Netflix Retrospective - Jessica Jones Season 2 Episodes 3-4

Jessica Jones likes to touch on uncomfortable subjects, which is not entirely surprising given what Jessica’s most famous comic storyline is. But I can’t deny hearing how a character was sexually assaulted as a child, doesn’t make me feel comfortable, and that perhaps is intentional as societal acceptance when it comes to stuff like this should be challenged. But being uncomfortable is not the same being entertained, so they really need to pull something out to keep that part going.

AKA Sole Survivor

We open with the relaxing sound of the waves. Jessica talks to Trish about she nearly committed suicide here when she was younger. They’re here to dump Simpson’s body, as the murder would almost certainly be attributed to Jessica. They find a small arsenal in the back of his car and Trish suggests hypnosis to bring out some lost memories. Jessica agrees, not wanting her past to kill anyone else.

Quick question though, why would she want a random hypnotist to find out about her past? Especially if something in it is related to the murders, would be easy to get the wrong impression is what I’m saying. Besides, Jessica has a track record of resisting hypnosis so this goes about as well as you’d expect. Griffin returns, reminding Jessica, and the audience of his existence. It’s been a couple of weeks since I wrote my last review, I’d forgotten about him.

Chao and Benowitz visit Hogarth, they’d gotten wind of her illness and wish to buy her out of the company. Hogarth refuses outright but is warned if she doesn’t negotiate they could force her out. Jessica returns home to find… I’d forgotten about this bullsh*t, an eviction notice, it’s illegal to operate a business on a residential property or something and now the superintendent, who happens to be Oscar.

She quickly confronts him about it, using strong language in front of Vido, good job appealing to him there. Apparently, he’s managed to talk the landlord around on her. Meanwhile, Griffin is chewing out Trish RE her nearly getting herself killed and is reminded that he was doing the same thing when he was in war countries. Turns out his ex-wife left him for that exact reason. Trish suggests he stay away less he be used against them but Griffin is having none of that.

So, in the one and only crossover bit in the entire season, Foggy comes to show Hogarth the buyout proposal and suggests trying to help her fight it. Hogarth turns him down. With 30 days till her eviction, Jessica begins pouring through Trish’s files on IGH. Jessica has a nightmare, whilst it’s impressive enough it doesn’t especially enhance the plot.

Turns out, to the surprise of no-one that Oscar has a criminal record, Malcolm theorises that he may have blackmail material on the Landlord, and goes to pay him a visit. Jessica meanwhile finds a photo in her case file and heads back to the IGH building from the first episode, the photo is of a particular door, although why anyone would take a photo of a door is beyond me (not like they were ever planning on selling the place)

Jessica feels an imprint on the door, and finds a reference to a Dr Lesley Hansen. She meets back up with Trish and talk quickly gets back to Griffin. Jessica did some background research on him because of course she did but has concluded he is a decent human being. She’s tracked down Dr Hansen via student loans and intends to pay the Doctor a visit.

They break into her apartment but finds the apartment completely empty. A neighbour tells them the property is spoken for, by his nephew, and the old tenant moved some stuff to the basement. They head down there, finding a furnace emitting some odd smells and Jessica finds a human skull inside, they suspect it might be Hansen but need to get it identified so Jessica stuffs it in a bag.

Malcolm tries to talk to the Landlord but he’s had less than ideal experiences with Jessica and it looks like his boyfriend is coming over to live (presumably thanks to an illegal passport Oscar made) so he’s having none of it. Jessica sneaks into the morgue, planting the skull inside the a casket and registering it on the computer system. Trish then moves in, and convinces a guy who works there to give her the id of the head in return for a favour.

Malcolm gives the news about the Landlord to Jessica and she comes up with a plan, she blocks the toilet with tampons and whilst he’s busy unblocking it, she nicks his house keys to go investigate. Of course Vido being there complicates matters. She finds that Oscar is a painter, and likely painted the picture of the Landlord’s boyfriend and accuses him of what I said earlier, showing photos that could easily have been used for Fake IDs, he denies and says he’d tell the police they were for a painting.

Now, here’s the thing, telling the cops about the murder of a guy he witnessed probably wouldn’t harm his divorce hearings, being accused of a crime he’d already spent jail-time for actually might, he has his priorities backwards. Trish is looking at the video the Whizzer send to her, when she’s interrupted by Griffin, who encourages her to use her platform to reach out for people. She heads off to put away the gun, whilst Griffin secretly downloads everything on her laptop, these downloads always take seconds.

Jessica is woken up the next morning by a knock on the door. It’s Hogarth, who shows her the legal notice from Cheng before tearing it up. We finally hear what Hogarth actually has, ALS, you might remember the Ice Bucket challenge from a year or so ago raising money for an ALS charity, so it’s a relevant choice. Of course, Hogarth is in the early stages so won’t be showing any major symptoms in this season. She wants leverage to use against her partners to prevent them forcing her out. Jessica at least kinda agrees to help her, something which she will completely forget about as of… now

Trish announces at the end of her radio broadcast a new segment about Doctors, and particularly asks for Dr Hansen, soon Trish Talk gets a call from Dr Hansen herself, allegedly, telling her to meet her and come alone. Jessica assumes this is a little suspect and to stop Trish from going submits a report to TMZ suggesting that her and Griffin may be having issues. She also calls Malcolm over to watch her.

