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| Image Courtesy www.screenrant.com |
Wow. That’s pretty much all you can say after
watching “AKA 1,000 Cuts,” the tenth episode of Jessica Jones season
1. This is pretty much the episode where
everything starts going to hell and we are left wondering just who the real
villain is. Kilgrave becomes far more
sympathetic in the first half of the episode—though he continues his
psychopathic ways before he can really become redeemable—but he is outclassed
by even more duplicitous and unsavory actions from seeming-allies of Jessica’s. What is the right way to react to a power
like Kilgrave’s?
The episode opens with
Kilgrave’s perspective of the conclusion of the previous episode, “AKA Sin Bin”
(1x09), in which Kilgrave escaped from the containment chamber, ordered Trish
to put a bullet in her head, and fled out the door, pursued by Jessica. After Clemons attacked Jessica to get her off
of Kilgrave, Kilgrave flees out the door and finds Hogarth attempting to drive
away. Hogarth pulls a gun on Kilgrave,
but he orders her to throw it away, an order which she obeys, to her
shock. Kilgrave then gets in her car and
orders her to drive him to a doctor she trusts.
Which doctor does she bring him to?
The one to whom she is still married, of course! Hogarth brings him to Wendy, and he orders
Wendy to fix him up, though he has evidently agreed to help Hogarth by forcing
Wendy to sign the divorce papers for her.
However, Kilgrave and Wendy begin commiserating about their horrible
lovers (Jessica and Hogarth, respectively):
Kilgrave is exceedingly frustrated by Jessica’s lack of appreciation for
all the trouble he went to in giving her back her “home.” This whole scene really serves to humanize
both Kilgrave and Wendy—though it doesn’t do Hogarth any favors.
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| Image Courtesy www.heroichollywood.com |
It is during this
conversation that Hogarth is semi-forced into revealing the crucial information
that Hope had been pregnant with Kilgrave’s child and gotten an abortion, and
that Hogarth had sent the fetus to “Hammond Labs” (can you say “Original Human
Torch Easter egg?”) to see if his powers could be replicated from it, though
the experiment failed. At this point
Kilgrave still wants to find and finish off his father, so when Jessica calls
Hogarth he orders Hogarth to find out where his father is. Jessica already knows Hogarth helped him
escape, and does not reveal the information.
Unfortunately at this moment there is a knock on Wendy’s door, and
Kilgrave thinks it’s Jessica. Instead of
carrying out his part of the deal with Hogarth, Kilgrave gives Wendy what he
thinks she wants: a opportunity for
revenge against Hogarth. Kilgrave orders
her to give Hogarth a taste of her own medicine, 1,000 cuts. Pam comes in before Wendy can kill Hogarth,
and Pam has to kill Wendy to save Hogarth.
At this point Jess finally arrives and learns from Hogarth that Kilgrave
is going to go after his father. To
conclude the plot with Pam and Hogarth, Pam is arrested, Hogarth visits her,
and Pam realizes that Hogarth freed Kilgrave and set all these events in
motion—and to top it all off, she’s lying to her. Pam refuses Hogarth as legal counsel, and
appears to have broken up with her entirely.
Here is yet another unintended victim of Kilgrave, as Pam was forced to
kill to defend Hogarth, only to discover after the fact that Hogarth was at
fault for the whole situation. I’ve
already made it clear how much I dislike Hogarth’s character, but I do like how
this whole sequence goes down, perhaps because it gives Hogarth some
understanding of just who Kilgrave is and what he’s capable of.
Returning to Jessica,
she goes back into the control room to find Trish trying to carry out
Kilgrave’s last order: “Put a bullet in
your head.” However, Trish comically
can’t follow through on loading her revolver before having to try jabbing the
bullet into the side of her head. Finally
Jessica grabs a bullet, tells Trish to put it in her mouth (“The bullet’s in
your head”), and then has her spit it out.
By technically fulfilling the order, Kilgrave’s hold is broken. It’s at this point that Jessica reveals the
good news: Kilgrave’s power does not
work over her anymore for some reason.
Kilgrave’s father (handcuffed so he can’t cut his heart out) explains
that because Kilgrave’s power is virus-based, Jessica may have developed an
immunity to the virus, making her the missing ingredient for a cure that could
protect someone from Kilgrave’s influence—though how that happened is still up
for debate. Trish agrees to take Albert
back to his apartment and help him work up a cure. I think Jessica’s solution to Trish’s orders
might be the funniest part of this episode (there really aren’t a lot of
comedic moments in this season).
