TV Talk – Netflix’s Marvel Knights – Villains & Heroes (Part 1 of 2)

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Before Disney+ consolidates itself as the primary source of all things Marvel with its TV shows to come, I thought I’d give a shoutout to Netflix for bringing us seasoned storytelling of some of Marvel’s best heroes and villains first. Collectively dubbed the Marvel Knights, I’ve probably spent the last year and a half weaving my way through Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, Iron Fist, The Defenders and The Punisher in chronological order of their release. The order is as followed:

2015

Daredevil – Season 1

Jessica Jones – Season 1

2016

Daredevil – Season 2

Luke Cage – Season 1

Iron Fist – Season 1

2017

The Defenders – Season 1

The Punisher – Season 1

2018

Jessica Jones – Season 2

Luke Cage – Season 2

Iron Fist – Season 2

Daredevil – Season 3

2019

The Punisher – Season 2

Jessica Jones – Season 3

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I think these shows are amazing; cancelled too soon by Netflix and Marvel as soon as Disney+ was announced. The way they designed each show, especially in the early days, with different colour palates for each hero (Daredevil – red, Jessica Jones – blue, Luke Cage – yellow, Iron Fist – green) was inspired, and culminated perfectly when all the heroes joined together for The Defenders. Some of these characters I was familiar with, thanks to their somewhat unsuccessful spells on the big screen, in Daredevil and the Punisher, and through my past affinity with Spider-Man comics. And some were completely new to me, like Jessica Jones. What the Marvel Knights all share in common is a desire to protect the burrows of New York City at a street level – it’s a shame the webslinger couldn’t drop in for a couple of episodes himself, but he’s off fighting aliens with the other major players in the Avengers. Falling in line with the MCU, the Marvel Knights brought their comic book characters into the realm of realism, fleshing out their motivations in an extremely mature way, and providing some of the better action sequences in all of television. For some of you, the Marvel Knights might be a distant memory, but how about I pay homage to the series by ranking my favourite villains introduced to us on the show? Favourite heroes then? How about both?!

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The Top 20 Villains of the Marvel Knights

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20 – Gregory Salinger (Foolkiller) – Jessica Jones

The most recent big baddie makes the list at number 20. He’s just a guy; no special superhuman ability other than being an emotionless psychopath – a subhuman ability, if you will. He’s actually a perfect villain for Jessica Jones to face; considering a lot of Marvel Knights were fighting against everyday people who corrupted the system or society, her private investigation work would lead her to a calculated serial killer not yet on the police’s radar. Salinger becomes obsessed with exposing Jessica Jones as a sloppy fraud, but she proves measured and too smart for him; the wicked face-scar Salinger receives from Hellcat is a bit of a nod to his comic design, me thinks.

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19 – Benjamin Poindexter (Bullseye) – Daredevil

If Daredevil was given another season, I reckon Bullseye would have been much higher on the list. It’s clear that what we saw of Poindexter was just an introduction, and the series was saving Bullseye’s grand transformation for the next season. I really wonder that kind of villain he would have been – better than Colin Farrell’s unhinged looney in the Daredevil movie, I’m sure. It’s clear Poindexter is super intelligent, and a flawless marksman, as his comic book persona indicates. I didn’t care that much about his emotional detachment issues as the season went on, but he does provide a highlight of the season, coming to the Kingpin’s aid, and shooting his potential assassins with elegant accuracy.

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18 – Willis “Diamondback” Stryker – Luke Cage

I respect Diamondback more than I like him. Willis Stryker, as Luke Cage’s half-brother, is another one of those ‘I-come-from-the-same-place-as-the-hero-but-I’m-mad’ characters that we see all too often in comic books, and are usually the simplest adversary any hero can have. Since I was only learning about Luke Cage and Harlem, I feel like Diamondback came out of nowhere, and was probably wasted by being used in the first season. When Cage talks to Jessica Jones about his brother later on, it’s clearer what fighting Diamondback meant to him, and I respect the difficulty of having your sibling come after you.

