What I’m Watching: Jessica Jones (Season Premiere)

Jessica Jones: Season 2, Episode 1 “AKA Start at the Beginning” (B+)

I’ve missed this show a lot and am so happy to have it back, and I didn’t realize just how long it’s been since it was last on. Season one debuted two and a half years ago, and I finished watching it back in June 2016 after an extended hiatus for my honeymoon and the TV catchup that ensued. Jessica was featured prominently in “The Defenders,” but that was so much less about her and her world than at least two of the other characters. I’ve always contended that this show is infinitely better than anything else that Netflix produces related to Marvel, and, though I’m one episode from finishing its first season, I’d actually rank “The Punisher” second behind this one. I wasn’t sure – and I’m still not – that anything could top Kilgrave and the effect that he had on Jessica, but this season opener proves that this show is well above average because of its central character. Jessica is upset by the public nature of her “vigilante” persona, and hates the idea of being a superhero even more than that. She’s prone to anger and violence, barely containing herself when the rival private investigator baited her, and now she may have to deal with a lawsuit from her old friend Hogarth, who has also just learned that she has a serious medical condition. Jessica has little patience for anything but shows it in a different way than other aggravated leads, and the way in which she dismissed Whizzer the first few times she met him and then ran after him when his powers turned out to be real and driven by fear was indicative of that. Trish being so invested in her uncovering what happened to her makes us as viewers also involved, and I can’t wait to experience more of this superb show over the next three months.