By Travis Johnson
September 30 – lock it in. That’s when the full season of Marvel’s Luke Cage drops on Netflix – the day pizza delivery guys the world over curse the gods that made them. This looks fantastic.
In case you’ve been living under a rock, here’s the official skinny:
After a sabotaged experiment leaves him with super strength and unbreakable skin, Luke Cage (Mike Colter) becomes a fugitive trying to rebuild his life in modern day Harlem, New York City. But he is soon pulled out of the shadows and must fight a battle for the heart of his city – forcing him to confront a past he had tried to bury.
Mike Colter plays the charismatic lead character, Luke Cage and is joined by Mahershala Ali (Cornell “Cottonmouth” Stokes), Alfre Woodard (Mariah Dillard), Simone Missick (Misty Knight), Theo Rossi (Shades), Frank Whaley (Rafael Scarfe) and Rosario Dawson (Claire Temple).
Marvel’s Luke Cage is Executive Produced by series Showrunner Cheo Hodari Coker (SouthLAnd, Ray Donovan), Charles Murray (Roots) and Jeph Loeb (Marvel’s Daredevil, Marvel’s Jessica Jones), who also serves as Marvel’s Head of Television.
Everything in this latest trailer is just grin-worthy: the tone, the acknowledged debt to blaxploitation cinema (Luke Cage was a reaction to black cinema of the ’70s, just as Iron Fist was a reaction to the kung fu craze of the same period), the nods to the comic – note the bracelets and headband when Cage steps out of the medical machine – the action, the music, the lot. Luke Cage reads Walter Mosley! That’s perfect.
It’s a truth universally acknowledged that Jessica Jones was better than Daredevil. Could Luke Cage be better than Jessica Jones? A little under two months until we find out…
