Jessica experiences a strange homecoming courtesy of Kilgrave. Hogarth's conflict with her estranged wife reaches a tipping point.
Tropes:
- Abusive Parents: Jessica is disdainful about Kilgrave's claims of a Freudian Excuse.
- Actor Allusion: Kilgrave orders the household servants not to blink until Jessica returns.
- Asshole Victim: The nosy neighbor Jessica didn't like as a kid is still living next door. Kilgrave casually humiliates her. Then again, she didn't deserve to become a human bomb.
- Ate His Gun: Narrowly averted by the guy who was holding his family hostage. Kilgrave tells him to put the gun in his mouth, but Jessica stops him before he can go through with it.
- Childhood Home Rediscovery: Exploited. Kilgrave meticulously recreated Jessica's old home down to the furnishings, pictures and electronics, even commenting on how difficult it was to find some of the pieces thanks to their age. Naturally, considering their history, it doesn't endear him to her.
- Continuity Nod: The reporter at the scene of the hostage situation is the same WHiH reporter who was present when Detective Blake was shot.
- Cutting the Knot: Laurent and Alva have instructions to kill themselves if Jessica tries anything, so Jessica drugs their food so they can't hurt themselves, but not Kilgrave's because he's Properly Paranoid. When they collapse, she gags him then drugs him with sufentanil.
- Double Standard: Rape, Sci-Fi: Invoked and defied. Kilgrave says his sexual intercourses with Jessica doesn't count as rape because he technically had her consent via his Mind Control. Jessica doesn't buy it and clarifies, that no, he definitely sexually assaulted her multiple times.
- Exact Words: Kilgrave reiterates that he said to "take care of [Reva]" and Jessica interpreted it as "kill her" to try and keep his own hands clean regarding the affair; Jessica won't have any of it.
- Foreshadowing: Despite his promise, Kilgrave actually does give Jessica a single command, without either of them seeming to notice. During their argument over him "getting back to zero" on the morality scale, he tells her to "Do the moral math." Instead of stopping everything and actually doing this, Jessica just keeps arguing with him, without noticing. This will become important later.
- Freudian Excuse Is No Excuse: Kilgrave's genuinely tragic past still isn't portrayed as anywhere near justifying the person he is now, especially since his rant about never knowing if someone really wants to do what he says ignores that he could always just ask them. This excuse is also ridiculed by Jessica:Jessica: You blame bad parenting? My parents died! You don't see me raping anyone!
- In the video of his childhood we see Kilgrave's response to having mind control powers for the first time. He had been crying in pain, but as soon as he forces his parents to step away, his face goes completely calm, almost dead. He was a sociopath even then.
- Happy Flashback: The episode opens with one showing Jessica's family getting ready for a family vacation.
- Idiot Ball: Simpson is brought a bag by a woman who was obviously under Kilgrave's control and pauses to look inside, instead of just assuming it's bad news (as one should in such a situation) and getting as far the hell away from it as possible.
- Mind Rape: Jessica says Kilgrave did this to her with his mind control, along with physical rape.
- Moral Sociopathy: Sort of with Kilgrave.Kilgrave: I have a conscience. It's just more selective.
- Morality Pet: Jessica considers becoming this to Kilgrave; someone who could teach him about morality and maybe make a hero out of him.
- Mythology Gag: Killgrave leaves a dress in Jessica's room, expecting her to wear it for dinner. She tears it apart and comes out of her room wearing the same clothes she was brought in with.Kilgrave: No dress?Jessica: Purple's not really my color.
- Not Bad: A wordless version, when Kilgrave silently commends Jessica on covering for him kidnapping her by insulting him to his face, something he would likely never let her do if he were mind controlling her.
- Not Me This Time: When Jessica gives Kilgrave a look at hearing about how Simpson is missing, he shrugs, indicating no, he had nothing to do with that.
- Screw Yourself: Kilgrave mentions that he once told a man to do this, and leaves it up to Jessica's (and the audience's) imagination what happened next.
- Shout-Out: When Kilgrave gets cops to let them get into a house, Jessica references this scene
when she mentions Obi-Wan Kenobi. - Stealth Pun: Kilgrave remarks on how his parents abandoned him when he was ten, prompting Jessica to say, "You're not Ten anymore."
- Title Drop: Courtesy of Kilgrave when he is about to have a man inside of the house commit suicide. Of course, he says "What Would Jessica Do?" instead of Jesus.
- Touché: Kilgrave's reaction to Jessica's test to see if he has safeguards.
- Wants a Prize for Basic Decency: Kilgrave orders the house servants to prepare him a cake as a reward for using his powers in a constructive manner.
- Wunza Plot: Kilgrave proposes this scenario: He's a psychopathic mind-controller, she's a superstrong woman who can be his moral compass.
