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One thing I really liked was that I sympathized with both Cottonmouth and Mariah in that scene. Cottonmouth because he had to shoot the one person who truly believed in him and wanted him to have a better life, so he was predisposed to view the man favorably, not to mention growing up in a world that surrounded him with misogynistic, rape-excusing bullshit. Mariah because, well, as nice as he might've been to Cottonmouth, the man raped her, and there's no defending that, no way to even begin to describe how traumatizing it is, and the fact that the misogynistic, rape-excusing bullshit she's heard all her life is now coming from the mouth of someone she loves and trusts as family... that's a deep cut. Basically, this was something that was stewing between them for a long time and it was never going to be pretty when it came out. I understand Cottonmouth desperately needing his uncle to be a good man, and thus painting Mariah as the one at fault. And I understand Mariah feeling so betrayed and enraged by that suggestion that she snapped and killed him in a moment of anger. That's good conflict and good storytelling. I would've been happier if Mariah had taken over as main villain at that point to be honest. She already showed that she was smart enough to come at Cage in ways that others wouldn't.
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Oct 30, 2016 21:31
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Yeah, that scene was powerful to me and not at all straining at credibility. I have a feeling Mariah was/is being saved to be next season's 'villain,' and that's where we'll see someone approach Cage with logic and finesse rather than just trying to hit him harder and harder.
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Oct 31, 2016 03:34
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Habibi posted:I have a feeling Mariah was/is being saved to be next season's 'villain,' and that's where we'll see someone approach Cage with logic and finesse rather than just trying to hit him harder and harder. She's definitely the Wilson Fisk of Harlem. Her entire arc concerns her ambivalent relationship to violent crime, and her vague flirtation with honest "above-board" power. And like Fisk, she fails to be that, and more or less chooses evil. It's interesting that both she and Fisk are "reluctant villains," because their stories become pretty sympathetic in light of it. They're both deeply ambitious figures who are tainted by their family's criminal past, specifically by some violent youth trauma. And both shows play it as tragedy...maybe Wilson wouldn't be so predisposed to violence if his dad wasn't so abusive, or maybe Mariah would've gone her own way if she wasn't routinely abused by her uncle or forced to care for Cornell. In general, inherited disadvantage and systemic failure affecting communities are prominent themes in Daredevil and Luke Cage. Maybe Iron Fist will go there, too, but at the moment, Matt and Luke seem like the more coherent partnership. In terms of "Heroes for Hire," I mean.
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Oct 31, 2016 09:20
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Habibi posted:Yeah, that scene was powerful to me and not at all straining at credibility.
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Oct 31, 2016 11:14
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This might've been posted already, didn't see it last page, but they've said that Defenders will only be 8 episodes. I wonder if they're realizing that a shorter tight story is better than having to fill out 13 episodes with two half-plots like they kind of did with LC and DD2.
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Oct 31, 2016 20:18
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Electromax posted:This might've been posted already, didn't see it last page, but they've said that Defenders will only be 8 episodes. I wonder if they're realizing that a shorter tight story is better than having to fill out 13 episodes with two half-plots like they kind of did with LC and DD2. No, because they said from the beginning Defenders was going to be shorter.
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Oct 31, 2016 20:25
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Electromax posted:This might've been posted already, didn't see it last page, but they've said that Defenders will only be 8 episodes. I wonder if they're realizing that a shorter tight story is better than having to fill out 13 episodes with two half-plots like they kind of did with LC and DD2. Maybe that, or maybe a budget for a show isn't meant for four main characters who each have their own show and escalating villains. Although that's probably written into their contract from the get go... I think way back when it was supposed to be shorter, though. I really don't think they'd shorten it for "narrative reasons", whatever the real reason is.
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Oct 31, 2016 20:28
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The original order was for 60 episodes of content. Four 13 episode series is 52, leaving only 8 for Defenders. They could have done all five as 12s, but I think keeping the big crossover smaller is the right instinct.
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Oct 31, 2016 20:44
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I think if they aim to do a second wave of similar shows, they should target 10 episode seasons. 13 hours of show really is a lot when you remember that even television writers on 20+ episode/season shows only had 43 minute episodes, not 60 minute ones. There has to be some burn-out.
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Oct 31, 2016 20:50
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Electromax posted:This might've been posted already, didn't see it last page, but they've said that Defenders will only be 8 episodes. I wonder if they're realizing that a shorter tight story is better than having to fill out 13 episodes with two half-plots like they kind of did with LC and DD2. I imagine it's very difficult to get all the various actors from individual shows together for one series, not to mention the plot headaches involved. I mean, this is really the first time Marvel's tried ramming multiple shows together. Even SHIELD/Ghost Rider introduced their crossover character in-show.
