“What I loved about Jessica,” says Marvel’s Jessica Jones star Krysten Ritter, “was how informed she is by her past, how vulnerable she is, how strong she is, how powerful she is.” The actor then added, “also she’s very cool, way cooler than I am.” Joined by EP Melissa Rosenberg, Ritter about was speaking onstage about the first season of the acclaimed and renewed Netflix series at Deadline’s The Contenders Emmys all-day event on April 10.

Based on the Alias comic character created by Brian Michael Bendis and Michael Gaydos back in 2011, the November 20, 2015 debuting 13-episode first season saw Ritter’s hard drinking and traumatized Jones trying to rebuild her life and a gig as a Hell’s Kitchen P.I. after her short-lived super hero stint and other dark times in her past. Carrie-Anne Moss, David Tennant, Rachael Taylor and Mike Colter also star in Jessica Jones. The latter’s Luke Cage is set for his own Netflix September 30 debuting series as well as joining of The Defenders as part of the multi-project multi-year deal the streamer has with the Disney-owned comic giant.

“It was really about building a character, and not being defined by her gender,” added Rosenberg last month of bringing the comic book Jessica to the streaming screen as Marvel’s first female led filmed project. “Informed by it but not defined,” the Twilight Saga screenwriter noted. “One of the things I love most about this character and the way Ritter plays her is she is utterly unapologetic. I mean, she just is who she is.”

“There’s so many layers for me to play, as an actor just getting in there and build this from the boots up was the biggest challenge I could have ever asked for, but that’s the good stuff,” said Ritter of her role in Jessica Jones – a role that saw her onscreen almost all the time.

Click on the video above of my chat with Ritter and Rosenberg in front of a packed DGA on that Sunday morning last month during the Netflix panel – it adds yet another layer to the powerfully nuanced superpower series.