Marvel's Luke Cage (Netflix series)

Just finished season 2 and wow, this was way better than the first season. Season one was too focused on trying to beat Luke with violence. Cornell was a cool villain, but it was hard to ignore the fact that he and Luke were in a stalemate purely because Cornell couldn't harm Luke and Luke wouldn't do anything to Cornell.

Then Diamondback showed up and thing just got stupider from there.

Defenders similarly had trouble really explaining why any of these other assholes were needed when the Invincible Man could just go end the plot any time he feels like doing it.

But LC 2 really hits its stride. It's the complexity of the plot that really makes what they tried to do with Cornell actually work here. Bushmaster aside, Luke's invulnerability is taken as a given. There is no pretense that any of these people can actually hurt him - again, save for Bushmaster - but the plot is complicated enough that it never really feels like Luke could just go punch his way to victory.

Bushmaster is a credible threat to Luke. Even with Bushmaster's nightshade ritual, Luke still seems stronger, and the fact that Luke's unbreakable but Bushmaster isn't is a clear edge. However Bushmaster is clearly the better fighter. Luke's not used to fighting people in the same weight class, which allows Bushmaster to get the better of him despite the inferior powers.

And he doesn't rely on cheat codes to do it. Where the Judas Bullets fell apart as a concept was how bluntly they just ignored the premise of the character. Luke's skin is invulnerable. "Yeah, well I have an invulnerability-breaking SUPER BULLET that can beat invulnerable skin!" That's just lazy writing.

In this season, you can tell that the writers are on the same page with that. The Judas Bullets are told to go f*ck themselves because something something Luke's skin is even harder now something something. It's a quick and easy Hand Wave to justify exiling those things from the story going forward because they're dumb.

They never go back to that well. Bushmaster's powers do not give him the ability to break Luke's skin; instead, he has to find ways to fight around Luke's invulnerability and that makes for a more intelligent and interesting villain.

I also loved the dynamic with Mariah and Bushmaster. Season 1 left off like Mariah was setting up shop, ready to take on the mantle of main villain going forward. Then season 2 comes along and goes, "But enough about that, here's THIS asshole," and thrusts Bushmaster into the story. But then around the halfway point it becomes apparent that no, Mariah really is Asshole Prime in this season.

The finale's setting Luke up to go down a dark path, lose himself, and have to find himself again. I am super invested in this. I'm really looking forward to seeing what season 3 will have to offer.

Edited by TobiasDrake on Oct 4th 2018 at 4:15:17 AM

Pretty much where I am. I do miss Cottonmouth and I'm gonna miss the hell out of Mariah, but this season was tightly plotted and paid off in so many ways by the end. I really do like how Bushmaster leaves the show having completely destroyed himself in the pursuit of his revenge, and Mariah still kind of wins by in all likelihood having passed on the worst of herself to Tilda — who knows how to make more Nightshade, hence the name, if she can get her hands on the materials, which I imagine is going to come back to haunt Luke in a later season.

Mariah passed some of herself to Luke too. There's a reason she left Harlem's Paradise to him, and his acceptance of it is pretty strongly presented as something that we should not be supporting of. That he's calling himself the King of Harlem also directly parallels Mariah's claim to be Harlem's Queen.

Tilda, I'd give a 50/50 chance for her return. She could walk away now and it'd be a satisfying enough conclusion to her story; the last vestige of the Stokes name has been burnt to ash in a cremation furnace, a gesture that clearly indicates that she's washing her hands of the family business forever. This is the kind of retributive murder that characters often do get to walk away from wearing a "morally ambiguous" label rather than "next season's bad guy".

But, as noted, she does know how to make the nightshade. So if they ever want to bring that back into the plot, she'd be the way to do it. I'd classify her as "on call"; her arc is complete and she has no compelling reason to ever come back, but she does possess a useful skill that a future writer may want to capitalize on.

Our last shot of her being inexplicably pissed that Harlem's Paradise wasn't left to her seems to suggest she'll return in some antagonistic capacity. I don't particularly like it, since it doesn't really follow well from her characterization in the story, but it wouldn't be the only reason I suspect the first few episodes and the final one were written before the rest of the story was fleshed out.

When she shows up at the nightclub she's dressed up in an outfit similar to her supervillain attire from the comics, so I'd be shocked if she doesn't play a major role in Season 3. She's pretty obviously being set up as a new threat now that Mariah and Bushmaster are out of the picture.

