‘Luke Cage’ Spoiler Review: Flaws Rise To The Surface In Final 6 Episodes

Nonsensical plot and choices

As I said, the last six episodes are very different from the first seven and a majority of the narrative decay comes with the character of Diamondback. Set up as an all-powerful crime figure, his personal grudge against as Cage’s long-lost best friend/half-brother should be momentous. Instead, it is hazily and lazily sketched. Firing the bullet that finally pierces the bulletproof man is an amazing introduction – if it wasn’t followed by episode after episode of his dumb, scattershot approach to villainy, to the point that you wonder how Willis Stryker managed to become Diamondback in the first place. He fails to kill Cage repeatedly when he has the chance, monologues at length at the most inopportune times for his goals, (his personal confession to a side character is both random and ultimately meaningless) as the character is portrayed as so much over-the-top evil, any nuance is blunted. I actually don’t blame Erik LaRay Harvey for this, as his hammy embrace of absurdity is the only thing making Diamondback entertaining, if not intelligible.

Why did he bail Shades out of jail only to immediately try to assassinate him? Why did this master of the shadow literally start gang wars he couldn’t finish? How did he ever maintain loyalty if all we ever see is his constant abuse of underlings? At least with Cottonmouth, you saw him slipping, losing control of his empire and lashing out. You understood why he was evil. Diamondback? His dad liked Cage more than him (ironically enough, even that wasn’t true). Even if Cage’s appearance is supposed to somehow knocked him off his all-powerful game, Harvey’s foot is on the crazy gas from the get-go; there’s nowhere to go but even further at that point.