Suits: Who Plays Jessica Pearson & Why Is She A Low-Key Sci-Fi Fantasy Icon?
"Suits" has seen a whole new life now that it has appeared on Netflix and taken over the streaming service by becoming the first ever series to record three billion minutes streamed for seven straight weeks. There are many reasons to love "Suits," including the legal intrigue of the Pearson Specter Litt law firm that dominates New York City. One of the big reasons to love the series is the trio of strong female characters, Donna (Sarah Rafferty) and Rachel (Meghan Markle), led by the powerful Jessica Pearson.
Gina Torres ("Westworld," "Hannibal") portrays the head of the law firm at the center of the storyline for 94 episodes. She is the vital center of the team that faces threats both from outside firms and from those who look to take it down from within. There is a sense throughout the series that the big gun of Harvey Specter is only the big gun because she trained him to be, and she allows him to continue. She is the one character that everyone from Litt and Ross to Donna and the loose cannon Harvey respects without question.
In 2019, Torres spoke with Collider about her role, "Would she be considered a good actor or a bad actor? Here's a woman that I played for the better part of six or seven years, who absolutely blurred the line between right and wrong, and did it with a ferocity and an intelligence, all for what she believed to be the greater good." But Torres is known for more than simply keeping Specter in line; she became a science fiction fantasy legend long before she put on the power suit and pumps.
She became a sci-fi fantasy icon on Firefly
The early 2000s brought one of the most exciting and unique takes to the science-fiction genre when "Firefly" reimagined the future sci-fi world as the Wild West. Following the sarcastic and somewhat sardonic Malcolm Reynolds (Nathan Fillion) and his lovable band of misfits as they survive the galaxy by picking up smuggling gigs and avoiding The Alliance and Reavers, the series ran for a depressingly short 14 episodes.
Gina Torres was one of the bright spots in the series as Zoë Alleyne Washburne, second in command under Reynolds. Washburne met Reynolds when the two served in the Civil War between the Allied and Independent Planets. They, unfortunately, were "Browncoats," or soldiers for the Independent Planets, and lost the war, forced to live as outlaws in the depths of space. She is strong, brilliant, and perhaps the calmest of the crew whenever you-know-what hits the fan. Torres has expressed her love for the series and the legacy it still holds today.
"That's not something you can predict," Torres told Newsweek. "You hope that it has a life, not 20 years later but while you're actually doing it. The fact that it resonated, not even so much immediately, but it was like ripples on a pond, and now it's become generational. That's an extraordinary thing and really is a testament to good storytelling, good characters, and hitting on our basic need for family and belonging and wanting to feel safe."
She was a small part of another sci-fi masterpiece
Gina Torres has more than "Firefly" in her sci-fi fantasy resume. She has amassed an impressive resume of roles in the genre that includes "Xena: Warrior Princess," "Hercules: The Legendary Journeys," "Angel," "The Vampire Diaries," and voicing multiple characters from DC Comics, including Vixen and Wonder Woman. However, while those are all somewhat smaller projects in the world of science-fiction and fantasy, she also played a small part in one of the most influential science-fiction franchises in history.
Torres got the opportunity to appear in a relatively small role in two movies in "The Matrix" franchise when she played Cas in "The Matrix Reloaded" and "The Matrix Revolutions." Cas is the widow of Dozer (Anthony Ray Parker) and lives in the real world with her children. While her character survived the war against the machines in "The Matrix Revolutions," she is among many surviving characters that don't appear in the fourth film, "The Matrix Resurrections."
The actress sat down with Variety in 2019 to discuss her thoughts on that. "Not to be bitter or anything, but the people that are actually in the movie, I believe, died," Torres explained. "And the people that aren't didn't. So, that's all I have to say about that. I'm so curious about where they're going with this. And what's their jumping off point and what story they want because it just felt like they told it." Torres' most prominent role may be in a legal drama at this point, but that doesn't stop her from being a low-key science-fiction and fantasy icon.