My favourite detective: jessica jones, a super-detective for the marvel generation

_In a new series, writers pay tribute to fictional detectives on the page and screen._ ------------------------- When Jessica Jones slunk onto screens in 2015, it was only fitting for the

series in which she featured to begin in the shadows of Hell’s Kitchen. As the first superpowered female lead in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (albeit, on Netflix rather than in movie

theatres), Jones existed on the margins. Like others, I had been waiting for a female-led Marvel film while becoming disenfranchised by its offerings. By the time Jessica Jones came around,

I was completely ambivalent and somewhat despondent. It was a welcome surprise that Jones (played by Krysten Ritter) was different — and not just because she was a woman. Part superhero, but

mainly hardboiled private eye, Jones was a departure from the superhero we had gotten used to, and the detectives too. Adapted from Brian Michael Bendis and Michael Gaydos’s Alias comic

book series, Jessica Jones merges the superhero and crime drama genres to ask provocative questions about power, justice and authority. JESSICA WHO? Jones is plagued by questions of what

justice means and what it means to be a hero. She has no time for martial arts or neat explanations. She is reluctant to take on the identity of a crime-fighting hero at all because she’s

extremely sceptical that there is such a thing. Whenever the word “hero” leaves her mouth, it’s with a degree of distaste. Her detachment is refreshing after no less than three Iron Man

films and countless heroic crime drama series. By the time we meet Jones, as critic Kathryn VanArendonk puts it: > the detective has become her own breed of superhero – a figure who > 

restores the status quo […] She brings order out of chaos. She > finds answers. She is superhuman.“ On the surface, Jones might seem a reluctant female hero, like Buffy in the early

seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997-2003). But sitting alongside the wider Marvel universe, though Jones helps others between paying clients, her scepticism makes things complicated.

------------------------- _ READ MORE: FRIDAY ESSAY: HAIL HYDRA - ON COMICS, ETHICS AND POLITICS _ ------------------------- AMBIVALENT ORIGINS Far from making her invincible to external

threats, Jones’ superpowers leave her vulnerable to fetishisation and gender-based violence at the hands of series villain Kilgrave. Played by David Tennant, Kilgrave has been interpreted as

a metaphor for white, hetero-patriarchal control and toxic masculinity. In contrast to other superheroes, Jones’ traumas lead her not to reassert herself as a crime-fighting hero but to

reassess the validity of the whole hero narrative. She trades the promise of a costume (which she notably never dons in the television series) for a camera, and becomes a morally ambivalent

private investigator. LAW AND ORDER At the intersection of superhero and crime drama, Jessica Jones raises important questions about the law and social justice. Superhero and crime drama

genres are generally conservative in terms of tone, politics and gender roles. While there are self-critical deviations, their premises often rely on a sequence: the establishment of status

quo, it’s disruption by crime and villainy, and the triumphant reestablishment at the hands of a superhero or crime-fighting detective. In the face of violence and injustice, the solution is

often meted out by a kind of vigilante who, hero or antihero, becomes synonymous with the law. As a jaded super-detective, Jones questions not only the status quo but the notion of the

vigilante hero and their perceived synonym with social justice. She never gives up a chance to call out others’ "heroism” for hubris or self-indulgence. ------------------------- _ READ

MORE: REMEMBER BLOCKBUSTER, NIRVANA AND PAGERS? THE NEW CAPTAIN MARVEL LIVES IN THE 1990S _ ------------------------- Evoking crime noir, Jones eschews the black and white to reside in the

greys, purples and in-betweens. She’s unconvinced as to whether anyone can or should have the moral authority to decide what is right or wrong. This detachment rarely wavers. Over the course

of three seasons and a team-up in The Defenders (2017), Jones’ dry scepticism is hilariously charged at everyone including herself _and_ her Netflix Marvel counterparts.

------------------------- _ READ MORE: MY FAVOURITE DETECTIVE: SAM SPADE, AS HARD AS NAILS AND THE SMARTEST GUY IN THE ROOM _ ------------------------- Critics haven’t always been sure how

to respond. Jones’ ambiguity as female antihero resulted in the character and series being simultaneously praised and denounced. Critic Stassa Edwards celebrated it as “slow unravelling of a

familiar genre”, while Eric Kain argued Jones had no place in the Marvel cinematic universe. Indeed, through her wry characterisation as jaded super-detective, Jones provides irreverent

commentary on the masculine grandiosity and oft-undisputed entitlement of the superhero, and its pervasion into neighbouring genres. If internet sleuths read this disparity as a clue to

Jessica Jones’s not-belonging, they might have just solved the case.