"Luke Cage"

Even though we still have three episodes of Daredevil S2 to finish, I twisted everyone's arm at home to watch the first ep of Luke Cage last night.

Yeah, we'll definitely be watching more.

It's slow and hot and rumbling below the surface, steeped in Harlem, and almost startling for its (very appropriate, but still rare on TV) saturation of people of color — mostly black, some Hispanic, and only a very rare person of Asian or white coloration.

Luke Cage is a guy who just wants to be left alone, a fugitive from the law (for reasons not spelled out in the first ep, but left to simmer, just as Jessica Jones' secrets were clearly present but left as hints early on). He takes low-paying jobs, cash under the table, struggling to get by, but for a man of amazing strength and apparent nigh-invulnerability, he lives in quiet, desperate fear.

I so much want to see more.

The obvious shows to compare this to are the other Marvel Knights on Netflix. Like Matt Murdoch / Daredevil, Cage has a strong moral code, one that wants expression and only starts to creep out at the end of the first ep. Unlike Murdoch, Cage starts off with no driving need to right wrongs; even as he starts to step away from that, it's in a defensive posture, less scrapper than tank, less seeking out evil to destroy it than trying to protect what good is already there. Murdoch's fear is that he will be unable to do enough; Cage's seems to be that he will do too much. Murdoch carries his desperate and guilty demons on his sleeve; Cage's are still locked tight and deep, visible only in Mike Colter's amazingly restrained physicality.

The other comparison is with Jessica Jones, and that's in different dimensions than with Daredevil. Like Jones, Cage is hiding from his past; for Jones, this is more mental and emotional, while for Cage there is a literal, physical hiding taking place, as well as emotional. Jones wraps herself up in loud cynicism and provocatively self-destructive behavior; Cage wraps himself in silence and, for the audience, provocatively servile behavior. Jones' fears eventually exploded outward, needing to be purged; Cage's seem as though they will need to be slowly, painfully, faced and overcome.

How this all fits in with how Jones and Cage eventually meet and, um, interrelate will be interesting to see (or review).

One thing that struck me in the first ep was how much it felt like a Western, especially toward the end, as the strong, silent, reluctant man is drawn by his innate goodness and the need of those around him to make a stand against villainy. That's a facile description of what happens here, but tonally it fits, and how that translates into modern Harlem is fascinating. What makes it fit is the sense of morality play, which is what Luke Cage is so far: not a simple morality play, to be sure, as there are many, many layers at work here. But, ultimately, Luke Cage seems to be about a man who has been beaten down, and who has to learn how to stand up again and protect others who face their own threats; I am looking forward to seeing how that plays out over the following episodes.

(After we finish Daredevil, of course.)

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