Jessica, now married to Luke Cage and mother to baby Danielle, is largely retired from the superhero business. But when Daredevil calls on her regarding the trial of a woman who was allegedly mind-controlled by a supervillain, the past comes back to haunt her.
The first issue was released June 29, 2022.
The Variants (2022) provides examples of:
- Alliance of Alternates: The various Jessicas reluctantly work together. The Big Bad turns out to have their own alliance of alternates, who are Jessicas forced into compliance by threatening their loved ones.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: The Big Bad behind the alternate Jessicas appearance is revealed to be one that still employs her Jewel persona. They pretend to be a naive ingenue but really orchestrated the whole thing to Kill and Replace Jessica for her life.
- Curb-Stomp Battle: Jessica flattens all three of the gangsters who are menacing Stomping Grounds without getting up from her seat. Or spilling her coffee.
- Doppelgänger Gets Same Sentiment: Jessica Omega, who was married to Daredevil on her world, and then saw him killed, hits on the Earth-616 Matt but regrets it.
- Evil Counterpart: Jewel is a sociopathic Life Drinker who slaughtered most of her world's heroes and is now traversing the Multiverse, trying to steal the lives of other Jessicas.
- Her Own Worst Enemy: Two-fold; Jessica asks for Charles Xavier's help to deprogram her of Killgrave's ticking time bomb in her mind. Though it appears as a Living Memory of the Purple Man in her mindscape, Charles helps her realize it's simply a manifestation of her own trauma from his control, because it only knows things she does. Later, variants of her start showing up and antagonizing her.
- Identical Stranger: Jewel and Knightress are from the same Earth. No explanation is given for why that reality had two different Jessica Joneses.
- Legendary Imposter: The Stomping Ground extortionists are led by, as it turns out, some doofus who thinks wearing a double-breasted suit and a big hat will let him trade on Hammerhead's reputation.
- Manchurian Agent: Exactly ten years after Kilgrave abducted Maria Snyder she killed her family. In court, she claims this was due to Kilgrave's mind control leaving a hidden instruction that she was programmed to follow. She warns Jessica that he's likely to have done the same thing to her.
- Mugging the Monster: The gangsters trying to extort money from the Stomping Grounds coffee shop suggest that they might hurt one of the customers to send a message. They pick Jessica as their example. It goes badly for them.
- Outside-Context Problem: First, Jessica has to contend with the possibility that the Purple Man left dormant commands that would force her to kill her family after a set amount of time. After seemingly resolving that, alternate versions of her start showing up and cause a different kind of problem.
- Shout-Out: At the end of the first issue, after meeting two alternative versions of herself, Jessica’s narration has a knowing shout-out to one of the most famous superhero stories to use that device:Jessica Jones: Crisis. I'm having a crisis. Swell.
- Stalker with a Crush: Jewel's origin is that she was madly in love with Cyclops off of news stories about him. When she read he and Jean Grey were engaged, Jewel stormed into the X-Mansion to confront them. Naturally, Cyclops having zero clue who this woman was didn't help as Jewel ended up slaughtering the X-Men.
- Yandere: The Big Bad turns out to be someone that was in love with Cyclops, even though they never met, and was so outraged he ended up with Jean that they sought to kill all the X-Men. She succeeded in her home reality.
