2016 – Netflix(NEW YORK) — Luke Cage was such a hit with fans this weekend that Netflix actually crashed. On Saturday, the streaming service managed to fix the glitch, allowing fans to resume their binging.
And they did: tuning into a different kind of Marvel show, featuring one of the comic book company’s first black superheroes, dating back to 1972.
The series focuses on a literally unbreakable black superhero, played by Mike Colter, who is hiding in Harlem and trying to shake off an earlier part of his life. There are homages to Black Lives Matter, “hands up, don’t shoot,”Trayvon Martin and more.
It’s enlightening without being overbearing, with Cage sympathetic as a wrongly-accused man trying to right some wrongs. But as all Marvel’s superheroes have to find their way at first, learning to navigate their new-found powers, so does Cage, who is reluctant at first about being a beacon of hope.
“How those think pieces coming?” the show’s official Twitter handle posted Monday, complete with a gif of Colter’s Cage motioning to “bring it.”
The series’ treatment of the subject matter has earned praise in many publications, as in Lorraine Ali’s piece for the Los Angeles Times.
“It’s not just Cage’s superhuman abilities that make him the best man for protecting Harlem and its people from nefarious forces,” she writes. “His deep understanding of black history and cultural achievements is just as critical as his Kevlar-like skin…Cage is as much about defending his Harlem neighborhood from bad guys on both sides of the law as he is about explaining why Harlem and its culture are worth defending.”
Vox’s Alex Abad-Santos adds, “the series explores the vulnerability of black lives to make an important point about its extraordinary man with indestructible skin.”
In the show, Cage laments, “Everyone’s got a gun, nobody has a father.” That’s just the kind of depth the actor says fans might not have expected. “We’re…focusing their energy on the character study, on how these characters feel about life and what’s going on. And then, yeah, we’ll give you some of the stuff that you’re looking for — like, you know, obviously some of the quotes that you remember from the comic books, and some of the cool stunts and stuff like that — that’s gonna keep them…entertained as well, but what makes them come back is the connection to the story, and what these people are doing, and how they’re developing and intersecting.
Marvel is owned by Disney, the parent company of ABC News.
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