‘Jessica Jones’ Season 2, Episode 9 Recap: YOU’RE A Bad Plan!

To paraphrase the great, late Whizzer: “With great Feelz comes great opportunity for writers to dash those feelz directly at your feet because haha, they just can, and this isn’t your mama’s Marvel anymore, kid.” Unless your mama is Alisa Jones, in which case…this is totally her Marvel. (At this point, I’m wondering why we’re still paying attention to Jessica Jones, who has the least amount of super powers besides Malcolm and Jeri, and even they are better at lawyering and detective-ing than she is at her…whatever she does.)

It’s a bad sign when Jessica Jones has become the moral center of a show that previously hinged on how totally unhinged this character was; kept barely in check by Trish Walker, a former drug and fame addict in recovery; Malcolm, a current drug addict who kinda just wandered into Alias Investigations whenever he was too high to remember what apartment he lived in; Luke Cage, who, whoopsie-doodle, Jessica murdered and forgot to tell him (to be fair, it was BARELY her fault!) and her faith in saving Hope from the same fate Kilgrave forced on her. (Whoops, she didn’t.) Oh, also her barely-checked trauma over her belief that she killed her entire family by distracting her dad from the road while fighting with her brother for a Game Boy. (Or whatever rights-equivalent Marvel/Netflix could get. Considering Jessica uses a DELL, I’m assuming it was something that translated from Japanese into “The Little Boy Who Lived Inside a Machine and fights endless blocks from angry sky gods.)

Now, Jessica is the one who is holding shit together: despite getting shot by the world’s worst private investigator Chang, she manages to convince her rage-soaked mom not to kill him. Instead, she injects him with the powerful tranqs that Dr. Karl Feelgood used whenever Alisa needed to go nighty-night for a couple hours (decades?) or so, then just threw him in a bathtub. A BETTER plan, IMHO, would have been to use some of those restraints on him so he couldn’t weasel his way out, should he, you know, wake up at any point when Alisa and Jessica decide to side-bar their bonding time to go save Oscar’s kid from being stolen to Montreal by his mother.

Now that was some detective work, and yes, the Jones’ made a good team for us, maiming exactly zero people (though I’m not sure how that bus is going to face itself in the mirror after being ground to halt by a lady). And again, Jessica shows some restraint and empathy towards Oscar’s ex-wife, telling her that it’s not about wanting Oscar to keep his son, it’s about not wanting her to go to jail for, again, going to Canada. I don’t know about you, but I think everyone on this show and otherwise should move to Canada ASAP, but hey, good try, Ms. Jones!

And this is where things get a little spooky: Alisa having that same epiphany that Kilgrave did in “WWJJD” last season: “Hey, I can use my powers to help people! And no one even gets mad at me!” So, you know, that can’t last.

Other things that can’t last: Jeri’s relationship with Inez, who she basically gives a death sentence to the moment she starts talking about taking the damaged nurse on trips to Tokyo once this craziness is over. Uh-huh. That ALWAYS works at well. It’s the same as a cop saying “Honey, it looks like I’ll make it home in time for dinner.”

Also: Trish’s increasing mental breakdown, leading her to quit on-air because she just HATES gluten talk (as do we all). This gets her a call from the only news network around, KZN, which wants her to come for an interview tomorrow. Considering the last time KZN came calling, it was a ploy for Griffin to propose to her, Trish may want to be more wary, but hey, she has that grenade of performance enhancers to keep her super sane. Oh wait, no she doesn’t. She’s out of magic Simpson drug, right before her big interview! Well, now it looks like her investigation into IGH is not just an expose investigation after all; so much as a “Please give me more drugs, but also, you guys are the WORST!” Maybe she’ll find Dr. Karl and he’ll turn out to be Patsy fan, and all’s well that ends well.

Just like Jessica turning her mom into the police, because once a killer, as Chang says, always a killer. Sound logic, airtight. Time for mommy to go to “Raft” which sounds, no offense, WAY worse than IGH. Maybe someone should be investigating that?

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 9 ("AKA Shark In The Bathtub, Monster In The Bed") on Netflix