Most of the talk with Marvel has to do with their upcoming movies. Avengers: Age of Ultron. Captain America: Civil War. Black Panther. Benedict Cumberbatch was finally (officially) announced as Doctor Strange.
Marvel also has some TV action going on too. But while Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and Agent Carter are interesting enough, what the studio has coming up with Netflix is far more intriguing. Netflix is still TV, right? Unless you watch it on your computer, tablet or phone, I suppose.
The Netflix venture is built around four 13-episode series that will eventually culminate in a final, Avengers-style team-up. The first of those shows is Daredevil, which I’ve written about previously. But Marvel is also chugging along on the second installment, titled A.K.A., Jessica Jones. And the title character for that one has just been cast, with Krysten Ritter (Don’t Trust the B in Apartment 23, Breaking Bad) nabbing the lead role.
According to Deadline, Ritter beat out Teresa Palmer (Warm Bodies) and Alexandra Daddario (True Detective) for the part. A.K.A., Jessica Jones is based on the Marvel Comics series Alias, which followed a former costumed superhero who decides to give up that life and become a private investigator. Eventually, her cases lead her back into the world from which she tried to escape.
I was a reader of Alias (and a big fan of its writer and creator, Brian Michael Bendis) and think Palmer or Daddario may have been better suited for the role. (Admittedly, I haven’t seen Ritter in very much.) But she is far better known as an actress and personality, and perhaps most importantly, has led another series before.
A.K.A., Jessica Jones will be run by Melissa Rosenberg, who wrote the Twilight films and was a producer on Dexter, and is expected to debut on Netflix in late 2015.
