Jessica Jones S01E10 Review: Kumbaya Circles & White Horses

Jessica Jones, Season 1, Episode 10: AKA 1000 Cuts

So, yeah, the show has basically abandoned all pretense of being a noir story with superhero elements that it had in the earlier episodes. And while this slight change in genre worked in its favour in the previous two or three episodes where it's far more action packed and more of a Jessica-vs-Kilgrave conrfontation, this episode really felt off. A lot of the B-plots ends up being aborted or utterly changed to feel relatively unnatural in such a TV show, and while I do realize that sticking strictly to genre conventions will hurt storytelling and make it predictable, it's also odd the change of tone that the series is taking.

It's a good thing that the series still feels epic, though, with Kilgrave being as badass and awesome a villain as ever. But let's leave that for last as I make good on my blog's name and actually rant a bit about aspects of this episode.

Following up Ruben's death, after it was handwaved rather oddly before, is welcome... if only Robyn wasn't such an annoying piece of shit. Seeing her be desperate as she puts missing person posters around and Malcolm struggling with his guilt is a nice gesture -- if a rather inappropriate and unwelcome at this point in storytelling as it promises distraction. And it did! Poor Malcolm ends up blubbering about the whole thing to the Kilgrave support group, and somehow Robyn shows up, works up a frenzy and gets them to become a mob to fight against Jessica. Jessica, who, mind you, was the only person who believed them. Even if they don't know of Jessica's crusade against Kilgrave you'd think this random psychotic bitch telling them to basically mob-lynch Jessica (and in the process unleash Kilgrave onto the world) feels like a forced plot twist. Robyn has been unlikable since day one, and any sympathy she might've gained from Jessica's questionable decision of keeping her brother's death from her has evaporated.

Speaking of which, Malcolm ends up being a bit of a distraction himself -- he hasn't quite degenerated to Robyn-level of "I hope Kilgrave kills her next" but he was kinda annoying since his purpose this episode is to feature Robyn's insanity.

And Hogarth is revealed to be the one who sprung Kilgrave out of jail, but Kilgrave predictably takes control of Hogarth -- who brings him to Wendy possibly to kill two birds with one stone and bring the two of them in close proximity. What was unexpected was Wendy and Kilgrave bonding over their personal love problems and their loved ones not appreciating grand romantic gestures-- an absolutely delightful scene... which takes a turn for the darker as Kilgrave starts interrogating Hogarth and finds out about the fetus. It's all good here, and Kilgrave telling Wendy to kill Hogarth with the titular 1000 cuts is suitably chilling... and then Pam randomly shows up, whacks Wendy and her head got... what is a verb that describes that? The edge of that table impaled her temporal lobe. It's a gruesome and honestly a bit over-the-top death, but the whole Hogarth/Wendy/Pam subplot which has been increasingly distracting just gets shut down as Pam is so disgusted by Hogarth doing all this and walks out, leaving Hogarth alone. It's brutal, and I do hope that it's over with in this episode. The whole divorce sub-plot felt overdrawn at times despite the great acting from the characters involved, and now I hope we can use all this crapton of trauma to actually develop Jeri Hogarth. Maybe that aborted fetus (which was apparently useless) would be of eventual use?

What I don't like is that beyond her trying to use Kilgrave to deal with her divorce situation, Hogarth doesn't seem to have a long-term game plan for dealing with or using Kilgrave, and it seems rather dumb for a character who's been built up as being sensible and pragmatic. I mean, it could be just Kilgrave manipulating her the moment she gives into temptation and opens that door, but still, it just feels rather forced just to unleash more melodrama. The fact that she fucked everyone over just for... ambiguous gains of no sensible reason makes her absolutely unlikable.

Meanwhile, uh, officer Simpson has apparently randomly embraced his comic book supervillain persona, which just felt stupid and out of nowhere. Hell, if I hadn't done that little research last episode I would be absolutely gawking at this unnatural change. He's been extremely passionate about bringing Kilgrave to justice, yes, but randomly showing up and killing officer Clemons for no good reason really came out of nowhere. Then he tries to get to Kilgrave's father, accidentally slaps Trish and gets booted out of the episode. I just don't... I honestly just don't get it. Even other shows that are far more superhero-comic based try to make a 'heroic character who eventually turns evil' feel gradual instead of being laughably random like this.

