All thirteen episodes of Jessica Jones go live on Netflix on November 20, and with the show dropping in on New York’s Comic-Con and showing the pilot episode, the buzz for the show is steadily growing. And here’s all you need to know about Jessica Jones before you dive into her story.

Jessica Jones Backstory

If you don’t know who Jessica Jones is or what part she plays in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, you could probably be forgiven as she didn’t have a large following in her comic incarnation.

But to bring you up to speed, Jones had a part in the limited run of adult-oriented comic, Alias, written by comic writer supreme Brian Michael Bendis.

Jessica gained powers like a lot of her superhero colleagues — being in the wrong place at the right time when a chemical unexpectedly spilled and exploded giving her superpowers and killing her family.

Then, through a little creative re-writing, Jones found herself involved in some of the other MCU superhero stories — for example, she gets her inspiration to get into the superhero crime fighting game from Spider-Man.

Sadly for Jessica, due to the adult nature of the comic, when it went bad for her it went into some very serious, dark places. She was mind-controlled and abused by a villain known as the Purple Man (a.k.a. Zebediah Kilgrave). The experience was so traumatic for Jones that she hung up her spandex and put out her shingle as a private detective instead.

That’s where Krysten Ritter’s incarnation of Jessica Jones takes over.

Jessica Jones’ Allies

Mike Colter (The Good Wife) will be portraying Jessica’s bartending love interest, Luke Cage, before he moves off to headline his own series next year.

According to an interview with Comicbook, Colter revealed that when he meets Jessica in Hell’s Kitchen, he’s in the middle of trying to escape something.

“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 that] Luke Cage is uptown in Harlem, working, trying to make ends meet. Luke really hasn’t figured out what he’s doing. He’s tending bar, he’s bouncing around. And for good reason, he’s a fugitive, he has some skeletons in his closet.”

But before Cage moves uptown to get going on his own stories, he’s going to be helping Jessica out with her investigations, as well as sharing some steamy scenes with her.

According to Digital Spy, Carrie Ann Moss (The Matrix) will play Jeryn Hogarth. In the comics, Jeryn is a male lawyer who worked for Wendall Rand — Iron Fist’s father.

This could suggest the character will be introduced in Jessica Jones and will play a larger role in the Iron Fist series, if that one goes ahead (more on that later). Much like Rosario Dawson’s nurse, Claire Temple, who appeared on Daredevil and will likely make an appearance or two on Jessica Jones but who won’t have a larger role until Luke Cage rolls out.

Rachel Tayler (666 Park Avenue) will take on the role of Jessica’s best friend, Trish Walker. A woman who, in Marvel canon, later becomes a superhero in her own right, known as Hellcat.

Crossovers Will Likely Be Limited

As noted above, Luke Cage’s story will be introduced on Jessica Jones, so two of The Defenders are already in this series. But what about Daredevil and Iron Fist?

Currently, unsubstantiated rumours are floating around the internet that Iron Fist isn’t actually going to get a show or appear on The Defenders when the street level heroes get together. But right now, there’s no confirmation or denials from Marvel or Netflix. We’ll just have to wait and see, but it likely means we won’t get an appearance from Iron Fist on Jessica Jones.

Brian Michael Bendis has written a short comic reintroducing Jessica where she hears about the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen from someone who had a tussle with him — you can get access to that free content at Comixology. That suggests that not only do Jones and Daredevil (Charlie Cox) both live in Hell’s Kitchen but they may not be that far from each other.

In fact, if you compare the above pictures, you can see that the Avengers tower is in both, in the top right corner of the Daredevil poster and upper left of the Jessica Jones, and therefore they are likely only a couple of blocks away.

And if that is the case then we are likely to hear about him and maybe even catch a glimpse but because they’ve been aiming to bring Luke Cage, Daredevil, Jessica Jones, and potentially Iron Fist together for a Defenders series all along it’s not likely they’ll waste too much energy on having appearances between the shows before that.

The Pilot Episode Aired At NYC Comic-Con And Fans Loved It

Get ready. ‘Jessica Jones?’ is one of the best first episodes ever—according to @EVComedy: http://t.co/FIoKVNzC2l pic.twitter.com/Uqd9iwHjay

— Collider News (@ColliderNews) October 11, 2015

Being the best first episode ever is a lot to live up to, but critics and fans alike seem to have thoroughly enjoyed the Jessica Jones pilot.

It’s modeled after old school film noir which makes it gritty and dark. In fact, it’s being called darker than Netflix’ first foray into Marvel territory, Daredevil, which is saying something. That series delved into the darkness deeper than any other recent MCU property had.

Jessica Jones also manages to, with the film noir tone and the fact that the super powers are used sparingly enough, give you the sense that you’re not watching comic book television.

That alone makes it intriguing enough to see exactly what kind of tone Jessica Jones will settle on.

The Jessica Jones Villain Is Dark

The Purple Man, who put Jones through her life-changing traumatic experience, is the key villain in Jessica Jones. So, though, she’s escaped his mind control before the series begins, he’s clearly not finished with her. In fact, the color purple surrounds her in every teaser that’s been released for Jessica Jones.

David Tennant plays Zebediah Kilgrave (aka The Purple Man), note the half-purple scarf in the above image. His mind-control combined with a lack of any compassion for other people make him evil, but he apparently won’t be a one dimensional villain. Tennant himself has said that the character will have multiple layers, like Daredevil‘s villain, Wilson Fisk.

That’s exciting, because Tennant can pull it off, just like Vincent D’Onofrio did. And really getting to know what was behind Fisk was one of the many things that made Daredevil an interesting show to watch.

And that shot at the end of this teaser, with the Purple Man’s face on the wall, is truly creepy.

Look for Jessica Jones’ first season on Netflix on November 20.

[Image courtesy Marvel and Netflix via Screenrant]