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17 – Will Simpson (Nuke) – Jessica Jones

I like this character a lot. When we first meet Simpson, he is a good-natured cop, but trying to keep up with the supers around him, Simpson gets hooked on military-grade adrenaline pills that often cause him to boil over due to hyper-alertness. You can almost feel sorry for him; he’s not that much different to the Hulk in being another failed Captain-America-replicating experiment, although a blue collar one here. I’d never heard of Nuke before, and Jessica Jones led me to come across his comic design that has an American Flag tattoo across his face; neat.

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16 – Cornell “Cottonmouth” Stokes – Luke Cage

Cornell Stokes is the status quo in Harlem before Luke Cage moves in, and then the community starts to question his practises. When the heat gets cranked to eleven, it’s Cornell Stokes that is the one to crack. Praise Netflix, for getting the talent of Mahershala Ali before he blew up in a big way with a couple of Oscar wins; the sheer presence of Cottonmouth is made possible by the calibre of sophistication that oozes out of Ali. This character had a shock exit because he forgot to never piss off his cousin.

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15 – Benjamin Donovan – Daredevil, Luke Cage

This selection might be a shock to some, but not only does Big Ben Donovan get around, earning the respect of the likes of Wilson Fisk and Mariah Dillard, he provides a terrific adversary for our heroes when the fighting is done; masks away, Donovan is the lawyer, that is a pain in the side of Matt Murdock at the attorney’s office, and a stall to Misty Knight in the interrogation room. If the Marvel Knights is mostly about bringing criminals to justice, then Donovan represents the guy in the system getting rich off the other side.

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14 – Alisa Jones – Jessica Jones

Alisa Jones is not really a bad person; if she could just get a handle on her anger issues, she could prove a terrific hero. After season 1 of Jessica Jones, finding another emotionally-investing adversary was going to be tough, but as Jessica’s long-lost mother, Alisa guides Jessica down an optimistic path with her powers, and a look at her future if she doesn’t keep her frustrations in check. I think Alisa Jones would have proved half the character she is without Janet McTeer’s intense performance.

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13 – Bakuto – Iron Fist, The Defenders

As I understand it, Bakuto is the recruiting finger of the Hand; an adversary of the Marvel Knights across multiple seasons. Bakuto stands out most in the Defenders, where it is realised how substantial he is to the Hand’s cause. He is renowned as the man who took Knight’s arm, and for providing the moral conundrum that saw Colleen Wing would side with the Iron Fist over her former sensei. Yes, Bakuto, can be bland, but he gets a lot of influential screen time.

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12 – Herman “Shades” Alverez – Luke Cage

Man, I hated Shades in Luke Cage’s first season, but in the second season, he was one of my favourite players. Out from Diamondback’s shadow, Shades showed just how much he was ahead of the game, with his plans to get out and live the good life. Shades shows true passion for Dillard and despair at the betrayal of his partner, Comanche. With all the hustle and bustle of season 2, I kind’ve wanted to see Shades succeed, but at the end of the day, Shades attached his cart to the wrong gift horse; Dillard proved too wild to tame. Yet, Alverez is far more than a simple hitman with sunglasses.

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11 – Billy Russo (Jigsaw) – The Punisher

The following two entries on this list are so evenly matched, as Netflix applied a similar story arc to both of them; but where one’s motives excel as a friend to our heroes, the other’s make for the more interesting villain. In Billy Russo’s prequel to becoming Jigsaw, he gets tangled up in the wrong side of the black ops operation that caused Frank Castle to lose his family, and Russo loses his sense of right and wrong. As menacing as I expected Jigsaw to be, Russo spends the first half of the next season just trying to remember who his enemies are. By the time his new motivations are realised, it’s a bit late for his empire to gain traction, before the Punisher has to save the day. I think Russo could have left a better legacy, as a villain the wider MCU has not done yet; he had great potential in uniting the forgotten at a street level with guerrilla tactics and homegrown terrorism. But the biggest disappointment with Jigsaw is the tame scars that are supposed to reflect his mangled-up face in the comic book; that carnival ride glass left but a scratch! Jigsaw could have been better.

