Netflix has released the full trailer for Luke Cage, the third series in Marvel’s TV slate for the streaming service. Luke Cage joins Daredevil and Jessica Jones, and Iron Fist will follow in 2017 before all four heroes join together in The Defenders.
The show follows the adventures of Luke Cage, the man with the unbreakable skin, as he works to avenge his wife’s murder and protect Harlem. In the new trailer, we get a look at Cage’s origins — "I was put in some tank like an exotic fish," he says bitterly — and see the familiar beats of any superhero story: He just wants to be left alone to live an ordinary life, but instead he finds himself compelled to use his power to help others.
In Cage’s case, that includes picking up a villain’s henchman and throwing him through a window without a backward glance, then walking through a storm of bullets.
"You might be bulletproof," a woman warns him in the trailer, "but Harlem ain’t."
We also catch glimpses of Rosario Dawson’s Claire Temple, the night nurse who appeared on Daredevil and Jessica Jones and is a central love interest for Luke Cage in the comics. "Sometimes if you want justice," she tells Cage, "you have to get it for yourself."
Finally, there’s what looks like a nod to the Black Lives Matter movement when Cage flicks up his hoodie to navigate the storm of bullets. Both Daredevil and Jessica Jones wore hoodies as part of their superhero uniforms, but the connotations of a black man wearing a hoodie and getting shot at are specific and unmistakable. It’s something that showrunner Cheo Coker has embraced. "The world is ready for a bulletproof black man," he’s said.
Luke Cage will premiere on Netflix September 30.
