Don’t Believe the Haters: Jessica Jones Second Season Totally Rocks

Let’s be clear: there was never any chance the second season of Jessica Jones was going to be as good as the first.  As great as Krysten Ritter is, superhero movies are only as good as the supervillain and there are very few supervillains as amazing as David Tennant’s Kilgrave.  Heck, I think Kilgrave is one of the most interesting and fascinating supervillains I’ve ever seen in any universe, second only to Heath’s Ledger’s Joker.  David Tennant made him such a memorable, narcissistic, nightmarish presence – imagine an evil James McAvoy-version of Charles Xavier – that his absence this year was going to be deeply felt.  So let go of the idea that this season of Jessica Jones can top the first season, it can’t.  But that does not mean that you should skip it, because this season of Jessica Jones is still really, really good.

This poor guy looks like he just wandered in off The Tick.

Jessica Jones is a pretty great show.  The basic premise that she’s a good detective with super strength and near-invulnerability makes her a very agile character.  Her friends, which were kind of distracting last season, are much more focused this season.  Her sister is still on her way to becoming a superhero in her own right (and all the risks that come with that) and her assistant also becoming a detective (watching how his path echoes Jessica is an interesting but subtle dimension on the show).  This season also starts with the prospect of a Watchmen-like mystery in which superheroes (called “supers,” which is ironic as Superman doesn’t exist in the Marvel universe) are getting mysteriously executed.  And the show spends a lot more time filling in Jessica’s backstory; we get to see her as a studious college student before she became the burnout detective that she is now.  So the characters, mystery and story are all pretty strong this time out.  And you’ll notice everyone is being really cagey about the Big Bad this season, and that’s because the Big Bad reveal is really well done.  As bad as Kilgrave was, at least Jessica knew what to do about him.  This season’s Big Bad is much, much more complicated.

The best thing about Jessica Jones is Krysten Ritter.  Krysten Ritter’s performance is better here than last season or her performance in The Defenders.  She’s convincing enough fighting and running, but the way she digs into the acting makes her so much fun to watch.  She’s great with the one-liners to her sister (the grocery shopping in Texas crack was spot-on) and with her teaching moments with her assistant.  Her very best moments, though, are the moments where she lets herself be strong and vulnerable.  There’s one scene (about 21 minutes into episode 8) where she’s discussing a memory with another character and, though the other character is talking, the camera lingers on Krysten Ritter.  There’s this blink-and-you’ll-miss-it moment in that conversation where she lets her face briefly go from happily nostalgic to deeply, horribly pained.  It’s a powerful moment that you won’t forget if you see it, and it’s a really important moment to the later narrative and so it’s amazing how well Ritter’s acting helps anchor that moment in your memory.

Carrie-Anne Moss is pretty amazing too.

So, this season won’t quite live up to the near-perfect first season of Jessica Jones, but – to be fair – there are a lot of things this season of Jessica Jones does better than last season.  Remember that annoying-as-hell neighbor?  She’s gone.  Remember that irritating super soldier?  He gets briefly redeemed this season and then he’s gone.  And the rest of the second string characters are much more interesting this time around.  Carrie-Anne Moss’s Jeri Hogarth has a great, dark arc this season that I really enjoyed.  She’s now one of my favorite characters lurking around this universe.  Sure, I miss Luke Cage, but I enjoyed Jessica’s love interest this season too.  He’s a little more grounded, a little more realistic, and a little easier to relate to.

Yeah he’s not Luke Cage but he is pretty cool in his own way.

Don’t believe the haters; Jessica Jones is still a great show.  You’ll need to be a little patient but the backend of the show’s thirteen episodes are much better than the first half.  Unlike The Defenders, Daredevil’s second season or Luke Cage’s first season, this is actually a show that gets better as it goes.  So watch it and enjoy.  Even though Kilgrave’s gone (well…), there’s still an awful lot to enjoy.