Harlem keeps changing their mind about what they think about Luke Cage, I almost got whiplash from the flip flopping. But all in all, ‘Soliloquy of Chaos’ worked well as a penultimate episode as it set the scene for the finale, and helped to put all the pieces together.
It is obvious that all that Willis Stryker’s plan is to get rid of Luke Cage, unlike Cottonmouth and Mariah that genuinely wanted to rule Harlem, those two were more like Winston Fisk and Stryker is more in tune with Kilgrave from Jessica Jones who central aim was just Jessica. It is unhinging Stryker how much he just wants to defeat Luke, so much so that he chases Shades and Mariah to help Luke, but that’s me getting ahead of myself.
We learn through the episode that Stryker was working on his own super-powered suit so that he could mimic the powers of Luke Cage. He also attempted to get rid of Domingo and Shades, the former he succeeded with as he had a shoot-out and then bombing at an abandoned warehouse. Shades, however, was not that easy to kill, Diamondback had him bailed out of jailed and then tried to get Zip to kill him but Shades fought back and killed them instead. Stryker also tried to pay off Mariah but she wasn’t all that keen of having him as an ally. This prompted Shades and Mariah to team up as they realized that Diamondback has to be put down and the only person that can do it is Luke Cage. This also introduced me to my new Marvel ship – #ShadyMariah.
Luke, while on the run, still finds the time to stop a store robbery, where he runs into Method Man from the Wu Tang Clan, this scene made me laugh though, because one of the robbers still took the time to fanboy over Method Man. Method Man, then goes on Sway’s radio show to talk about the incident and how he does not believe what the police is saying about Luke Cage, that Luke is a hero. Basically Method Man was telling us through his voice over and rap what the writers want the audience to know about Luke and his position in Harlem. Apparently after this incident, people all across Harlem were sporting hoodies with bullet holes in solidarity with Luke.
The episode ends in Pop’s Barbershop (a setting that I’ve missed lately) where all the main players gather together. Luke is hiding out there with Claire, Shades and Mariah were there to convince Luke to work with them and Misty followed Luke there and was attempting to arrest Shades and Mariah for Cottonmouth’s murder, when Diamondback burst in with his new super armor.
We can expect that this is all building up to an epic Luke vs Diamondback fight in the finale, and hopefully with Luke disposing of him. But will all the players survive the finale? We have one more episode left where we find it out.