‘Jessica Jones’ Season 2, Episode 4 Recap: That’s Not Me

Woof, Episode 4 of Jessica Jones Season 2 (“AKA God Help The Hobo”) was a toughie. Knowing that there are *checks watch* approximately 300 more hours of emotional damage and whatever the opposite of catharsis is that we have to get through before this season can wrap on another barely restrained rubber ball evisceration, I’m getting a little burned out by the trauma already.

And doesn’t it all feel so…unnecessary? In a way? Because if the thrust of the season is to get to the center of this big IGH mystery–which, you know, doesn’t even seem like that much of a mystery, as much as a…what, vendetta?– there are so many more fruitful avenues to take besides blackmailing Trish’s former statutory rapist or tracking down the world’s angriest wigmaker into giving up exactly zero intel about Evil Nurse Jackie. Whose hair wasn’t even that frizzy, because it was a wig! I feel so dirty.

Here are just a few ways Jessica and Trish could get to the center of this IGH tootsie pop: A) Go ask Jeri for help, who is both looking for her own version of experimental drugs and has at least some legal sway left to subpoena hospital records; B) See above, but with Matt Murdock and Claire Temple; C) Go find that hard-drive that Kilgrave kept around of all the other children across the world who were being experimented on and go from there; E) Aren’t the Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. around somewhere? Go talk to them!

It just seems like if some secret not-even-government-maybe?-entity is either saving people’s lives by turning them into superheroes or villains (up to the individual, really), OR covering up some sort of massive uprising where former patients are killing hospital staffers, this is a problem that is out of Jessica’s paygrade. Literally. Like, no one is paying her to take on this case; Trish, now back on the sauce in the form of Simpson’s Bane gas-mask (which is basically just first-person shooter mode + rage) is essentially the largest liability and target for this season thus far. If Trish could just let this story go, or even, say, let her boyfriend, the very prominent TV journalist who would be MUCH harder to disappear than a public radio personality, help out? This IGH thing could be solved. Or not. Or put on ice and solved later by those way more capable and level-headed. Jessica, buddy, there is a literal kid falling out your window right now and the case of the superintendent who won’t let you take off his pants. Why not tackle the more pressing issues?

But that’s the thing about vigilantes, isn’t it? They’re always sticking up for the little guys, even when it puts them in harm’s way. See, that’s ALSO where this season gets confusing, though: aren’t the people that IGH “experimented” on technically more powerful than the organization that saved their lives? Is it maybe the IGH who needs to be saved from the Dr. Hansen impersonator, or the meat-face guy who Jessica keeps seeing in her flashbacks?

It’s hard to be on the side of Big Pharma, or Big Shadowy Secret Government Organization, but in this one case, I’m more worried for the safety of the shady players. Who is looking out for Chang and his buddy Nick?

Or hey, why not worry about yourself for a change, Jessica? You’re being arrested for the grodiest van murder outside of an SVU episode! Hopefully Jeri hasn’t dosed herself up with those off-market anti-ALS drugs yet, because you’re going to need a lawyer better than Foggy McSidekick.

One thing this episode got right though? New York is disgusting in the summer. This one time, a rat bit me in my own bed. And I didn’t even get any special abilities, except maybe the extra cool power of semi-permanent nerve damage. Where’s my key to the city? JK, burn the whole thing down, boys. Burn it to the ground.

Drew Grant is an editor, writer and YA novelist living in Los Angeles. Formerly the Arts & Entertainment editor at The New York Observer, Drew also founded the brand’s television vertical, tvDownload. Currently, she is managing editor at RealClearLife.com. Her passions involve watching TV, writing about TV and interviewing people on TV. At Oberlin College, she once taught a class on Twin Peaks, and that’s pretty cool. Previous bylines: Salon.com, Cosmopolitan, Maxim, and Gotham Magazine. Twitter and Instagram: @Videodrew.

Watch Jessica Jones Season 2, Episode 4 ("AKA God Help The Hobo") on Netflix