Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Alias (Vol. 1), Issue #6 – “B Level (Part 1)”!

It’s been a while since I tackled the first Alias story. In that storyline, Jessica Jones is a suspect in a sudden murder investigation wherein she discovers that everything was a big government plot. Also, she helped Captain America maintain his secret identity. If word had gotten out that Captain America was REALLY Ray Fucking Romano, people would be flipping their shit!

I’m going to hit this four-issue story and then the Issue #10 standalone story. I’m looking forward to seeing what my gurl Jessica Jones is up to this time.

Alias (Vol. 1), Issue #6 [April, 2002]
Written by: Brian Michael Bendis
“B Level (Part 1)”

Jonesy and her buddy Carol Danvers are enjoying a luncheon at the ol’ bistro. Sitting outside with their sunglasses, they chat about Spider-Man’s shitty costume and how he shoots webs out of his butthole, which I’m already laughing at! Peter Parker does shoot webs out of his butthole. Hahaha!

Like Jessica is one to talk, though. She admits that her costume was pretty awful too. Danvers doesn’t agree, but Jessica tells her to shut the fuck up and agree with her! No, I guess she doesn’t say that, but I’m saying it. Quite heartily, I might add.

After throwing shade at each other about their respective haircuts, Danvers asks if Jessica has any fuck buddies lately. You know, to lighten the mood. Put Jessica on the spot. Live vicariously through her involuntarily celebate friend.

“In your line of work isn’t there a plethora of meeting potential?” Danvers asks her, shocked that Jessica isn’t drowning in dick.
“My line of work? All I meet are cheaters.”
“Oh yeah, I guess that’s true.”

At any rate, Jessica isn’t too suave with the members of the male persuasion…except for, uh, mumbles _{Luke Cage} heh heh. Cough.

Well no, she doesn’t admit it, but Danvers suggests it and freaks her out. There’s no way. That dude is a total “cape-chaser”, meaning he only fornicates with muscled, strong, oily Super Women! Not any heroes-turned-private detectives. Gross! He’s been with Spider-Woman, Tigra, even She-Hulk.

Jessica doesn’t like hearing about Luke Cage’s overt promiscuity. Not today! Danvers smiles and tells her not to worry too much about it, but Jessica is most certainly visibly worrying too much about it. “Oh man… oh man…”

She ends up admitting that she, too, slept with him.

“How was it?” Danvers asks.
“Shush.”
“No, seriously.”
“Seriously? I was hammered. I have no fucking idea.”
“Liar.”
“I’m not.”
“Okay. Don’t tell me.”

Jessica tells her to knock it off and cut her some slack. She’s still REELING from this “cape-chasing” revelation. For some reason. Who cares? Ohhhh, the charismatic bartender has fucked more women than Wilt Chamberlain. Cry about it. Pass the Bechdel Test once in a while.

Today’s your lucky day, Jonesy! Carol Danvers is going to whip out her phone and hook you up with some prime cuts of meat!

“Yes – here we go. Perfect, right on the money… Scott Lang.”
“Where do I know that name?”
“He’s such a cutie pie.”
“Where do I know that name?”
“He’s got a great job.”
“Where do I know that name?”
“He’s single.”
“Where do I know that name?”
“He’s Ant-Man.”

Never mind the fact that they Sorkined through the conversation. Jessica doesn’t want to date Ant-Man? The most attractive hybrid of Ant and Man in town? Preposterous!

Danvers vouches for him. He’s a nice dude! And Jessica doesn’t want to date nice dudes. Go find yourself a serial rapist then, lady. You seem to have more fun with THOSE types I guess.

NO Ant-Man. No weird genetic mutations. No X-Men, no Spider-Man, no Captain America. Wait, is Captain America and genetic mutation?… … … … … well, still no.

Carol Danvers prints out Ant-Man’s phone number from her state of the art 2002 palm pilot that Tony Stark modified himself instead of inventing the iPhone five years earlier like he should have. Then the palm pilot beeps like a pager, which Tony Stark should have invented 85 years ago, and Carol prepares to shove off to Avenger Land. She didn’t even get to tell Jessica what she intended to during lunch, but I suppose that can come later. It probably wasn’t important anyway. Just the whole Luke Cage having AIDS thing.

Carol leaves and Jessica’s sad. Time for some good old fashioned early 2000s cyber-fuckin’.