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Nov 1, 2016 15:08
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When there isn't the issue of ad revenue I don't even get the desire to stretch shows out to 13 hour long episodes. Doesn't it save them a ton of money to have a shorter, tighter story? Everyone do the Stranger Things thing
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Nov 1, 2016 15:54
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https://twitter.com/TheDefenders/status/793090985123127296 https://twitter.com/TheDefenders/status/793452570459054082 Sweet Misty's gonna be around in the Defenders.
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Nov 1, 2016 17:07
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Maybe it's a swerve and the Defenders are actually going to be Hellcat, Misty, Night Nurse, and
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Nov 1, 2016 19:30
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Chokes McGee posted:Maybe it's a swerve and the Defenders are actually going to be Hellcat, Misty, Night Nurse, and As long as Foggy is there to help.
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Nov 1, 2016 19:35
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bunnyofdoom posted:As long as Foggy is there to help. Of course, its avocados are law, you cant just have one.
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Nov 3, 2016 04:53
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Finished LC last night, and I agree completely that it just kind of petered out at the end. Diamondback was not nearly as good of a villain as either Cottonmouth or Mariah. Shades was more compelling. It felt like Diamondback was too cartoony and like the directors told him to just do his impression of Samuel L Jackson in Pulp Fiction. Everyone else was great. Like with Jessica Jones it could have lost an episode or two.
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Nov 3, 2016 13:17
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Only 5 episodes in but I like it so far. The yellow silk shirt/headband thing was awesome. Only thing I don't like is how invulnerable Cage is. He never seems threatened like Matt was in DD so, like others have said, for the most part he just loving barges into a mob meeting and stands there rather passively. I think the tension is supposed to come from the idea that, yeah, he's invulnerable, but his community, his friends and his neighborhood aren't and he can't be everywhere at once. They touch on this (everyone in Harlem wants a favor from Luke) but I think they could have ramped that up a tad and had more than "World Series Ring" as a bridge toward better exposition. Maybe it's because, so far at least (ep 5), Cage doesn't really have a family, kids, close friends or a really tight connection the community so the stakes never feel all that high for him. I mean, he lost Pops, and OK and he's a reluctant hero and a victim - that's his character - I get it. It's weird but for once I actually wanted The Token Little Kid who Luke looks after that's put in harm's way Also, I feel like we're brushing right up to the edge with the MCU as far as "street level" and "cosmic level" stuff relating to suspension of disbelief, especially with all the "silver hammer" and "the incident" crossover/callbacks. It's hard to explain but it's something that's always bugged me, even as a kid at the peak of my comic book addiction. I never cared much for Batman and Superman or Green Arrow and Green Lantern together. I never liked Spiderman, Moon Knight or Daredevil in outer space or someone like Hawkeye battling the Hulk. I think mainly because the threat level should be consistent with the heroes' powers for the most part. Luke Cage has good acting overall and really good music ("Long Live the Chief" was fantastic - who was that?) but it’s not drawing me in like DD did for some reason and I never get that "just one more episode before I go to bed" feeling that shows like The Wire, Breaking Bad, The Sopranos and even DD seemed to demand. There's a little clunkiness to it and sort of an "uneven" level of quality; lines (and punch lines) not always hitting home, scenes working/not working overall, pacing issues, etc. but when it works, it works really well and I'd say it works at least 75% of the time. Cage's church sermon, the jail flashbacks, Luke's low key humanity, Dawson's conversation with her mother and her beating the gently caress out of the mugger in ep. 5 were great, for instance. I'm much more interested in "street level" things like how Copperhead, Punisher and Kingpin intersect, Night Nurse's "role" in the community, the nitty gritty of the arms dealing, the corrupt cops, the politics, and guys like Cage and Murdock balancing a regular life with the responsibilities of being a superhero than I am with mystical Ninjas, resurrection and how the Avengers' fuckery and aliens affects the city. I still think a self contained Tarantino “Heroes for Hire” movie with all the f-bombs, n-bombs, cheesy and over the top gratuitous violence and close ups of women's feet would kick much rear end. Blackspoitation meets Kung Fu in an R rated superhero movie.
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Nov 5, 2016 21:50
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BiggerBoat posted:Luke Cage has good acting overall and really good music ("Long Live the Chief" was fantastic - who was that?) Jidenna.
