Luke Cage 1.08

Blowin' Up the Spot

- Misty Knight and other police officers come to investigate the death of Cottonmouth; Shades does what he can to help Mariah overcome her shock and cover up her part in her cousin's murder; the evidence clearly doesn't match up with Mariah's story or the story provided by Candace, an employee of the club, but Misty is forced to investigate Candace' allegation that Luke Cage murdered Cottonmouth
- Claire tries to get Luke to safety after he took an explosive, high powered round to the gut at the end of the last episode; she gets an ambulance to tranport them to a clinic but before they can get to the clinic the sniper, Diamonback aka Willis Stryker, strikes again and the pair are forced to flee on foot
- Misty and Diamondback, separately, trace Claire and Luke to the clinic; Luke finally gets to face his assailant face to face; he is still injured but even injured he is much stronger that Stryker; Stryker gets the jump on Misty and for a moment it looks like he is going to kill her; Luke trails Diamondback to an old abandoned theater; they duke it out; Diamondback escapes; Luke passes out
- Misty has taken Claire into custody and she is questioned at a police station; Misty goes a little too far, Claire isn't being cooperative, and doesn't seem to get any useful information out of Claire; Misty still doesn't know about Luke's past; the way things are going I get the impression that Misty is going to be off the police force before the end of the season
- Luke awakens the next morning and goes looking for Diamondback again but Styrker finds him and shoots him with the high-powered rifle, knocking him into a trash truck

- once again the music is quite impressive; love how it is used; I especially like the music and the way the scenes are shot in the old movie theater
- this was a bit of an in betweener but I like how it is setting things up for things to come
- one reveal is that Luke and Diamondback have a past; they grew up together; possibly in the same household; Luke's father was a minister; Luke took the fall for something that Diamondback did; that's how he wound up in Seagate, that's my read of the back and forth conversation between Luke and Willis; Luke admits to not being the friend he should have been but it is still unclear why Diamondback wants to kill him, especially if Luke took the blame for something that Stryker should have gone to prison for; I get the impression that it is a personal score, and that Stryker's feelings toward Luke go beyond the bounds of rational thinking; it maybe that he is and has for quite some time been jealous of Luke

- in one of the scenes where Stryker is stalking Luke and Claire there is a very obvious reference made to The Warriors (1979)
- in one scene where Luke and Claire are alone talking he mentions how his father used to call him Power Man; I'm not sure if the anecdote cones from the comics or is something that was made up for the series