With all of Harlem bearing witness, Luke takes on the fight of his life in hopes of emerging as the defender his city needs.

Marvel’s Luke Cage wraps up its first season with an episode that begins like something we’ve seen so many times before, two guys duking it out in the street while the neighborhood watches. We’ve seen it before… a lot. Hell Rocky V ended with it.

But that’s only about 15 minutes of the episode, there’s a lot to wrap up with the warrants out for him and a lot of clearing the air with what people think Cage did…

…and it doesn’t wrap up nicely! There’s a lot that’s left out there.

In many ways, this is the Empire Strikes Back of the Marvel Netflix series. It’s a continuation of a story and it’s one that ends on a low note. It acknowledges that life is a series of low notes and the show acknowledges that even innocent African American men are often shat on by the system. It’s a fresh statement from anything, let along a live action series from Marvel.

The series leaves a lot out there and actual breaks from the usual paint by numbers ending of most of the Marvel live action releases and does that by giving us a coda.

That coda is important in that it reminds us the basic themes of the series and much of what it has said throughout its thirteen episodes, a greatest hits of its points. It reminds us why Luke Cage is special. And while this episode, and the series as a whole, has some bumps, it also reminds us why this series is special. It shows that superheroes can be relevant and act as a mirror to our society.

Marvel’s Luke Cage is a triumph in many ways and hopefully is just the start of even more to come.

Overall Rating: 8.65