Krysten Ritter Says Jessica Jones Has Even More 'Fierceness' as a Mom in “Daredevil: Born Again ”(Exclusive)

The actress returns as Jessica Jones alongside Charlie Cox's Daredevil in the second season of the Disney+ series

NEED TO KNOW

• Krysten Ritter reprises her role as Jessica Jones in Daredevil: Born Again after nearly seven years
• Ritter says returning to the character felt “pretty wild,” but it was a “dream come true”
• The Marvel star also shares more about one new aspect of her character that adds a layer of “fierceness” to the role

Krysten Ritter says returning to her Jessica Jones role after nearly seven years was "a dream come true."

The actress first played the complex character in her own Marvel series, which premiered on Netflix in 2015 and ran for three seasons. Ritter also starred in the crossover miniseries The Defenders, teaming up with Charlie Cox's Daredevil, Mike Colter's Luke Cage and Finn Jones' Iron Fist to save New York City from the villainous group the Hand.

Now she's reprising her role again in the second season of Daredevil: Born Again, an experience she calls "pretty wild."

"It's pretty wild to be there and be in the costume," she tells PEOPLE. "I was first cast as Jessica Jones at the end of 2014, and we started filming in 2015, so it's 11 years playing this character, and it's such a gift and it's so fun."

"It's just a dream come true. I feel really lucky," Ritter, 44, added. "On one hand, it's like old hat, and on the other, it's like no time has passed, and it just feels completely natural and right."

Ritter explains that slipping back into her role as the superhero was "second nature" to her. The Breaking Bad alum says she "wasn't at all" nervous to come back on set and reprise her role.

"Slipping back in was so second nature. She's so in my cells," she says. "I think day one everybody was just like, 'Wow, this is just so natural.'"

"I really got 10,000 hours of playing Jessica Jones under my belt that I was just ready to rock," adds Ritter. "We had the best time."

In Daredevil: Born Again, Ritter says the action and the stunts are "much bigger" than they were on Jessica Jones. She says one of her favorite aspects of reprising her role is blending the "rich character development" fans saw in the original series with the "big action sequences" they get in the new series.

"I obviously have this amazing history and so much that Jessica has this great, rich character development, and deep excavation into who she is. To bring all of that and then get to do these big action sequences, with all of that history built in, it just makes me feel so epic," she says.

Working with longtime friend Cox, 43, who she says is "basically family" to her now, is just an added bonus. Ritter says the first day she filmed with him she immediately was able to fall back into a familiar routine.

"Honestly, the first day I worked with Charlie … he's in the Daredevil costume, and immediately I got to pick on him for his horns," she recalls. "And all of that stuff that we had actually improvised in The Defenders just kind of bleeds into our relationship."

"We have such a unique history. We have a really shared experience that you don't always have when you're in our position. When you're acting, you're the only one having that experience. But in our circumstances, we all had our own show that was exactly the same, the same crew, the same producers, and then we all came together and did The Defenders, and we just had the same experience," Ritter says. "We were always a touchstone for each other. And so Charlie has become … basically family to me at this point."

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Jessica Jones has evolved and became a mother since the last time fans saw her. Exploring the additional layer of who the superheroine is as a mom to a daughter was something that "really excited" Ritter when she read the script.

"I was really excited to layer that in for her. It's obviously in the comics that she has a child, and adding that layer on top is just candy, because then it gives you more to do and more to explore," she says. "This character that's so rich and has so much weight of the world on top of her and so much to dig into and so much psychology to then even have more to do is, I mean, you just can't ask for better."

This new layer added to her life will only add more "fierceness" to Jessica Jones, according to Ritter. While she's typically held back with her powers because of the complicated relationship she has with them, Ritter, who's a mom to 6-year-old son Bruce, is certain that becoming a mom has changed her. She says now when it comes to protecting herself or her child nothing will get in her way.

"Jessica has always had, in my opinion, a complicated relationship with her powers — almost a little bit of contempt for them because of how she got them, the car accident, being experimented on, losing her family," she explains. "[And] being left with these powers that she doesn't want to hurt people. She doesn't want to use them. She doesn't want to have them. But having that moral obligation that comes with it, that's been a real sort of conflict for her."

"In the past, I think when we saw Jessica, in my show, she would've used restraint around her powers or used them reluctantly," she continues. "Now I think it's safe to say if you're going to f— with her or f— with her child or get anywhere near that, she'll be coming for you. And that's exciting to me."

New episodes of Daredevil: Born Again season 2 premiere Tuesdays on Disney+.

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