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Nov 5, 2016 22:15
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BiggerBoat posted:. I never cared much for Batman and Superman or Green Arrow and Green Lantern together. I never liked Spiderman, Moon Knight or Daredevil in outer space or someone like Hawkeye battling the Hulk. I think mainly because the threat level should be consistent with the heroes' powers for the most part. I understand that, but one of my favorite stories of Daredevil is a two parter when Frank Miller first joined up as the artist, before he took over scripting. Part 1 was him stopping the Hulk and getting his rear end kicked and part two is an ongoing series of visitors to his hospital room. Usually when Daredevil goes up against someone way out of his league, he usually gets his rear end kicked pretty quickly. Also another great story featuring Spider-Man is Nothing Stops the Juggernaut. That said, I think these level of heroes in space can certainly seem out of their depth until you've built up to it. I think it's safe to say, outside of some Avengers, most of the MCU characters wouldn't fit into space. And the few that have been transported to other worlds, such as some in Agents of Shield, were clearly being shown as out of their depth. quote:I still think a self contained Tarantino “Heroes for Hire” movie with all the f-bombs, n-bombs, cheesy and over the top gratuitous violence and close ups of women's feet would kick much rear end. Blackspoitation meets Kung Fu in an R rated superhero movie. I think the executive producer for Jessica Jones said the two limits that are imposed by Marvel is no one saying "gently caress" (though Punisher got one through in DD S2) and no frontal nudity.
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Nov 6, 2016 00:11
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If anyone gets one "gently caress", it's Frank Castle
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Nov 6, 2016 14:06
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Speaking of which, are there any plans for them to make Frank Castle his own series? just asking because he's my number one favorite in all of marvel.
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Nov 6, 2016 14:21
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Fargin Icehole posted:Speaking of which, are there any plans for them to make Frank Castle his own series? just asking because he's my number one favorite in all of marvel. It's already in production
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Nov 6, 2016 14:35
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BiggerBoat posted:Only 5 episodes in but I like it so far. The yellow silk shirt/headband thing was awesome. Only thing I don't like is how invulnerable Cage is. He never seems threatened like Matt was in DD so, like others have said, for the most part he just loving barges into a mob meeting and stands there rather passively. I think the tension is supposed to come from the idea that, yeah, he's invulnerable, but his community, his friends and his neighborhood aren't and he can't be everywhere at once. Yeah, there in lies the problem with actually powered people. The hell is Mook with gun supposed to do to stop someone like Luke Cage, Wolverine, Venom, or Thor? So, they go after the squishy, not bulletproof other people nosily taking a gander at all this car-door ripping, rocket shrugging, machete shattering business. And thus we have a conflict. You're absolutely right that for it to work they need to be grabbing characters and not just bystanders. Characters with names but aren't so important that you just think 'Oh there's no way they'd kill them, Bobby, Lonnie and that dude who's selling videos of 'The Incident', people who you'd miss and help make things tense when they get threatened. Or someone needs to get some tear gas and a flamethrower and give that a shot. No one besides Tony Stark and Thor have any energy weapons. I mean, I guess Storm too though. Kinda.
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Nov 6, 2016 14:39
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Alexeythegreat posted:It's already in production And comes out next year.
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Nov 6, 2016 16:09
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Something else has begun to bug me about Luke Cage six episodes in. The actor is fine but, drat, Luke always has the same tone and delivery. Whether he should be freaking out, scared, angry, tired, nice, mean, worried, uncertain, steadfast or frustrated, his emoting is always the same: calm, cool, tough, guarded and monotone. Like I get that that's the character and all and no one minds when, say, Clint Eastwood or Liam Neeson do it in a film, but over the course of 13 hours it starts to get old. Frank Castle had more emotional gravitas and nuance and he's practically the definition of a one note character. Cage isn't written with a whole lot of range so far and it's getting a little boring. Hopefully at some point he completely loses his poo poo or has a breakdown or seomthing to humanize him a bit more.
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Nov 6, 2016 16:59
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I think he got kind of angry near the end of episode 2 when that guy had the gun to his head. EDIT: Also, brainwashed Cage in Jessica Jones definitely was angry.
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Nov 6, 2016 17:24
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I'm really curious if the rumors are true and the villain of the Defenders is Mephisto . It could either be super awesome or dumb as hell depending on how it's handled. Also, I really really hope the Punisher series is basically just them lifting story arcs from the MAX series and doesn't give him his own super antagonist. Jigsaw was and is dumb as loving hell as a villain.
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Nov 16, 2016 20:17
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BiggerBoat posted:Only 5 episodes in but I like it so far. The yellow silk shirt/headband thing was awesome. Only thing I don't like is how invulnerable Cage is. He never seems threatened like Matt was in DD so, like others have said, for the most part he just loving barges into a mob meeting and stands there rather passively. I think the tension is supposed to come from the idea that, yeah, he's invulnerable, but his community, his friends and his neighborhood aren't and he can't be everywhere at once. I thought they did a good job of showing his powers as being a double-edged sword. Sure, he's virtually invulnerable - but the one time someone gets a bullet through his skin, the very changes that make him so 'super' complicate the relatively mundane action of removing a bullet from a bullet hole to the point that he very nearly dies. If they hadn't found that doctor dude Luke would have ended right there, 'super' or not.