Y'know what, fair enough. I totally spaced on her being a supervillain from the comics.

In addition to the nightshade formula, her extensive botanical knowledge and likely capacity to concoct deadly poisons would provide a new angle to come at Luke from as well. Another way to threaten him despite his invulnerability.

So I was surprised when I found this out just recently: Are the Jamaican Accents in the show really that bad? English isn't my mothertongue, thus I have trouble keeping many accents or dialects apart, but to me they sounded quite cool.

It's a matter of debate:

• It's fake as hell. (read the comments)
• Real Jamaican reacts to Fake Accents (In Luke Cage) - " at least they were TRYING ..."
• It's the best thing about LC Season 2 (reddit)
• It's hella bad (jamaicans dot com)

Like many things in life, some feel insulted because they didn't find authentic Jamaican actors, others think it was okay but not great, and some don't really give a crap and feel the show's positives outweigh an unauthentic accent.

Edited by Soble on Oct 17th 2018 at 11:11:32 AM

Cancelled[1]

Dangit, I'm having the worst luck with tv shows in recent years. Seems like whenever I find something new to watch and start getting into it I find out it was cancelled or it gets cancel just a bit after I start watching it. This is tedious.

im guessing they are just gonna make a heroes for hire series with luke and danny

Goddamnit.

They'd better be prepping Luke Cage and Iron Fist's shows to be merged into Heroes for Hire or something, not just dropping them from existence. Even then that wouldn't work as well for continuing the existing plot hooks in either show.

This absolutely sucks considering the wonderful season 2 Luke Cage had.

And I don’t want to go there but the only two shows left standing are Daredevil and Jessica Jones, two shows comparatively whiter than Iron Fist or Luke Cage.

If they do Heroes for Hire then the first episode could be about Danny finishing up his business from Iron Fist then coming back to help Luke out in Harlem. I really hope they have a plan to keep these characters around.

Watch the season 2 ending be dropped or ignored.

Iron Fist ended with too many plot hooks- some outside of New York -to be resolved in an entire season of a joint show like Heroes for Hire, let alone a single episode.

Luke Cage's material not so much. The only real dangling plots we've really got there are Luke becoming club owner and Tilda becoming Nightshade (and whatever they're planning with Diamondback from Season 1), all of which can be resolved within New York and within either Luke Cage Season 3 or Heroes for Hire Season 1.

It's shitty either way, but part of me kind of hopes they're only being "cancelled" from Netflix and renewed on Disney's own service. Super-scummy business practice and I'd hate Disney for it, especially if they're forced to change the shows to accomodate the new platform, but the shows aren't ready to be merged together into Heroes for Hire yet.

Edited by Anomalocaris20 on Oct 19th 2018 at 11:14:30 AM

They might drop those threads to make a new start for HFH.

I touched on this in the Iron Fist thread but I just hope this isn't the last we see of these characters. Or at least, I hope this isn't the last we see of Luke and Colleen.

Wow. It's easy to assume Iron Fist was cancelled because of season 1 being dumped on critically and having very questionable quality that a better season couldn't repair the reputation of, but Luke Cage season 1 was actually liked much more on top of having a good season 2.

On the one hand I'd prefer Heroes For Hire over the show being cancelled-cancelled, but on the other I do feel like this show was just really getting its legs under it. It could easily feel like Iron Fist dragging this show down with it, even if it was good, unless it was amazingly, mindblowingly good.

Bear in mind, no one outside the Netflix corporation knows how many people actually watched those shows. Their viewership numbers could be far lower than their high profile in TV critic circles would suggest.

I think the Heroes for Hire show is wishful thinking, honestly. According to the article, the show was cancelled because of creative differences and the inability to agree to terms for the third season. Basically, the showrunner clashed with Netflix over the direction to take the show in and when an agreement couldn't be reached, the decision was made to pack it in and drop the ax.

This does not suggest that they're just clearing space for a Heroes for Hire series.

At least tethercat principal suggests that Luke will own a cool club forever and never actually be corrupted

Inb 4 that is retcon'd.

Daredevil season 4 will be greenlit solely to have Matt look right at the camera and express his surprise that Luke Cage turned to crime and that Danny got tetanus and died.