Once again, we open right where we
left off. Guns firing, people running and screaming, Luke still being
bulletproof. Not a great situation, not going to lie. He’s able to keep her
more or less covered by his large frame, and when an opportunity presented
itself, he ran for the kitchen. Once inside, he barricades the door with as
much equipment as possible. Diamondback is deterred, but not stopped.
Shades, trying to be the voice of
reason, continually insists that he and Diamondback cut their losses and make a
break for it before the riot cops get there. But, Diamondback will not have any
of that. His obsession with destroying his half-brother seems to be driving him
batty. Shocking, I know. Luke’s able to give Misty a little emergency first aid,
and let her know about most of the crazy details in this crazy situation.
Realizing that they only have a few minutes before It hits the fan again, he
reveals a secret trap door and storage room. Aren’t prohibition era restaurants
convenient? They get down there just before Diamondback launches an RPG at the
door. Misty puts it best, “your family is messed up!”
 |
| Luke has not time for your silly doors. |
Diamondback obviously doesn’t take
Luke’s disappearing act well, and starts concocting a new scheme. Shades seems
to notice what might have happened, he stares pretty intently at the section of
floor where the door is hidden, but doesn’t say anything at the moment.
Underground, Luke does his best to makes sure Misty doesn’t die of blood loss.
Kind of an uphill battle at this point. They also do their best to make amends
for the last few… I’m not sure, days… maybe weeks, it’s hard to tell in shows
like this, of hostility that has existed between them. It’s one of those “I was
wrong sorry,” “No I was wrong, I’m sorry,” moment.
Meanwhile, Claire is held with
several hostages. One of them being the waitress… you know, the one that was
coerced into lying about Luke killing Cottonmouth. She screwed up her leg
during the craziness. With only a little persuasion on Claire’s part, she’s
able to convince the guards to let her treat the Waitress. After learning that
Claire arrived with Luke, the Waitress admits that she lied because Mariah
coerced her, and let’s Claire know about the hidden storeroom. Claire gets the
Waitress to fake a seizure. Why? So Claire can have an excuse to get to the
basement, after disabling an inept guard, and meet up with Luke and Misty.
With the baddies, Diamondback is
doing his best to control the situation. He uses one of his hostages,
Councilmen Boone, to lie and say Luke’s behind everything, and that Luke wants
a helicopter to escape. He releases half the hostages, as a sign of good faith.
After the charade ends, Diamondback let’s Boone know a little about his
background. Willis Stryker, aka Diamondback, was the older of Reverend James
Lucas’ two sons. Born out of wedlock with his secretary Dana Stryker.
Diamondback clearly has… mixed feelings about his family. He hates Luke, for
being the younger son that still got to get their father’s name. Ever read King Lear? Pretty much the same reason
Edmund hates Edgar. “I’m not the ‘real’ son, so daddy never loved me, so I hate
the ‘real’ son” reason. Never seems to think to hate his Dad, for whatever
reason. Anyway, Willis Stryker and Carl Lucas grew up best friends, and that
only seemed to add to Diamondback’s current hatred. Everybody in town knew the
familial connection, but no one felt it important to tell the two boys.
Outside, the cops are starting to
note the holes in the narrative that they’re being given. The big one, Luke
Cage doesn’t use guns. Because a guy with super strength doesn’t need a gun to
mess people up. Sound reasoning. But, things are a little too crazy right now
for the more level headed cops to do anything about it.
 |
| If Mike Colter only does one thing exceptionally well, it's the "I am so tired of being shot at," face. |
Having finally run out of patience,
Diamondback goes over the PA and gives Luke an ultimatum, turn himself and
Misty over or he’ll start killing a hostage every ten minutes. Not good. And,
outside, Mariah gets the approval she needs to outfit the cops with the Judas
2.0 bullets. Also, not good. While waiting for Luke, Diamondback revealed the
catalyst that led to this situation. Back in the day, Carl Lucas and Willis
Stryker were just two dumb kids that made the dumb decision to steal a car.
They get caught, and sentenced. Carl, being the good boy son of the preacher,
got an alternative punishment and was required to join the Marines. Willis,
being the “fatherless” punk, got sent to juvenal hall. He killed another
inmate, in self-defense, and was sent to actual prison. While he was away, his
mother died of cancer. All she left him? One of James Lucas’ heavily cited
bibles. Kind of messed up, no? Obviously, he felt that he got kind of a raw
deal, considering that both of them shared a father, and swore everlasting vengeance
against Carl Lucas. Diamondback the puts on his strength enhancing glove, and
crushes Boone’s ribs. They then dump the body outside. Messed up.
Luke cuts the power before
confronting his half-brother, which is fortunate since at that exact moment
Shades chose to check out the trapdoor. The whole sunglasses in doors thing
seems kind a stupid now, huh, Shades? Misty and Claire are able to overpower the
jerk and handcuff him to the wall. Luke then disables the thugs and frees most
of the hostages, all except the waitress. How unfortunate. Willis gives his
little brother another ultimatum, stand and let the waitress die, or try and
save her and get shot by another Judas. Luke, being the hero type, opts to save
the girl. Thankfully, Willis’ aim is awful and he misses the last shot. No more
1.0 Judas bullets to worry about. Hooray. Diamondback and Zip escape out a back
exit, and Luke and Shades are taken into custody. Hooray?
I think that this episode’s only
real major miss step was that it decided to tell us the events that led to
Willis Stryker becoming Diamondback and Carl Lucas into Luke Cage rather than
show it. Yes, I know Netflix Marvel shows, and heck superhero shows in general,
seem to be rather flashback heavy but this is a situation that would have been
more useful to see rather than be told. The setup is good, two unknown half-brothers
stealing a car, and end up getting caught. In part because they were engaged in
the age-old debate, who is better, Prince or Michael Jackson. We could have
seen them during the better times, see the rift that begins to form while the
trial begins, and then ultimately Stryker shifting into Diamondback by the time
he’s released from jail. Pretty awesome sounding, right? But, no, instead we’re
given the Cliffs Notes version as narrated by Diamondback. Whom, if you haven’t
figured it out by now, falls under the category of Unreliable Narrator.
Because, you know, he’s the bad guy. The time that could have been devoted to
that instead is used to pad the episode. At least that’s what it feels like to
me. Not a bad episode, but not as good as it could have been for me.
http://giphy.com/gifs/netflix-marvel-luke-cage-l0HlOGt9WAEUjNXqw
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