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Nov 16, 2016 20:34
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I've got one ep left in this show and I don't even give a poo poo because Diamondback is such a bad villain. Like all Marvel shows, this one should have ended around episode 6.
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Nov 16, 2016 21:03
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Naerasa posted:I've got one ep left in this show and I don't even give a poo poo because Diamondback is such a bad villain. Like all Marvel shows, this one should have ended around episode 6. I don't think this applies to DD S1. It was a pretty solid season, they just didn't quite stick the landing.
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Nov 16, 2016 22:54
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WarLocke posted:I thought they did a good job of showing his powers as being a double-edged sword. Sure, he's virtually invulnerable - but the one time someone gets a bullet through his skin, the very changes that make him so 'super' complicate the relatively mundane action of removing a bullet from a bullet hole to the point that he very nearly dies. If they hadn't found that doctor dude Luke would have ended right there, 'super' or not. Has a superhero ever just died of sepsis?
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Nov 17, 2016 10:33
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OldTennisCourt posted:I'm really curious if the rumors are true and the villain of the Defenders is Mephisto . It could either be super awesome or dumb as hell depending on how it's handled. I hope they have that person played by Sigourney Weaver. That'd be the best. Also good luck to Spider-Man's Senerio fucked around with this message at 19:08 on Nov 17, 2016 |
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Nov 17, 2016 19:02
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Man, Diamondback sucked. What a boring villain. Why get a good actor if all you're giving him is one note and telling him to hammer it into the earth's core? Its like each scene of his just got worse and worse until the finale, and boy was that a dull fight. They really need to cut back on the number of episodes they make for each season, or the runtime per episode. This show dragged almost as bad as Jessica Jones. Hope Iron Fist has a bit more focus. e: VVV good point, kind of like how no one even dared to say Wilson Fisk's name, but they did a much better job with him once he got on screen. As Nero Danced fucked around with this message at 09:17 on Nov 21, 2016 |
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Nov 21, 2016 09:09
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Diamondback was great. When he was off camera in the first half of the season and everyone referred to him in hushed tones because he was so powerful and frightening.
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Nov 21, 2016 09:15
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A sad note. Which episode has Sharon Jones appear in the club? I kinda want to rewatch that bit.
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Nov 21, 2016 09:16
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BSam posted:A sad note. Which episode has Sharon Jones appear in the club? I kinda want to rewatch that bit. Final one, during club re-opening.
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Nov 21, 2016 09:40
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Gervasius posted:Final one, during club re-opening. Cheers, but dang, it's after diamondback. i'll try to watch it.
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Nov 21, 2016 09:42
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Bedridden with Mystery Plague yesterday so the watchthrough I started on Friday and that I expected to take me about a week ended, er, yesterday. Diamondback was definitely the weak link here though I didn't mind him so much as the rest of you, I think. I honestly wish there were more of him, specifically that they'd built/explored his relationship with Luke more gradually, so the reveal that a major antagonist is this childhood friend/half-brother we've never heard of would actually carry some weight. Instead, in a show that's ultimately about family and community and legacies, we get this critical relationship delivered via infodump, and the show suffered a bit for that. I otherwise do agree that they could have cut an episode or two, but I honestly didn't mind that it was spread out a bit (maybe, again, since I binged most of the show yesterday while I was in bed with a light fever). Still, loved it. NetflixMarvel are three for three as far as I'm concerned.
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Nov 22, 2016 02:17
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Buschmaki posted:But he's presented as being totally in control of Harlem, the heir to the fat lady's legacy, and Diamondback's top distributor. For Cottonmouth to be incompetent every other criminal in Harlem also has to be because he's presented as the top guy.  Anyway, my unoriginal take - was a good series overall, the last few eps were pretty dumb in a lot of ways but still fun, and Diamondback was awful as a primary antagonist and the prospect of him being back in the future but with *superpowers* is a big uggggghhh. There's a point in I think ep 10 or 11 where Misty tells Luke that he has to tell her who this guy really is, and he says 'he's my half brother, he framed me, sent me to jail, and had me brutally tortured there. Now he's come for revenge' and me and my wife just turned to each other and were like WHAT. Shouldn't Misty ask Luke if he misspoke and that he's the one out for revenge, or else what unforgivable crime he committed against Diamondback to cause this extreme hatred?
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Nov 27, 2016 09:09
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OldTennisCourt posted:I'm really curious if the rumors are true and the villain of the Defenders is Mephisto . It could either be super awesome or dumb as hell depending on how it's handled. If that's true, I wonder if it'll tie into Agents of Shield. The current season features Ghost Rider, though Mephisto hasn't been name dropped yet.
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Nov 27, 2016 11:24
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