Jessica Jones season 3, episode 9 review: A.K.A I Did Something Today

“We’re gonna get through this.” Minor spoilers for Jessica Jones season 3, episode 9 follow.

Trish’s mom is dead, and Jessica Jones is the only who can help her handle the situation and hopefully give her some solace.

There isn’t much time to grieve, though, given that Trish attacked Gregory and clawed half his face off, causing the police to begin to search for her.

Jessica and Trish

There’s a lot that can be said about the relationship between Jessica Jones and Trish but, for this season, strained is about the best way you can put it. That said, there’s a lot to glean off their interactions in this episode, especially surrounding Jessica’s character. Her walls break down here, and we’re able to get to see a side of Jessica that is rarely seen on this show.

One of the best parts of the episode comes within the first ten to fifteen minutes of it when Jessica is simply helping Trish, with very little dialogue present. Whether it be a simple hug while Trish is crying or cleaning the blood out from underneath her fingernails, this episode really demonstrates that Jessica has a side to her that is able to truly care about those around, especially her friends. And given that Jessica has been so much traumatic stuff, it makes sense as to why she would know what Trish needs at this moment in time, even if Trish doesn’t respond. Then, as the episode goes on and we get to see what Jessica is willing to do for Trish, it endears you to Jessica even more.

That comes to one of the most frustrating parts of this episode — when Trish finally begins to respond because her hypocrisy abounds. Pretty much the same thing that happened to Jessica happens to her but, instead of her best friend killing her mom, a serial killer did, along with the inadvertent help of Erik’s fear. This is really where her hypocrisy comes into play.

She expected Jessica to just forgive her for killing her mom and was angry when Jessica didn’t, but when Erik asks for forgiveness for simply being a part of a chain of events that led to her mom’s death, she punches him in the face. This really wouldn’t be that big of deal if she hadn’t been pushing for Jessica to forgive her at the beginning of the season, but she was, making her hypocrisy extremely frustrating. Rachael Taylor is a great actress, giving a solid performance, but her character is a self-centered hypocrite that drags the show down because of the story choices behind the writing of the character.

Hogarth on the offensive

Another character who is extremely hard to like is undoubtedly Jeri Hogarth. It’s an interesting development to have Hogarth represent and be the lawyer for Gregory, but almost everything about how we got to this point was slightly botched. The story choice is good and creates and really interesting obstacle for the back-half of the season, but her motivations as to why she did it are honestly not well executed.

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This episode makes it pretty obvious as to why Hogarth is willing to represent Gregory in his legal case, and that’s to simply gain back traction for her law firm. She is willing to betray Jessica because her own actions led to her own substantial decline in reputation. She’s always been shown to be a snake, but never to this extent. And while the show tries to provide reasons as to why she would take on a client like this, there is no time to dedicated, like at all, showing her come to her decisions, it just, happens. So while the choice is good and will hopefully play out well in the future, how we got there wasn’t handled as well as it could’ve been.

As for her personal life and attempts to try to talk to Kith, they’re absolutely boring, Carrie-Anne Moss gives a great performance, but the relationship just doesn’t feel like it’s built up well enough to warrant any emotional investment. It could’ve been cut out from this episode entirely, and it wouldn’t have made a shred of difference as to the overall plot of the story.

What does it mean to be a hero?

The theme that started out this season makes a return in full force in this episode, there’s no doubt about it. Is doing the right thing always the right thing to do, or is the right thing for one person wrong for someone else? And how do heroes respond in that grey area? That’s the idea that this issue poses, just not in the best way it could. It’s not incompetent in its portrayal of the idea, but it could’ve done better.

Jessica consistently says throughout the season, and in this episode, that she’s no hero, yet she acts the most heroic out of anyone on this show, other than maybe Malcolm. She sacrifices herself for those she cares about or for a cause she believes in and consistently tries to help people who need help, despite her best judgement. She’s a hero but not a flawless one, and this episode does a really good job of showing that with certain that Jessica does throughout it. It’s simply where others are involved where the ideas posed aren’t as well done.

When it involves Trish or Erik when it comes to the themes, other than one specific well-done character-building scene with Erik, the themes fall flat. These people aren’t heroes, but either try to act like they are or simply use their powers for selfish reasons and, so when the show wants to try to apply the grey moral area to these characters, it doesn’t work because it’s black-and-white with those characters. It’s more where this episode ends regarding this theme not centered on Jessica that the episode excels with the question it’s posing.

The back half of Jessica Jones has been much better than the first half so, despite the missteps in this episode, especially involving Trish, Jessica’s journey and character moments elevate this episode.