The Heartbreaking Story of How Jessica got her Powers

Today we’re talking about the tragic origins of Jessica Jones’ powers, and, at the end of the video, we’ll briefly touch on why she gave up being a superhero a long time ago at the end of this video.

So Jessica’s story actually traces all the way back to the earliest days of Marvel. Her birth name was Jessica Campbell, and she attended Midtown High School along with Peter Parker. Though she never really interacted with Peter, she always secretly had a crush on him. Jessica witnessed Peter get his powers, but did not realize what she was seeing.

Later, Jessica went to Disney World with her family. On the way home, the family got into a horrible car accident after Jessica and her brother got in an argument. When the father turned to stop the fighting siblings, the family car hit a military convoy transporting radioactive chemicals. The tragic event left Jessica comatose while her family was brutally killed. Jessica spent months in a coma, until Galactus arrived on Earth and first encountered the Fantastic Four. The cosmic radiation from this celestial being’s appearance seemed to change Jessica, and she woke up from the coma. She was placed in the Moore House for Wayward Children, and was later adopted by a woman named Alisa Jones and her husband. Jessica took the couple’s name, becoming Jessica Jones, and as she recovered from her injuries, it did not take her long to discover she had new superpowers as a result of all of this.

Jessica would go on to become a superhero herself, having long been interested and even attracted to famous figures like the Human Torch. She took on the namesake of Jewel, and for a while, she seemed to enjoy this. However, early on, before she ever really got media or superhero attention, Jessica encountered the villain Purple Man, who used his powers of mental control to overwhelm her. Though, in the comics, he did not assault her sexually, he did humiliate Jessica many times, and forced the woman to hurt others. The experience ultimately caused her to abandon a career in super-heroics entirely, instead becoming a private detective, starting up her own agency called Alias Investigations.