Double Take: The Story Behind Jessica Jones’ Costume

Double Take is our new original video series debuting every Monday afternoon on the Den of Geek Facebook page. Each week, we uncover the hidden references, comics easter eggs, and Hollywood oddities you may have missed in your favorite movies and television shows.

Double Take: Jessica Jones’ Jewel Costume

During the flashbacks in season 1 episode 5, “The Sandwich Saved Me,” we learn that Trish had designed a superhero costume for Jessica, and offered her the ridiculous code name of “Jewel.” This is pretty much exactly the Jewel costume that comic book Jessica Jones wore during her brief stint as a more traditional superhero.

And yes, she did call herself Jewel. And yes, she was suitably ashamed of it after the fact.

The whole “Jewel” thing is kind of a funny commentary on the state of Marvel Comics, too. Alias was published in 2001, the tail end of an era in which every superheroine out there was scantily clad with features that defied the laws of physics.

Jessica’s Jewel identity would have been only a few years earlier in “comic book time,” but because of the sliding scale of how comic book time works, the aesthetic of the Jewel costume and codename is more similar to Marvel stuff of the late ’80s. See characters like Dazzler or Quasar for the kind of primary colored, optimistic stuff Jewel is in line with.

One of Jessica’s other codenames was “Knightress” although we haven’t heard it mentioned on the show. Presumably, that was her post-Jewel, mid-90s “bad girl” reinvention after the Jewel identity and its whole aesthetic fell out of fashion.

We caught a brief glimpse of Jessica in her Knightress identity in flashback in the second comic book series Jessica starred in, The Pulse. Here’s a page from The Pulse #14 as proof…

Check back next week for a new episode!