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10 – Davos (Steel Serpent)– Iron Fist

Conversely, Davos fell into the background of season 1 of Iron Fist, but excelled with the mantle of chief villain later on. Davos surprised me when becoming the Iron Fist, as his motivations and execution was very clear. Obsessed with the honoured responsibility of his homeland, Davos forgets compassion, seeing all criminals as they are, without no moral grey. If we ever get a sequel to Doctor Strange, I imagine Karl Mordo will share similar hallmarks to Davos, as they both are dedicated to the cause, with a flawed understanding of what it takes to undertake it. Davos’ otherworldly features also contribute to his unique characterisation – the man doesn’t eat, he trains ritualistically, and wants to protect a world he has never set foot in. Considering how bland the first season of Iron Fist was, Davos was a big reason why the second season worked.

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09 – John Pilgrim (Mennonite) – The Punisher

This guy is great; an oppositional militant who understands exactly what it takes to be just like the Punisher. His quirk, is he is also a missionary; aiming to lead a viceless life that somehow doesn’t cover ‘thou shalt not kill’ very well. Seeing Pilgrim in action would be much better than I can describe here; just know he is as competent as the Punisher and coming straight for him.

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08 – Mary Walker (Typhoid Mary) – Iron Fist

Never had I ever come across Typhoid Mary in the comic books, but out of all the entries on this list, Mary Walker is the one I absolutely want to know more about. It’s a total shame that the Marvel Knights got cancelled, because I could have seen Mary Walker hopping seasons, fighting alongside the Punisher, or causing another feminine headache for Matt Murdock. I’m not sure how clear it is in the finale of Iron Fist (perhaps they were saving something for future seasons), but from reading up on Mary Walker’s comic bio, not only is there the meek Mary and the combative Walker personas in her brain, but a berserker third personality just awaiting the right trigger to go nuts! Her comic’s costume is a bit reminiscent of some incarnations of Harley Quinn, and although I’d come across Alice Eve in movies before, this character is who she will be known as for me from now on.

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07 – Alexandra Reid – The Defenders

I suppose it’s only fair to pay tribute to the leader of the Hand, even if she did turn out to be a white woman. As the big baddie for the Defenders sole team-up, Alexandra is integral at delivering us the conclusion to Electra’s story, and proving an extremely powerful figure, as even Madame Gao is scared of her. Netflix got Sigourney Weaver to play Alexandra Reid; oh yeah, The Defenders brought in the big guns.

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WARNING: The following six are the crème de la crème.

06 – Trish Walker (Hellcat) – Jessica Jones

If not for the final two episodes of the final season of Jessica Jones, Trish Walker wouldn’t be anywhere close to this list. It breaks my heart that she finds herself here, but by her own admission, the poor dear realises she has gone too far. The last we see of Hellcat is her being hauled away to the Raft – the prison for superpowered people. Considering we see Walker’s desperation to affect the world from the very beginning, and the drastic lengths she will go for an edge, I think we are provided with a lot of points along the way to see where Trish has gone wrong. I was probably more excited for Trish’s story from season 2 of Jessica Jones onwards, learning about her past drug use, and her disappointment that Jessica can’t see her potential. Like what I’ve seen of DC’s Catwoman, this femme fatale wants to do good, but her finalistic ideology gets in her way. I admire her powers – the abilities to see in the dark and land on her feet.

