Marvel's Cloak and Dagger S02E01-02 Review: Oh Right This Show

Marvel's Cloak and Dagger, Season 2, Episode 1: Restless Energy; Episode 2: White Lines

Well, I wasn't the biggest fan of the first season of Cloak and Dagger. I don't have much of a connection to the characters before watching the show, only briefly seeing them as minor characters in Civil War comics, and the first season was... it wasn't perfect, it had some pacing issues and plot-juggling issues, but what superhero show doesn't, right? But while it was never bad, I didn't really find myself all that interested in the heavily drama-oriented storyline, and the plotline wasn't anything particularly special. But it did leave enough of a good impression for me to at least try and check out the second season. I make no promises on whether I'll completely watch the second season or not, but I did at least watch the premiere episode. Maybe if I do continue on with this season, I'll do a two-episode-in-one-review format? I did remember finding it hard to really talk about Cloak and Dagger episodes due to how slowly paced they can be.

Episode 1 is... it's more of a "set the scene" episode, which is definitely needed since it's been a while since I watched the original season. Tyrone's still on the run and using his Cloak powers to follow around drug dealers and sneak-stealing their drugs and money out. Tandy's attending this group therapy session with her mom to talk about her abusive dad. And while the surly officer Brigid O'Reilly is pissed that Tyrone's basically using Cloak powers without thinking about the oh-so-fragile gangland balance (this is the MCU, give Luke Cage or Daredevil or someone a call), they're a lot more... well-adjusted, I guess, after the hectic "figure out this conspiracy" mentality of the first season. That's not all there is to the first episode, of course, but it definitely is slow, with a lot of scenes that are just quiet dancing or brooding set to music.

Of course, being superhero material, they end up helping people again, with Tandy going after the abusive boyfriend of Mikaela, one of the ladies from her group therapy who is clearly being abused heavily. And Tyrone ends up biting off more than he could chew and ends up going up against a particularly large gang, and only poor note-keeping and Tandy's timely arrival manages to save him. Both their efforts sort of end up in a mess. Tyrone fucking around with gang dynamics put a kibosh on Brigid's police operations, while Tandy ends up instead scaring the abusive boyfriend so bad that Mikaela ends up taking pity on him and moving back to his side. Oh, and the two have a brief fight, but it really only lasts about 5 minutes.

The episode's final scene is Tyrone and Tandy having some superhero fun as they decide to go into full-on super-spy mode as they hang out at a club, with Tyrone planting a recording device with his teleporting powers to help save Brigid's operation... but while it's cute to see them just have some fun, Cloak and Dagger end up walking into the remains of a bloodbath as within minutes, all the gangsters in the room have apparently been massacred.

Episode 2 follows up on this as Tyrone and Tandy call in their only ally, officer Brigid, for help, and the episode's framed in a "what did our main characters do afterwards", which involves frankly unnecessary cuts to the scene of Brigid opening the door that blows away the Voodoo sign.

And we basically follow the three characters as they sort of go on their own personal crusade to get answers and do stuff. Tyrone basically just gets a long speech about Loa from Evita's aunt, and... and I genuinely don't know enough about the Vodun/Voodoo religion to know if this is actually a decent representation of a real-world belief, or if it's just another instance of television shows completely missing the mark on real-life exotic religions. From what it's presented, it's... it's nice enough and ties into Tyrone trying to find peace by breathing and drawing signs with chalk. Oh, Evita's back too. She's... she's nice and supportive, but does give Tyrone one hell of a mouthful for not seeing her. Particularly after she finds out about the teleportation powers. While all of this is going on, Tyrone ends up teleporting to Mikaela's ambulance a couple of times, sort of tying this in to the other two stories even if Tyrone doesn't fully understand.

Meanwhile, as she deals with her own PTSD and hallucinations of evil dad, Tandy ends up speaking her mind -- albeit in a pretty harsh manner -- to Mikaela on the therapy session. It's essentially approaching a delicate situation with a flamethrower, leading Mikaela to (off-screen) leave her abusive boyfriend... and we later on find her overdosed with heroin in a hospital. Tandy's emotion-reading powers quickly tell her that this was thanks to someone forcing the heroin into her arm in an ambulance, causing her to go on a bit of a personal crusade to hunt down the ambulance responsible, leading to her team-up with "Brigid" later on.

Also, we get a couple of scenes with her re-experiencing PTSD, and interacting with the social therapy workers or whatever. It's well-acted, even if I do think that they end up being more padding than anything else.

Meanwhile meanwhile, Brigid is at a low point after initially promising the two kids to handle dealing with the gangster bloodbath, eventually completely giving in, calling in the massacre and just getting herself drunk and wasted at a bar... and when she looks at a nearby puddle, a reflection of her seems to mock her and tell her that she's going to "take over". And... and we've got a lot of characters recently in superhero material with Fictional-DID, because alternate identities are like a cool trope even though it is never really portrayed properly. Gotham's Riddler, Iron Fist's Typhoid Mary, Doom Patrol's Crazy Jane, Supergirl's Reign, The Flash's Killer Frost, Legion's titular main character... and that's the ones I can think up on the fly.

But, of course, the twist this time is that instead of another split persona taking over, there's apparently a second Brigid O'Reilly running around, and the episode is at least pretty clever at keeping this twist bottled up. The real Brigid is tied up in her apartment, but the audience doesn't see that until the last series of scenes. The second Brigid (apparently called "Mayhem") is the one we see for the most part, being this very, very confident -- if brusque -- super police officer. She quickly calls in ever single part of the crime scene, breaks an expensive painting to get one of the gangster's family to talk, and later on teams up with Tandy to arrest one of the ambulance-using kidnappers. And then slits the fucker's throat. The second episode ends with Tyrone and the real Brigid BAMF-ing into the scene, meeting Tandy, and later coming face-to-face with "Mayhem".

Overall... it's a neatly done two-parter, I suppose. Again, a lot of people like this thing so it's a matter of personal taste more than anything, but I really do think that these episodes really could've had a lot of their more redundant "look at this nice moment" scenes trimmed down or cut out a little. I am a big fan of some of them, like Tandy and Tyrone enjoying themselves in the club, or the "movie night", but I do feel a fair bit of the scenes could've done with a bit of trimming. We'll see if this mystery of Mayhem and the main characters' main problems will be enough to keep me around. Not the strongest opening to a sequel season, but not a bad one.