Man, Clemons, you really shouldn't be discussing your retirement out loud in every other scene. And to make his death worse, Simpson didn't even have to kill Clemons. Yes, he destroys all the evidence so that Kilgrave couldn't be prosecuted, but why do that? It really doesn't make sense when held up to slightly closer scrutiny. He's just crazy and while crazy villains can be entertaining this one just doesn't make sense.

Also, Hope, whose unfair trial has been the driving force behind Jessica Jones staying around to try and defeat Kilgrave ever since episode one, to try and struggle and be the hero she thought she couldn't be... ends up being a random downer ending as Hope kills herself to 'free' Jessica from the burden of trying to save her and not kill Kilgrave in the process. It's a bold plot twist, but one that I don't really find worked smoothly. I guess they're trying to imply that any pretense of being a superhero, at being a hero in the classical sense, is lost with Hope's death (man, in hindsight, what an obvious 'meaningful' name Hope has) and it's no longer a redemption arc for Jessica to reclaim her 'hero' status or even just to save a person, but Jessica's now just out for blood and to murder Kilgrave.

So with three episodes down the line naturally Jessica won't be anywhere in punching distance to Kilgrave like the many ample times she's got a chance to do so in the past few episodes. 

At least the two principal characters of the conflict -- Jessica and Kilgrave -- are handled pretty well in this episode. The conversation between the two is great, Jessica snarking at Hogarth at the face of Wendy's death (while comforting Pam in the same breath) is great, and despite spending most of the episode running where the plot demands her to, she's still pretty fun. I did like how she got around Kilgrave's commands, by having Trish have a bullet in her head by having one of them in her mouth -- and Trish's simple helpless meek squeak after the compulsion to put a bullet in her head is gone is just heartbreaking, showing just how horrifyingly absolute Kilgrave's powers are. And, well, the fact that Jessica is immune is definitely going to be a game-changer now, though Kilgrave having people ready to hang themselves as insurance still means that Kilgrave's not exactly helpless.

Speaking of Kilgrave's victims, can we say how chilling it is for his victims to be unable to stop themselves from obeying his commands even when Kilgrave's gone? With the 12 hour and 'technical obeying' limiters in play, we see the creepy moment where Trish is just sobbing, trying to whack that bullet into the side of her head futilely until Jessica convinces her not to. We see Papa-Kilgrave wake up from being unconscious and try to immediately cut his heart out. And even after he was bound up and talks like a normal person to the rest of the cast, there's a visible point when he suddenly points out that he needs to cut his heart out -- despite being absolutely coherent all throughout the scene. Pretty chilling. 

We also get some flashbacks to a point in time that the show has been keeping absolutely vague throughout all this, which was when Kilgrave and Jessica were in a relationship. And, well, Jessica's slight refusals and rebuttals, as well as Kilgrave losing his temper and telling Jessica to cut off her ear -- he stopped, but still, the fact that he did that makes the whole 'you're the thing I care about most in the world' speeches ring far more hollowly than before. I'm not sure how I feel about this. On one hand it is totally in character with how Kilgrave has been behaving, but on the other hand, it seems like a cheap attempt to go all 'lol look at this monster of a character' and demonize Kilgrave even more than he already has, losing the single point of decency that the dude has, which was his sick love towards Jessica. Now that's gone, and Jessica's reason to not kill him is gone since Hope's dead, and I felt that the show's pushing it a bit too hard. I mean, he idealizes that scene, clinging to that one moment where he thought Jessica had a thing for him because he let her out of his control for all of 18 seconds...

The weird scene with Jessica jumping off a building onto a white horse is just weirdly trippy and dumb, though.

Now whether the vaccine that daddy-Kilgrave and Trish have been spending the entire episode worked and daddy-Kilgrave is just playing along with his son's orders, or if he just simply failed to resist, isn't exactly made clear. Apparently Kilgrave's powers work with a virus? Somehow? It's a plot point, I guess, though it's one that isn't really exciting considering everything else going on and it honestly felt a bit like an afterthought.

It's a messy episode. On one hand, the good stuff is good. Jessica, Kilgrave and the Hograth subplot (lack of proper reasoning on Hogarth's part aside) are definitely on point this episode. The flashbacks and the macabre setup with the gallows and the 1000 cuts. The little plot development with the vaccine are great. But it's strung together rather sloppily compared to most other Jessica Jones episodes, and it's bogged down even further by the utterly idiotic and moronic Robyn plot, and Simpson randomly being evil doesn't work for me either.