Jessica and Luke Cage team up once again to find Kilgrave. Meanwhile, Kilgrave tries to find ways to increase his power.
Tropes in this episode include:
- Apologetic Attacker: Jessica apologizes before and after she shoots Luke.
- Ambiguous Situation: While it's clear Luke was compelled by Kilgrave to say he forgives her, when he repudiates her after The Reveal, it's unclear if this is also mind control or his real feelings.
- Barrier-Busting Blow: What a mind-controlled Luke does to Jessica when she tries to hide from him.
- Boom, Headshot!: How Jessica ends her fight in the climax in this episode. She grabs a cop's shotgun, presses it against Luke's head and pulls the trigger.
- Brand X: We see the label on one of Jessica's bottles on her desk. It's Wild Fowl Whisky.
- Chronic Hero Syndrome: Flashbacks show Jessica unable to hold back from saving people. And Kilgrave ordering her to do something so fundamentally against her nature as cold blooded murder broke his hold on her.
- Chairman of the Brawl: Jessica uses metal folding chairs in her fight against Luke Cage.
- Comically Missing the Point: Robyn, as per usual. Malcom takes her to the industrial waterfront where he dumped Ruben's body.Robyn: If you're mind controlled to drown me, I'm dragging you in, too, fair warning. Look, broomstick, you're into me, it happens, romantic backdrop, it's working. But I'm in mourning.
- Malcolm's complete confusion makes it land.
- Due to the Dead: Malcolm takes Robyn to the river so she can say goodbye to Ruben.
- Fighting from the Inside:
- Cage is visibly doing this throughout his and Jessica's fight. It's unsuccessful until he manages to freeze long enough to encourage her to shoot him. This is Foreshadowed from the first moment he's controlled by Kilgrave in the flashback to their meeting outside the restaurant where Hope killed herself. He follows every one of Kilgrave's commands, but there's always a brief, but significant, pause.
- When, before she goes down to confront Kilgrave, Luke warns her to "Keep her distance," does he mean from Kilgrave or from himself?
- He has notably less finesse than usual when fighting, telegraphing his blows and not properly redirecting the comparatively Weak, but Skilled Jessica's hits and grapples, which allows her to get some good hits in.
- Fighting Your Friend: Jessica is forced to fight Luke while he is under Kilgrave's influence.
- Foreshadowing: Kilgrave and his dad talk about how the time of his control has increased, and before entering the club we see the kid Kilgrave told to stare at a fence still there, at least 24 hours later.
- A Good Name for a Rock Band: Kilgrave's reaction to Jessica saying he was found because she "followed the trail of misery."
- "I Know You're in There Somewhere" Fight: It turns out, Luke Cage was under Kilgrave's control the entire time. The climax of the episode involves him trying to kill Jessica. She pleads with him to stop several times, to no avail.
- Ironic Echo: Kilgrave echoes Luke's forgiveness speech to Jessica, word for word. See Wham Line.
- Oh, Crap!:
- When Luke calmly and with no effort picks the hotel employee up by her shoulders and moves her across the room.
- When Luke shows up out of nowhere at the end of the episode, still under Kilgrave's control.
- Punch Catch: Jessica catches Luke's initial punch, but he soon overpowers her and hits her.
- Scary Black Man:
- Luke tries to intimidate a landlady, but she is unfazed, up until he effortlessly picks her up and moves her aside.
- This also undoes his attempt to kill Kilgrave, when Kilgrave's father gasps on seeing Luke charging towards them, alerting Killgrave.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: After nearly dying the previous week, Malcolm, finally clean, decides to leave of his own volition.
- There Was a Door: Played with during Jessica and Luke's fight. She's waiting to ambush him when he comes through a door. He reverses the ambush by coming through the wall.
- Title Drop: Courtesy of Kilgrave. When Cage expresses his desire for revenge, Kilgrave says, "Take a bloody number!"
- Urine Trouble: As has been shown in previous episodes, when Kilgrave tells someone to keep doing something, they will do it nonstop without even going to the restroom.
- He tells a club-goer to stare at a fence forever simply because he annoyed him. The next time we see the poor guy, he's still in front of the fence and has obviously soiled himself.
- Jessica remarks that the scientists working for Kilgrave "smell like piss and shit" due to their nonstop experiments.
- Vertigo Effect: On Jessica's face, when Kilgrave reveals that Luke is still under his control.
- Wham LineKilgrave: I forgive you for everything and I’ll say it every day for as long as you need to hear it!Jessica: You heard that?Kilgrave: [grins] I WROTE IT! [in sing-song voice] Surprise![Luke appears and punches Jessica in the face, throwing her backwards across the room]Kilgrave: Mr. Cage had been ordered to ring me about your exploits since before he blew up his seedy little bar. Uh, the 12-hour window at that point was actually 16 hours. Now it's 24... and a hundred yards. [Jessica gets up] Did you think he was more powerful than me? With his unbreakable skin? Is that why you desired him?Luke Cage: You really thought I could forgive you? You killed my wife.Jessica Jones: That's not you talking, that's him.Luke Cage: Shut up.Kilgrave: I tried so hard to avoid this, Jessica. This is not what I wanted. But you failed the test. [into the mike] Kill her.
- Yank the Dog's Chain: Luke finally forgives Jessica for murdering his wife and lying to him about it, only for it to turn out that he was under Kilgrave's control the entire time and had been made to say those things to gain Jessica's trust.
