Without watching Luke Cage’s first appearance in Jessica Jones, understanding how he fits into the Marvel-Netflix timeline could be confusing. So here’s a little history lesson. Daredevil was the was the first Marvel hero to get his own show on Netflix. Then came Jessica Jones, where we first meet Luke Cage. So if you're wondering if Luke Cage takes place after Jessica Jones, the answer is yes, just a few months after the Jessica Jones finale leaves off. Mike Colter even said it himself.
“I can tell you what they’ve allowed me to, which is basically Luke Cage will take place a few months after Jessica Jones. So in real time, if you watch Jessica Jones , you’ll find [at the end] Luke Cage uptown in Harlem, working, trying to make ends meet,” Colter told ComicBook.com last year.
Whether or not Luke Cag e takes place after Daredevil Season 2 is the tougher question. Charlie Cox recently spoke on the timeline of Daredevil Season 2 and Luke Cage, which actually proves to be quite an interesting overlap. Cox revealed parts of Daredevil Season 2 happen at the same time as forthcoming events in Luke Cage, particularly Nurse Claire Temple’s arc. He said he runs into Claire at the hospital and she had a scrape on her head that is actually from something that happened in Luke Cage, an injury I’d assume is somehow related to Cornell ‘Cottonmouth’ Stokes.
“One thing that I thought was really cool is that in the second season [of Daredevil ], we had a scene together and in the storyline we hadn’t seen each other for a long time and it takes place at the hospital. Rosario had — Claire Temple has a cut in her eyebrow. So I was like, ‘What is that?’ Apparently it had nothing to do with our world but it’s part of Luke Cage ,” the Daredevil actor shared at Wizard World Chicago. “The timeline had been thought through and worked out so that whatever’s going on in Luke Cage , which we don’t know, I don’t know, somehow at some point during that show, the next day she’s in the hospital talking to me,”
This means that Claire (played by Rosario Dawson) may be extending her job search to Harlem after resigning from her night shift at Metro-General Hospital in Hell's Kitchen at the end of Daredevil Season 2. However, at the start of Luke Cage , she may still be employed as Night Nurse. At some point in Luke Cage Season 1, something else brings her to Harlem.
Since Luke Cage starts right after Jessica Jones ended, it’s important to get the sequence of events in order as far as why Luke Cage moved to Harlem. I’ll preface by saying Jessica and Luke’s relationship was bound to fail from the start. The two met because Jessica Jones was 'investigating' whether Luke Cage was sleeping with a married woman. Then one night, they used their super strength to break up a bar fight and ended up having some super sex shortly after.
Luke Cage had just lost his wife, Reva Connors, in an accident. As it turns out, Jessica Jones was responsible for killing her because she was being mind controlled by Kilgrave. To make matters worse, the only reason she came clean to Luke Cage was because he was going to kill the bus driver that he thought was responsible.
Luke Cage and Jessica Jones split up, but Luke Cage wasn't ready to put the past behind him. Set on revenge, he got dragged into the Kilgrave situation, mind-controlled, and blown up inside his bar. Once Kilgrave learned Luke Cage survived the blast, he mind controlled him again to kill Jessica Jones. Injured from being shot by Jessica Jones, Luke Cage wakes in Jessica Jones’ apartment with Nurse Claire Temple. She helped Jessica sneak Luke out of the hospital and evade the police once she realized he had impenetrable skin. Once Claire fixes him up and tells him Jessica got arrested, he doesn’t stick around very long. As a fugitive who lost his bar and could be deemed a conspirator in Kilgrave murder, no wonder why he takes off to Harlem and takes a job at a barbershop to fly under the radar.
The ending of Jessica Jones also explains why Luke Cage and Claire Temple become close friends. She’s one of the only people who knows about his abilities aside from Jessica. Even more interesting than catching up with Luke in the present, is learning about his past. We don’t know anything about him pre- Jessica Jones . How does Luke Cage go from convict to super-powered hero? Watch all 13 episodes of Luke Cage on Netflix.
