'The Defenders' Recap: 'The H Word'

Written by Scott Edwards

THIS IS THE EMERGENCY SPOILER ALERT SYSTEM...YOU ARE ADVISED TO READ AT YOUR OWN RISK...

The time has finally arrived where superheroes are ready to join forces and I have not been this excited to see another team take on the evils of the world in a long time. The Defenders has arrived on Netflix and our four Marvel characters are ready to come together to take down the Hand, since there does not seem to be a way to destroy them. New York City may never be the same again as Luke Cage, Danny Rand, Jessica Jones and Matt Murdock assemble, but will they be able to get along? I guess we will find out.
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Winning his latest case, Matt Murdock is approached by an old friend as Karen Page comes to congratulate him and get a statement for her next article. Going out to grab a bite with his former love, Matt has given up being the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen and has excelled in his law practice. Seeing that they are both doing okay, it is obvious that they both wish things had gone another way and that the team never broke up. Saying that he is good with leaving the Devil behind, Matt is only lying to himself and needs to find out who he really is and is given advice from his old friend Father Lantom who knows what secrets his parishioner has been forced to hide from the rest of the world.

Even as the sun comes up, Jessica Jones is not done with drowning her sorrows in a bottle. Not taking a job since her final fight with Kilgrave, she is a mess and needs something to get her out of her rut. Getting greeted at her office by Mrs. Reynolds and her daughter who have a job for her, Jessica is quick to dismiss it as a cheating husband, but the two women do not want to accept her answer. Receiving a call in her office telling her not to take the job however piques her interest and she starts to do a little digging. Being able to track the telephone call to a part of town where people like to go to disappear, Jessica takes a little trip only to find something nasty in a box, but that is not the only thing that seems out of place.

Trying to find a man who may have insight as to the whereabouts of the Hand, Danny Rand and Colleen Wing are not fast enough to save him. Being told that the battle is back in New York, the two head back to their former home, but all is not well with Danny. Putting the blame on himself for the deaths of his brothers at the monastery, it is apparent that Danny must do something to clear his conscience. Not telling Colleen any of this, Danny is trying his hardest to keep his demons at bay but with a new assassin in his sights, they have bigger things to worry about.

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Getting out of lockup with the help of Foggy Nelson, Luke Cage is ready to get back to Harlem. Getting off the bus and having his coffee with Claire, Luke admits that she was the force that kept him out of trouble with her letters, but she left plenty of things unsaid about the old neighborhood. Knowing that things have started to resort back to the way they were when Diamondback was running things, he knows that Mariah still has her hooks into what is going on. Getting a visit and talking a walk with Misty Knight and getting caught back up on what is happening, the deaths have risen over the past couple months, along with people getting out of the projects. Thinking that it is a courier program of some sort, Luke will do anything in his power to help, but instead of throwing fists, he needs to be the icon that the people have made him out to be, the Hero of Harlem. 

Going into the hospital to get her final diagnosis, Alexandra has gotten the news that she expected, that she is dying. With no way to combat her illness, she decides that she will leave her mark on New York before she is gone. Contacting Madame Gao, Alexandra tells the member of the Hand that their project must be moved up and there is no time to waste.  Even though Gao is not too happy about the change, she does not put up a fight and gets everything escalated as quickly as possible. Watching from her rooftop as the city starts to shake, Alexandra has put something into motion that is about to bring New York City to its knees.

One of the things that I feared about bringing all of the Defenders together has happened in this episode. They tried to make it watchable for anyone that has not viewed any of the previous series. While that is a good idea, because not everyone loves all of the characters, it resulted in a half-hearted attempt to recap each series and that just left me wondering why they even tried to do it. You need to go all the way when doing this, or not do it at all, but the series premiere of the Defenders was far from impressive until something actually happened in the last minute. I hope that the following episodes do not suffer from this form of storytelling, because being only an eight-episode season, it will leave a lot of people wondering what the heck went wrong.

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