Week 81: Blowin' Up the Spot, DWYCK

Blowin' Up the Spot: I love the intensity that Diamondback brings to the show -- Erik LaRey Harvey is really committed here -- but it's diminished somewhat by the show's refusal to explain why he's mad at Luke for something in their past. The episode parcels out a crumb of information every few minutes like we're on a strict information ration, but it's not enough. I can't root for either man if I don't know what their beef is about. It's also highly coincidental that they'd wind up on opposite sides of a street war in Harlem if they have a past together down south, and I find it hard to believe that Diamondback would expose his identity at the beginning if he's as smart as the series has established. But those are ultimately quibbles over details; all that really matters are the feelings. I love the choice of the gorgeous old theater, damaged though it is in the fight, because it looks so good on TV. Claire Temple's growing understanding of the nature of Luke Cage's powers is also kind of neat; it's one thing for us to hear the mechanics of it, but it's another for us to see a medical expert freak out about it. I don't fully buy that Misty Knight would get so aggressive in questioning the nurse who tried to save her dying partner, but I guess we're supposed to assume jealousy over Claire's closeness to Luke? Then there are the machinations of Mariah Dillard and Shades Alvarez behind the scenes, which the show is right to minimize because they're fairly standard stuff. Poor Candace Miller is doomed, isn't she? Also, here's an overdue shout-out to the show's excellent musical score by Adrian Younge and Ali Shaheed Muhammad, which consistently strikes the right notes between soul and funk in every scene, and knows when to lean into the Blaxploitation sound on occasion, as with this hour's final scene at the garbage truck. (7/10)

DWYCK: When we started watching Luke Cage, I said that the specificity of its tone was one of the show's best achievements. That remains true now that we're in the back half of the first season, but this episode stretches the boundaries, pushing the series into psycho-drama via Knight's professional therapy and into horror via Luke's visit to the mad scientist who made him. The latter is a bit more effective given the gnarly barn-interior set and Mike Colter's muffled screams in the boiling water (I wonder how many hours a stuntman spent being submerged over and over), and because Knight's "voluntary" conversation with a pseudo-therapist felt like a genre cliché that we've seen a hundred times before. She has a breakthrough at the end, real or fake, but she still doesn't admit her feelings about Luke, which is damning. As for Diamondback's takeover, it doesn't line up with everything that we've seen so far -- his relationships with Shades and Cornell Stokes seemed quite different in the season's front half, for one thing -- and I appreciate the attempt to make him interesting via Bible-quoting and Harvey's performance, but he remains a generic tough-as-nails street boss who shoots his own underlings and customers on a whim, which is both a tired trope and getting harder and harder to believe. Seriously, who is left to work for him or buy from him at this point? He's doing ten times as much to put himself out of business as Luke is. Still, there are neat little character details, like Mariah not flinching when Diamondback shoots people, Shades's face registering his discontent when Diamondback won't listen to him about the viral video, and Luke's apprehensive "I don't" as Claire and Dr. Burstein discuss inserting the long needle in his face. (6/10)

Here's praising "DWYCK" for its discussion of sexism on the police force, and its acknowledgement of the sexual violence that male officers commit and often get away with. I wasn't expecting that, but I'm glad the show went there.

How do you take Misty Knight's breakdown at the end of the hour, real or fake? Is she merely telling the therapist what he wants to hear, or is she genuinely moved to tears by the realization that the loss of control rattled her?

I'd also like to praise "DWYCK" for dramatizing the plight of Mariah Dillard in the scene where Diamondback shoots the gang leaders at the table. She begins that scene with a plan to escape from the criminal underworld that she never wanted to join, and she's willing to give up so much to the other gangs that it might have worked. Diamondback ruins her life in a few seconds of gunfire, cutting off her path to freedom. She's able to control her reaction like a pro, but it must have been agonizing for her. Everything else that follows for her in the future of the series makes this scene even more remarkable. I've said it in so many words before, and I'll probably say it again in the future: Other villains on this series are flashier, but Mariah is the most complex and most interesting.

Blowin' Up the Spot
The Bible-quoting bad guy trope has been done far too many times for me to enjoy this iteration of it, and I'm not sold on the back half of this season after this episode. We had an engaging character in Cornell Stokes, who had a back story and motivations I could understand, but I don't quite get how Willis "Diamondback Exposition" Stryker a) got to be in the position of power that he's in, and b) why he hates Luke so damn much.

Now, if we can get Rosario Dawson to just somehow find reasons to migrate from series to series, as they progress, I would be 100% on-board with that.

DWYCK
Speaking of overused tropes, let's do a cold open with a prominent character talking to a psychiatrist.

I wonder if the blood Luke is coughing up would have been sufficient for testing, instead of sticking a needle in his throat? Which, by the way, seems to have been one hell of a vein back there to get that much of a draw from!

I feel that we're gearing up for a BLM themed confrontation, which is fitting, considering the overwhelming amount of Black history they have managed to put into this series.

Yes, I don't particularly care for the Bible-quoting either, because it rings hollow. Like I said, the show is trying to make Diamondback seem distinctive by adding little flourishes like that, but they don't have the desired effect because his actions rarely line up with his words. Instead of the Bible, he could quote Wikipedia or New Edition lyrics or the damn Voynich manuscript; it would have the same effect. He still behaves like a generic (if unusually murderous) crime boss. I appreciate that the show wants to be more entertaining and it has the right instincts, but it needs to work harder to pull it off than tossing in a few Bible quotes.