1x07 Manifest

9.6/10. I've said it before and I'll say it again -- just give this show over to the villains. Cottonmouth and Mariah are better actors, more interesting characters, and have more intriguing, realistic backstories than Luke Cage or anyone in his coterie does, and that makes them more compelling, despite or perhaps because of the fact that they're on the side of the law.

We learn that Cottonmouth is something of a tragic figure. Sure, it's an old story, but the idea that he had musical talent, could have gone to Juliard or, as his Uncle Pete told him, grown up to be better than the rest of his cohort, adds another dimension to the ruthless man we see standing in front of the Biggie painting in Harlem Paradise. There's the hint of the idea that had he grown up in different circumstances, under a less harsh environment, there might be no Cottornmouth. There might only be Cornell.

Going back in time to Mama Mabel's brothel, seeing how Cottonmouth and Mariah's grandmother used to run the place, is a smart move that helps us understand both of the antagonists better. The added backstory to Mabel, learning that she took over the local mob after her husband died, and that her brother-in-law feels passed over for it, gives context to the brutal environs that the two of them grew up in. And Cottonmouth having to kill Uncle Pete, the only man who ever believed in the musical abilities he wanted to pursue, after Pete's jealous betrayal, a horrifying incident that gives us insight into the man that Cornell became, the path he was forced down.

In particular, I love the scene where he's playing his piano, and is forced to participate in Mabel and Pete killing a local footsoldier who ran afoul of them. The way it's interspersed with scenes from the present is especially well done. The way that Cottonmouth takes out that gun, holds it to the mirror, and drifts back to that moment, tells us so much about what that implement, and that time, mean to him, for good and for ill. And the scene of Mabel wrapping her bloody fingers around his, symbolizing the way that he is wrapped up in all of this bloody business, the way that his own blood ties him to it, segues perfectly into his attempting to play the piano and his fingers writhing as he struggles with the memory. It's an impressively artistic sequence.

But it's not just Cottonmouth for whom we gain insight. While Mariah is less a part of the scenes from the past, she is more a part of the scenes from the present. We see her struggling with the way the empire she's tried to build, the family name that, as Shades (who's apparently embroiled in the old days as well) points out, meant something, is crumbling. The overtures from her political rival, the demand that she step down, all represent a setback, a rejection, a failure that she has no desire to face. Alfre Woodard does an amazing job, showing intensity and hurt in equal measure.

And there's still an important reveal from her past as well, than Uncle Pete, the man Cornell admired so much, molested her. It's a bold choice on the part of the show, something that fuels Mariah in her anger at her cousin, and which shows the different ways that she and Cottonmouth have both been marked in their experiences under Mama Mabel, but see the causes and the culprits differently. The rage she shows when Cottonmouth accuses her of having wanted it -- after he says she received preferential treatment and she reminds him how she protected him -- is fierce and visceral, and if Cottonmouth had to die, her being the one to do it is fitting.

Shades, despite his little speech about being powerless that suggests he was once also under the heel of the elder Stokeses, isn't quite as up to the task as Woodard or Mahershala Ali, but he at least represents a certain malevolent cool, an envoy of a higher power, that makes him a solid if somewhat convenient ingredient in this harsh family mix.

Of course, it's not all good, because we have to spend some time with Luke on the show that bears his name. As Luke himself points out, we've done the "Luke tries to decide whether to run away or fight" storyline already, and it wasn't especially compelling the first go 'round. Throwing in Misty Knight's mistrust of him, which, while well-founded, feels like a narrative dead end since we have every reason to think she'll see he's a good person and try to prove it. There's some table setting in terms of plot, with the reveal that people know he used to be Carl Lucas hanging over his head, and a new lieutenant that Misty has history with entering the scene, but otherwise, it's a waste. Even the conversation with Clare Temple, which features one of the best performers across the Netflix corner of the MCU, doesn't salvage it.

But hey, at least Luke takes a bullet! It's an intriguing setup for the next episode that raises a number of questions as to who could pull something like that off and what the fallout will be. When the best you can do, however, is to make people interested in what'll happen next, rather than what's happening now, it doesn't speak well of the story you're telling.

Thankfully, the story of this episode centers around the bad guys. Both Mariah and Cottonmouth, create characters worth following in this episode and in this series. There is a history between them, one tied to Harlem's own fraught past, that shows the ways that even the people who made it out of those rougher times, did not make it out unscathed, and carry longstanding scars that drive them to do things they never wanted to do, no matter how much people claim that deep down, it's what they wanted.