, consequences be damned. These subplots really aren’t doing much for me.

Rating 7.5/10

AKA WWJD

Join me as the bullsh*t train finally pulls into the station

So, Jessica moves in with Kilgrave who has managed with miraculously painstaking effort to duplicate the look of the house exactly from a bunch of photographs… Yeah, I’m calling bullsh*t on that.

Anyway, Jessica has visions of her family because she still has survivors guilt from being the only one to survive a collision with a truck. She had a mother, father and little brother who naturally annoyed her (so much so she once duck taped him to a tree – honestly I’ve seen worse pranks on YouTube)

But interesting things come as Jessica and Kilgrave help to diffuse a hostage situation. Jessica wants to show him the hero life a bit and to her rather disgust, he ends up enjoying it. Leaving Jessica with a dire decision. Stay with Kilgrave and guide him into be a hero, or… I’ll get to that

Meanwhile we have Simpson and his stupid-brigade. I’m honestly sick and tired of him now. He wants Kilgrave dead and it’s going to become more and more annoying the more they keep doing this with him. And they will for a while. Also, he’s the cause of a particular bullsh*t moment which I’ll get to.

In the only subplot to get any attention today, the one with Jeri, nothing is really accomplished aside from Kilgrave now finding out about the feud. So Jessica talks with Trish, who convinces Jessica to go back and try to be with Kilgrave

Or maybe she doesn’t as Jessica gets her hands on another stash of medical anaesthetic and injects him with it, carrying him away from Simpsons Hillbilly squad. But in a rather strange turn of events, after her disappearance, an old neighbour who was in an earlier seen gives Simpson the bomb he’d used in an earlier scene and remotely detonates it.

What the f*ck?! There’s no way that wasn’t mind control, but we’d established already that the drug knocks out his powers. If it’s a lingering instruction, why couldn’t he give lingering instructions to the Doctors needing to replace his kidneys instead of having stay awake. More bullsh*t please

This episode had some attempts to make me feel sorry for Kilgrave. I don’t know if it was intended that I fell for it but I didn’t fall for it at all. I never really felt sorry for him, kind of curious perhaps but not sorry in the slightest.

Rating 7/10

AKA Sin Bin

A captive Kilgrave is none the less a dangerous Kilgrave

With Kilgrave captured, and sealed away Jessica is on a timeclock to prove the existence of Kilgrave’s powers, as Hope receives a plea bargain and Jeri’s marital strife forces her to take drastic measures that could topple everything. Oh and Simpson’s taking some bullsh*t meds in a plotline that’s not going to be important yet.

Hope’s plea bargain means that Jeri gets quite a bit of the spotlight this weak as she has to handle being a part of two distinct subplots that intertwine with the main plot in a way Gotham never could handle. I think Jeri is fine, I don’t particularly care for her character but I’m accepting of the kind of world Jessica lives in and Jeri works within that world

But her marital strife is what projects the plot forward this week as her estranged ex is now blackmailing her for 90% of her money. Proving she gives as much as she gets, Wendy is quite a b*tch in this episode particularly and it sets the stage for events coming

Meanwhile, with time ticking away, Jessica has to find the one weakness in Kevin aka Kilgrave’s arsenal, his parents. It’s an OK reminder that for all her personal drama and kick ass-ery, she is still a Private Investigator, kinda wish we’d seen more of that than the pretty much distracting arc Simpson was going through.

It’s time to bring Detective Clemons back onto the show. I know he’s a bit character and I haven’t really mentioned him before this point (there was so little to say) but his natural distrust of Jessica and relatively honest cop-attitude (for the most part) was a nice balance to everyone else.

Of course just as Jessica has everything in place that’s when things start to go wrong as Jeri cuts the wire set to electrocute Kilgrave if he tries to control someone, this results in Kilgrave escaping and the death of his mother. His father survives another day for more plot but things are beginning to escalate for team Jones and that sense of worse to come is well felt.

Rating 8.5/10

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Images/clips used in this review are from Marvel's Jessica Jones and belong to their respective owners. All images in this review are subject to fair use