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05 – Wilson Fisk (Kingpin) – Daredevil

Is it criminal that Wilson Fisk is not higher on the list? Well, it just goes to show the depth of the Marvel Knights. The biggest joy when hearing that the Marvel series was being developed was the chance to see a long version of the Kingpin done well; and bravo, Vincent Donofrio is terrific casting to realise the dream. Although Wilson Fisk has since appeared in Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, the mob boss has always seemed best suited pitted up against the Daredevil, with a more mature tone and the backdrop of the gritty criminal underworld. The Daredevil script focuses most heavily on Fisk’s love for Vanessa, and whilst that’s a valid side of the Kingpin I thoroughly enjoyed seeing, there wasn’t as much of his lethal strength on display – apart from when he squashes Anatoly Ranskahov’s head in the door, of course. The ruthless control Fisk seems to have over Hell’s Kitchen is beautifully portrayed in the opening couple of episodes of Daredevil, and completely put into action through his ability to manipulate the people within the system designed to keep him at bay in season 3. Don’t mess with the Kingpin, or you will disappear like his rabbit in a snow storm.

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04 – Madame Gao – Daredevil, Iron Fist, The Defenders

It takes Daredevil, Iron Fist and the Defenders to get the upper hand on Madame Gao. This wily old coot is even one of the few people Wilson Fisk is weary of, and has enough gall to even put an attempt on his life. Gao is the cruellest of the villains, blinding those who work for her criminal drug empire for maximum obedience. When it becomes known that she is a prominent finger of the Hand, something tells me she probably could have killed Iron Fist if she had so chosen to. Gao is rich, strong and wise; I would not want to come cross Madam Gao, without a Hulk in my pocket.

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03 – Kilgrave (Purple Man) – Jessica Jones

Despite seeing how much of a selfish jerk he is, I think I kind of want a week or two with Kilgrave’s abilities… the ability to control people’s will on command – okay, it sounds bad when said out loud, but think how fun life would be. Then again, Kilgrave displays just how lonely and disconnecting it can be as well, not knowing if the people closest to you are there because they want to be or because you told them to. Don’t feel sorry for him though, at all; Kilgrave will ruin your life or kill you on a whim. The Purple Man allowed the first season of Jessica Jones to explore one of the most mature storylines of the entire MCU – what happens when a good-natured hero gets captured, imprisoned, raped and forced to use her powers for injustice effortlessly? What makes it worse, is Kilgrave can neither understand remorse or delight in his actions because it’s all he knows, and it’s all too easy. There’s a real claustrophobia in his presence. Thankfully, Jessica Jones aims to put an end to the man who wields his power like a child. And Kilgrave is David Tenet – absolutely marvellous.

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02 – Mariah Dillard (Black Mariah) – Luke Cage

If I had been watching Luke Cage at the time of its release, then I would have lobbied hard for actress Alfie Woodard to win all the awards possible. Mariah Dillard is manipulative, cruel, heartbroken, enraged, and the speeches Mariah gives, are knocks out of the park by Woodard. Initially Dillard seems to be the unquestioning benefactor of Cottonmouth’s criminal enterprise, but pretty soon, we discover that when shit goes down, she’s the one who steps up to the plate. In the second season, Dillard and her new boyfriend Shades, aim to go straight, but her family’s criminal roots go deep, and she faces a challenging ascent. Her relationship with Nightshade is realised so passionately raw too, and it’s not often we get to see an older woman’s perspective on motherhood. I can’t believe how fantastic Dillard became – good in the first season, then she shot through the roof as the main player. A gift of the MCU.

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01 – John “Bushmaster” McIvor – Luke Cage

I thought Killmonger was the best part of Black Panther, but forget all you know about him because he ain’t got nothing on the Bushmaster. In Season 2, the Bushmaster comes to Harlem to reclaim his birthright, carrying the powers to match Luke Cage for strength, and it’s not long before the two go toe-to-toe for the heart of Harlem. The Bushmaster has a compelling backstory and a pride that sees him want revenge on the Stokes family legacy. Just like Killmonger, he has been cast aside from an empire he was born into, and only has trouble with Cage because he stands in his way. For me, the Bushmaster could be the best villain in the entire MCU – a menacing superpowered gangster.

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A special mention to Rafael Scarfe, Nobu Yoshioka, William Rawlins, Elektra Natchios, Harold Meachum, James Wesley and Turk Barrett, I just couldn’t fit on my list!

Part 2 to come soon!

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