Discussion Series / LukeCage2016

Removed:

• Expy:
  • When executive producer Cheo Hodari Coker said in an interview that Luke Cage was the MCU's version of The Wire, he meant it. Many of the characters have noticeable parallels to Wire characters:
    • Luke Cage himself would be Omar Little, especially with his refraining from profanity, and his targeting of other criminal gangs.
    • Cottonmouth is Avon Barksdale. They're both men that believe that the criminal lifestyle has rules, are angered when those rules are broken, and seem disgusted with their associates' attempts to go legitimate. It helps that Mahershala Ali actually bears a resemblance to Wood Harris.
    • Mariah Dillard is a composite of Stringer Bell and Senator Clay Davis. She takes an active role in her cousin Cornell's criminal empire, wanting to go legitimate, like Stringer, but with the corrupt politician elements of Davis (putting up a pleasant facade in public to hide her ruthlessness in private). Just like Avon and Stringer end up betraying each other over conflicting differences (including Stringer having Avon's nephew murdered), Mariah and Cottonmouth have a similar falling out, only this one ends with Mariah personally killing Cottonmouth.
    • If Cottonmouth is Avon, Diamondback is Marlo Stanfield - another gang boss who is a lot more ruthless and bloodthirsty than their predecessor. During the first half of the season, when Cottonmouth is active, Diamondback takes on a role similar to The Greek - he never actually appears on screen, and everyone only interacts with his Number Two, so Shades functions to Diamondback in the same role that Spiros does for The Greek.
    • Misty Knight has a somewhat adversarial relationship with Luke Cage that's similar to Bunk Moreland's adversarial friendship with Omar Little. She also begins to act similar to Jimmy McNulty after Scarfe is killed.
    • Inspector Ridley is the equivalent of Bill Rawls.
    • There's a scene where Misty and Scarfe are commiserating by their car while sharing a bottle of Jameson, similar to how in The Wire, Bunk Moreland and Jimmy McNulty like to drink in a secret location out by the tracks.
    • The gang war between Mariah and Bushmaster in season 2 has shades of the Barksdales' war with Marlo Stanfield in season 3 of The Wire. The only difference is that the Stokes and the McIvers have history, whereas the Barksdales and Stanfields don't.
  • Those who have just come from Daredevil (2015) will notice a lot of similarities between the criminal characters of both shows.
    • Cottonmouth and Mariah are a decomposite of Wilson Fisk into two separate characters: Cottonmouth embodies the crime lord parts of Fisk (volatile gangster with cops on his payroll), while Mariah embodies the public face elements (the one who wants to do good things for her neighborhood). They both even paint their vigilante adversary as a bad guy for the sake of publicity (Fisk by painting the Devil of Hell's Kitchen as the one behind the shooting of Detective Blake, and Mariah by pinning Luke for Cottonmouth's death).
    • Rafael Scarfe combines Detectives Blake and Hoffman into one character. Like Blake, he becomes unreliable and ends up getting killed for it, while like Hoffman, he ends up selling out Cottonmouth's criminal enterprise.
    • Shades is analogous to James Wesley. Both are very competent second-in-commands to their respective crime boss, and they both have undying loyalty. However, while Wesley excels at running the organization like a well oiled machine, and playing diplomat to bring other crime lords in line, Shades excels at playing advisor, rather than take a direct part in the organization, and also is more vocal if he disagrees with what his boss is doing, and also will cut ties if he thinks his boss won't listen to reason.
    • Misty Knight starts off seeing Luke as more of an adversary, but eventually warms up to him as the show progresses, similar to the evolution of Sgt. Brett Mahoney's views of Daredevil.
    • Claire Temple continues to have utmost faith in Luke's cause even when the criminals are using the media to smear him. This is similar to how Karen Page is continually believing in what Daredevil does even when Fisk is trying to paint him as a terrorist.
    • Bushmaster has some very Wilson Fisk-like moments in season 2.

This seems like a lot of Square Peg Round Trope. Some of the examples really don't bear much scrutiny. Luke isn't much like Omar even though they both happen to fight drug gangs without swearing. Their personalities, backgrounds, goals and actions are completely different. Further, most of the other write-ups take elements from multiple characters, which isn't an expy. It's pretty easy to find a few traits of one character spread out across multiple characters in virtually any other show.

How old is Mustafa Shakir?

According to the flashbacks, Bushmaster should be around the same age as Mariah, around 50.

Before adding him as an example of Younger Than He Looks, I want to make sure the actor is not a case himself.

This was added to the page:

• Lost Aesop: If the show had a single aesop, or moral, to tell about police brutality, urban gang violence, or race politics, it's very non-committal on a lot them. For example, "Black Lives Matter" gets mentioned only once, and as a spin story spun by one of the Big Bad Ensemble. Police brutality comes up as an issue, but the only officer to get charged for it is a black man who beat a black child. Most characters who talk about racial solidarity or community heritage are villains who feel entitled to keeping the power they've amassed. But at the same time, you have people like Rackham, who is an unapologetic racist, and acknowledgment by several characters that Luke Cage being a black man makes it nigh-impossible for anyone to believe he's innocent. Still, any "lessons" that can be gleaned from the show are up to personal interpretation.

I pulled it here because it feels like complaining. "The themes were disjointed, and if you disagree you're imagining things." Still, I figured it was best to get some more input.

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I didn't want to just jump in and change the Alternate History entry, in case I missed something, but isn't the only mention of Obama when Boone is referred to as 'Diet Obama'? I don't recall any actual suggestion that Obama had been president at all in the MCU, all of that is fan speculation. I happen to think the speculation is probably correct, and the Ellis presidency definitely makes this an Alternate History, but I think the current entry is misleading.

Edited by Ulysses21 Avatar from here. Hide / Show Replies

Something else that I'm not sure what to make of.

• Series Continuity Error: Diamondback's line (referring to Damien as a "diet Obama") suggests that Barack Obama is the President of the United States in the MCU just like in real life. Iron Man 3 and Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. say that the fictional Matthew Ellis was elected post-Avengers, meaning he won the 2012 election, so Obama was only president from 2008-2012. However, in episode six, the woman doing the interview with Mariah Dillard suggests that the Councilwoman shake it up with something fun, invoking Obama singing Al Green. Offering it as advice only makes sense if Obama were still in office and thus still politically relevant.

Most of the example sounds like "this looks like this trope but it's not." Okay, fine, that's a subversion. The problem is it's topped off by claiming that referencing Obama singing Al Green only makes sense if he's still "politically relevant," which makes no sense. People reference thing past politicians did all the time. So I don't know whether to just keep it cut or remove that line or what.

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Lighter and Softer?

Black Lives Matter gets a passing name check in the first episode, and there is public outcry when Lonnie is beaten up by a police officer but beyond the mention of Treyvon Martin in Method Man's rap Bulletproof Love, the issue is left fairly wide berth.

Killing a kid would have been much darker than the MCU goes for, no matter how much Darker And Edgier the Netflix series' are but it still sticks out a little how what was clearly a BLM reference was softened to seeming awkward and cartoonish.

Is there a trope for this? I'm not sure what it counts under.

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