In the comfort of her own dilapidated office, Jessica (as FEYGO) does some steamy, lewd conversational minglings with MRSEDUCT over AOL Instant Messenger. How quaint! You love to see it.

FEYGO wants to meet MRSEDUCT, but Mrs. Educt (lol) agrees! They sort of semi-arrange a meeting. I hope it’s Scott Lang; showing up with a big boner.

Jessica leans back in her chair, satisfied that Captain Marvel is being boring saving the word and she’s diddling while perusing adult chatrooms.

SO, What is. Ms. Alias’ current case? A woman named Nancy Moss hired Jessica two days ago to investigate her possibly-cheating husband. Cybersex that turned into the regular penis-in-vagina-and/or-butt kind.

Moss didn’t mind the cybersex. She thought it was a healthy outlet, but Jessica certainly doesn’t share the same sentiment. “If Oprah stuffed that bunch of shit into her head – I swear to God I’m flying to Chicago to kick that bitch in the ass once and for all,” she thinks, lighting a cigarette.

So it’s not penis-in-vagina stuff, but it does sound like the and/or-butt stuff. Which is perfectly fine by the way. In fact, I encourage it. In fact, I demand it! Against the law otherwise, I always say.

Jessica’s instructions were to pose as a man online and goad Scott Lang… I mean, this cheating guy… into meeting her in person to bust his ass. “The trick is to not come off like a serial killer on the guy,” she narrates, describing the methods to her madness. “You gotta build the relationship.”

Yeah, that sounds like bogus stuff. Hired two days ago, was it? Can’t build a relationship in that timeframe. It takes at least four days. Maybe a week if you have the flu.

Listen, doesn’t matter. Jessica’s gonna catfish this dude and we’ll be here to see it. She writes down her notes and then gets up to take the ol’ whiz.

Jessica’s secretary, or what I assume is her secretary, answers her phone while she’s taking’ the ol’ whiz. She all but tells him to hang up the fucking phone and get the fuck out of there before he gets thoroughly fucked in the vagina-and/or-butt.

It’s not her secretary. It’s just some teenager in her office who came all the way downtown to meet up and say hi.

“Do I know you,” she sneers.
“Do you?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Just fucking with you – you don’t.”

This guy already sucks a lot. He tells Jessica that he’s a big fan, but she’s just too damn perplexed to even know what to make of this encounter. It’s rude, that’s for sure. And unwelcome. And invasive. And… is it time to pee again yet?

“How do you even know who I am?” Jessica asks the so-far-unnamed twerp.
“Websites and shit. All the guys at my school are into the X-Men and that tool Spider-Man and shit… But I like what you got goin’ on. I like that you ain’t into the costume shit.”

This guy sucks a WHOLE lot. I hope he gets suspended from school. He’ll spend his time at home washing the dishes and fondling his sister’s underwear.

“I saw Thor once in person – I was in Central Park with my dad and Thor stopped down – and I swear to God it was the gayest thing I ever saw in my life.”

OK, this guy has sort of redeemed himself. Even Jessica just let her guard down a little bit. Thor is the worst.

Long story short, he saw her in the yellow pages and couldn’t help but stop by and meet her in person.

“How old are you?” she sneers ago.
“Seventeen. How old are you?” he responds.

Well, enough of this. Jessica shoves him out the door and urges him to go away and don’t come back anytime, like, ever. Please. slam

What a waste of time. Time to check her voicemail… but there’s a knock on the door. She looks up from her desk phone annoyed. “Come on, kid, do me the favor of fucking the fuck off.”

But it’s not the kid. He already fucked the fuck off. This is a very sad-looking woman who doesn’t think anything of the barrage of profanities. Jessica apologies and the woman jumps right into it. Well, no she doesn’t. It takes her a while to spit it out, all “I need your help” and “I’m going through a rough time” and “waahhh” and “a bloo bloo bloo”.

Her name is Jane Jones. She assures Jessica that they’re not related. Not really. Her husband is related, but he’s been missing for weeks.

She reveals her husband is named Rick. Rick Jones.

And perhaps this is supposed to be some sort of reveal.

Final Thoughts

What a cliffhanger! I don’t know who Rick Jones is! I know who Rick James is, and that guy was a super freak. I’ll tell you that much.

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