Watching Albert try to create a cure is also quite interesting, though
it seems like a foregone conclusion that he won’t succeed.
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| Image Courtesy www.comicbookmovie.com |
Jessica returns to her
office, where she finds Malcolm outside helping Robyn put up flyers for Ruben
(in case you forgot, Kilgrave forced him to kill himself in episode 7, “AKA Top
Shelf Perverts”). Jessica confronts
Malcolm for leading Robyn on when they need to tell her the truth before going
up to her office to change her shirt.
However, when she gets to the office, she finds Kilgrave waiting for her
with a proposition: he has arranged for
Hope’s freedom, and in exchange he wants his father. The two of them then discuss their shared
history, including why Kilgrave thinks that she stayed with him of her own free
will: he gave her exactly 18 seconds of
freedom, which she did not use to escape.
However, she tells him that it took all 18 seconds to fully regain
herself, and that he put her under his control again before she could attempt
to escape. Then he made her start
cutting her ears off, though he relented after a single cut.
Unfortunately, this is
when Robyn goes nuts. She follows
Malcolm to the Kilgrave support group, hears him admit to helping cover up
Ruben’s murder, and incites the support group members to blame Jessica for
their trauma and join her in attacking Jessica, despite Malcolm’s
protests. They all go over to Jessica’s
apartment, where she is telling Hope the good news that she will be released. The support group members overwhelm her before
Robyn discovers Kilgrave and removes the duct tape from his mouth. At this point in the story, Robyn is not the
best character, although after everything she has been through (including her
twin brother’s death), I suppose you can’t particularly blame her. She represents all the people who do not know
what Kilgrave is capable of and blame the victims of his crimes.
When Jess comes to,
she goes to the prison to pick up Hope, but discovers that Kilgrave has taken
her prisoner and is demanding that she bring his father to him to secure Hope’s
freedom. Jess goes to the apartment and
collects Albert, who brings along his antidote, which he sprays on himself
before they enter the restaurant where Kilgrave waits. However, when they arrive they find that Kilgrave
has taken the support group hostage and is using them as leverage: one word and they hang themselves by stepping
off the bar. The antidote does not work,
Kilgrave takes control of his father, Hope stabs herself in the jugular (of her
own free will), and Kilgrave has the support group hang themselves so he can
escape. Jess succeeds in rescuing the
support group, but she does not reach Hope in time to save her. Hope’s dying request is for Jess to kill
Kilgrave now that he can’t use Hope as leverage over her. This is insanely intense: after everything Jess has done this season to
trap Kilgrave and expose his powers, Hope still wound up dead. Yet again, Jess is left at the end of her
rope thanks to Kilgrave remaining 2 steps ahead of her.
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| Image Courtesy www.gloveo.com |
The final subplot of
the episode involves Simpson, who arrives at the CDC facility after everyone
has left but before Clemons’ backup can arrive to secure the crime scene. Clemons tells Simpson that they have all the
evidence they need to put Kilgrave away, but Simpson tells him that that’s not
enough: “I have no other option. I’m taking him out.” Simpson forces Clemons to tell him where
Trish is, and shoots Clemons after he reveals the information. Simpson then douses everything in flammable
chemicals and lights Clemons and all the evidence on fire. I guess they won’t be putting Kilgrave in
prison any time soon. Simpson then goes
to Albert’s apartment to try to keep her safe and away from Kilgrave. Trish is immediately suspicious of his
behavior—dilated pupils and the fact that last she saw him he was
half-dead. She forces him out and keeps
the bottle of red pills. Yet again,
Simpson is behaving erratically, though this time around he can blame his
actions on the extenuating circumstance that he’s taking adrenaline-based
super-soldier pills. However, I still
don’t think that his actions align with his motivations as well as the other
characters.
Even though this
episode features three of my least favorite characters doing especially stupid
things (Hogarth, Simpson, and Robyn), I actually enjoyed this episode. It helps to make Kilgrave a little more
sympathetic and gives Jessica everything she’s been working for this
season. However, that could never be enough,
not with someone like Kilgrave involved.
What did you think of
this episode? Which are your
least-favorite characters in Jessica Jones? Let me know in the comments!
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