Jessica is waiting when ‘Doctor Hansen’ shows up and convinces her to talk with her instead of Trish. Jessica has worked out that Hansen was the one siphoning patients from Metro General to IGH. ‘Hansen’ claims that IGH isn’t what they think and they’ve been protecting their reputation with the murders. Which tells me IGH doesn’t deserve a good reputation.

Malcolm arrives at Trish’s place and soon gets word that the skull was indeed Dr Hansen, and that Jessica has walked into a trap. Trish asks for Malcolm to help her get past the paparazzi that Jessica summoned with her TMZ tip, all 8 of them. He manages to get rid of all but one of them.

‘Hansen’ tells her that IGH brought her back from the dead, and it was that process that gave her abilities. Jessica says she didn’t want to and ‘Hansen’ gets defensive, showing she also has abilities, a fight ensues, she manages to get away, but gets snapped by the one photographer Malcolm didn’t get rid of. Jessica takes the camera and sees the photo.

This is a less intense episode but is still feels rather slow, with only the last few minutes providing any meaningful progression

Rating 7.5/10

AKA God Help the Hobo

We open with Jessica Jones at her court ordered anger management session. I’ll skip the details but it does about as well as you might expect. Jessica returns home, not happy with Malcolm, especially since the photo of him and Trish together made the cover of a magazine. She gets to work but there’s arguing going on upstairs and between that and the fans, since it’s suddenly a very hot day, makes it difficult for Jessica to concentrate.

She stares at the photo of ‘Hansen’ and notices she’s wearing a wig. It’s good enough to fool Trish, so it’s likely human hair and only 3 places would make that. As Trish is left to deal with the press thinking her and Griffin have broken up, Jessica has to deal with Vido, who’s come down to bug her and get away from his parents arguing above. As Jessica tells the two where Vido is he climbs into the Window Frame, Jessica rushes to get him out as he slips, with Jessica saving him in the nick of time.

Griffin suggests moving Trish over to his network but she refuses as it won’t get her taken seriously. Hogarth gets a visit from Cheng, who’s not happy that she’s dropped the case against Jones. She urges him to stand down but he’s searching for other avenues. Jessica apologises to Trish as they head into wig store #1, the owner recognises Trish, who destroyed a couple of her wigs and left her a scar. They bribe into revealing that ‘Hansen’ pays cash and had no hair, she suspects from chemotherapy or the like.

But the revelation she may have had cancer means IGH might’ve covered medical expenses at Metro General. Trish shows Jessica the video Malcolm took of her and Max in the trailer in episode 2. Given the two days he had have already passed and Trish wanting some privacy back after the whole boyfriend fiasco, Jessica offers to threaten him without hurting him, in principle at least.

Cheng shows up at Jessica’s flat, offering Malcolm a place at Cheng consulting in exchange for dirt on Jessica, he refuses. Trish gets Max’s attention by showing the star in his latest film the video and she walks off set. Jessica is a little more than Max can handle so he makes the call for all the files Metro General have on IGH patients. Even Jessica sees she may have gone too far.

Hogarth calls Jessica but although she’s been looking through their expense accounts, she’s found nothing especially interesting. She gets a knock at the door and it’s Oscar who, after finding out Jessica saved Vido’s life, has completely changed his outlook on Jessica and thank god this wasn’t stretched out because I was already getting bored.

Griffin and Trish have sex, Trish goes to have a shower as Griffin gets a phone call from someone, he assures the person on the other side that she knows nothing. Back with Jessica and Oscar, he confirms his beef was with Jessica specifically and not powered people in general. He’s only recently been released from prison…

They bond a little and almost have sex but Oscar decides it’s not normal to hate someone one minute and have sex with them the next and leaves. Jessica you were being a little presumptuous. Next morning Malcolm confronts her and she’s still not angry about the whole Max thing… anyway, he demands something more akin to work, and a 25% cut, which Jessica negotiates down to 20. He also warns her about Cheng’s visit.

Hogarth approaches her doctor, and with the cure years away she considering finding drugs in Europe that could end her life there and then, which the Doctor naturally refuses to offer. Max came through and they have the names of the 3 patients at metro general that were funded by IGH, Jessica, the Whizzer and someone called Inez Green.

Jessica’s research finds that she has a criminal record, 6 misdemeanour citations but no registered address, so is likely homeless. They check out the neighbourhood where she received said citations, and discover where she’s held up. Trish is armed with a special taser they’d earlier tested on Jessica. Trish also took Simpson’s inhaler, which upon a scuffle between Jessica and someone... It isn't their suspect.

Meanwhile someone breaks into Jessica’s flat and begins taking her files on IGH. Malcolm heads in with her girlfriend, who’s looking for booze. He soon realises Jessica isn’t in and finds all the files gone. Hogarth begins looking for her suicide pills online, and buys some. Turns out Inez Green isn’t their mark, she was a nurse at IGH but was injured by a patient who threw her into a cabinet, her co-worker wasn’t so lucky.

The thief was working for Cheng, trying to find some dirt on Jessica. Unfortunately he’s found by ‘Hansen’ and killed violently. Trish and Jessica arrive at the scene and Jessica is soon arrested. She was with Trish the entire evening and her whereabouts can be corroborated, this should be open and shut but hey, that doesn’t quite sell the cliffhanger, especially with Trish’s erratic behaviour.

The pacing is what’s killing this season so far, otherwise it’s not too bad once again.

Rating 7.5/10