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'Jessica Jones' Makes Me Question The Point Of The Marvel Cinematic Universe

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This article is more than 8 years old.

I just finished two days of binge-watching Jessica Jones, going against my better instincts to read the comics first and spread the episodes out over at least the course of the week.

I regret nothing.

The show is great, with fantastic chemistry between the leads of Jessica (Krysten Ritter) and Trish (Rachel Taylor), and an absolutely sublime performance by David Tennant as the evil-yet-weirdly-sympathetic Killgrave.

But this is not a review of the show. Rather, I want to discuss how Jessica Jones relates to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, or rather doesn’t relate, and how it makes me question the point of Marvel’s grand master plan.

For those who don’t know, the Marvel Cinematic Universe is Marvel/Disney’s roadmap to have everything in Marvel media, both movies and TV, be part of the same “universe.” This was originally supposed to be how three separate superhero films (Iron Man, Thor, Captain America) combined into The Avengers, when at the time, there was nothing quite like that in movie history (and really there still isn’t, until Dawn of Justice gets here).

But that was supposed to expand into TV as well, first with the trial run of Agents of SHIELD, and now with a quartet of show on Netflix , Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Luke Cage and Iron Fist.

This actually worked pretty well for a while. Agents of SHIELD had a masterful late-season turn in which SHIELD itself was essentially dismantled by the Captain America: Winter Soldier revelation that Hydra was running most of it. That included showcasing that one of the core members of the cast was a member of Hydra this whole time, which was both shocking and fit perfectly into the movie-created lore.

And yet, nothing has happened to that extreme since, with SHIELD reduced to at best pulling cameos from some third-string member of Thor for a guest spot, but largely having nothing to do with The Avengers at all, despite how close Phil Coulson used to be to the group. It’s not clear if anyone ever even let The Avengers know that Phil Coulson came back from the dead, when he was essentially their coach for so long. Now the show just references the “big leagues” every so often by saying things like “everything changed when that city got dropped out of the sky” (referencing the events of Avengers 2). But that’s really it.

Enter Jessica Jones, which now seems so far removed from the world of The Avengers, it might as well not be in the same universe at all. Not only that, but it’s also weirdly disconnected from its own sister show as well, Daredevil.

Jessica Jones is so scared of association with the films, it drops quite literally like, two references to the Avengers in 13 episodes, and refuses to even refer to them by name, calling them “those guys” or referring to Hulk and Captain America as “the green guy and the flag-waver.” The entire plot is based around trying to prove in court that a man has the power to mind-control people when aliens just invaded the world like last year, and a sentient robot tried to destroy the world with a city-meteor shortly after.

But what’s even weirder is how Jessica Jones almost refuses to acknowledge Daredevil at all, despite the fact that it’s supposed to be sharing at least this little corner of the Marvel Cinematic Universe with it.

For example, a major character in Jessica Jones is Jeri Hogarth, a big time lawyer. And yet, despite the fact that Daredevil revolved around two competing law firms, and small one and a big one, from what I could tell, neither were brought up, even in casual conversation. And the same goes for “the vigilante,” the masked man who was going around beating up criminals in Hell’s Kitchen, where Jessica Jones and Luke Cage reside. No mention of him or his burough-controlling adversary Wilson Fisk at all.

I had a theory for this as the episodes went on, that Jessica Jones was actually a prequel to Daredevil, taking place before the events of that show. And yet, as you head into the final episode, Jessica Jones (very, very minor spoilers) does finally make a direct connection to Daredevil at long last, not with the hero himself, but at least with one of the characters from the show. But there you learn that these stories have been happening in parallel with each other, which makes the complete lack of cross-reference until that point really strange.

My question is, what’s the point of the Marvel Cinematic Universe having all characters occupy the same space when they’re not even allowed to say the names of the most popular heroes in the world, nor are they allowed to even have cursory references to their own companion shows when the events of each are supposed to be happening right down the street from each other?

I know that as time goes on, Jessica Jones/Luke Cage and Daredevil will intersect more, but for now, outside of a singular episode where they share a character, I would never have had any idea they were taking place on the same few blocks of New York. It’s just weird.

I also understand that everything in the Marvel Universe is trying to “be its own thing” and stand on its own two feet, but so far, it seems like the movies have a huge, huge priority, while TV sort of gets to pick up the scraps. The third Captain America movie gets Tony Stark returning for it and Thor gets The Hulk. Jessica Jones gets…a little kid running around in a Captain America Halloween costume.

This is where I think DC is actually doing a somewhat better job of things, keeping its TV and movie universes separate. The Flash and Arrow are much more well connected than anything we’ve seen from Marvel so far, and they’re even essentially merging to form a third show, Legends of Tomorrow, using beloved characters from each. I’ve speculated that DC may be poaching villains from shows like Arrow and Gotham to protect its films, but generally, they seem to be given pretty free reign to do what they want.

But the Marvel Cinematic Universe is just weird. It’s why if I hear something like “Marvel says Deadpool is part of the MCU!” that starts to mean less and less to me. So now, what, Ant-Man will show up in a two second cameo in that movie or something? Outside of The Avengers, there’s just so, so little interconnection between elements of the MCU, and in TV especially it’s particularly noticeable.

I really like these new Netflix shows, and I don’t have a problem with the MCU generally, but I also really don’t understand the point of it if they’re going to keep everything within it separated off in these little boxes where cross-referencing seems borderline illegal. If it’s going to be a living, breathing, connected universe, they have to make it feel that way. Otherwise, why bother at all?

Follow me on Twitteron Facebook, and on Tumblr. Pick up my sci-fi novels, The Last Exodus and The Exiled Earthborn, which are now in print and online.

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