My Weekend Crush

Imagine a TV show centered on a female heroine that spares us the spandex. Imagine a TV show centered on a female heroine that effortlessly passes the Bechdel Test. Imagine a TV show centered on a female heroine that hinges almost entirely on the concept of consent. Now just go to Netflix and watch it, because that show is “Jessica Jones.”

Having seen the first half of the season of the new Marvel ex-superhero series I can confirm that it is very good, fairly gay and absolutely terrifying. The terror comes not in the standard issue things-that-go-bump-in-the-night and/or bad-people-who-want-to-watch-the-world-burn kind of way we are used to seeing in movies and television. Global apocalypse is not what Jessica Jones is fighting.

Instead this is a much more personal. The terror is intimate in the way terror often isn’t, and also rather specific and universal for women as a whole. This is the horror of a man, a very bad man, who wants to consume us whole. A man who wants to, and effortlessly can, control us against our will. A stalker to the Nth degree. We’re talking too-close-for-comfort nightmare fuel at its finest.

The whole series drops on Netflix today and you’d better bet I can’t watch to watch the rest of the show. Sure, so far it needs more Carrie-Anne Moss. But what I’ve seen is more than enough to convince me that this is the stuff not only of nightmares, but dream TV. Happy weekend, all.

p.s. I will be recapping the series for AfterEllen, so look for fresh reviews each week starting Monday.