Daredevil #511 – Review

by Andy Diggle (writer), Roberto De La Torre (art), Matt Hollingsworth (colors), and Joe Caramagna (letters)

The Story: Foggy seeks out Daredevil and Dakota attempts to rescue Becky.

What’s Good: Last month’s Daredevil seemed to finally find itself, deciding to dedicate itself to the tribulations of Daredevil’s buddies Foggy and Dakota, characters who had been utterly neglected and whose perspectives should be invaluable.  Given Daredevil’s uneven quality of late, I wasn’t sure if Diggle would stick with this commitment, but he does.  Daredevil #511 focuses once again on Daredevil’s unique cast of friends and that’s good news in itself.

The end result is a book that feels really moody, desperate, and atmospheric.  It, unlike the main Shadowland series, captures just how dark and insane Hell’s Kitchen has become.  You really get the sense of New York’s devolving into an anarchic hell of indiscriminate and irrational violence and rage.  In so doing, this issue really makes it clear how this is something that Shadowland, the main series, should’ve doing much earlier.  The mood established this month and the depiction of Hell’s Kitchen’s madness and the price of Shadowland’s establishment and the events within are made clear this month, and it’s solid and it makes Shadowland appear all the more lacking by comparison.

De La Torre also continues to crank out great Daredevil art.  It’s dark and gritty as usual, but in capturing the riotous, insane Hell’s Kitchen core, there’s a constant sense of derangement to De La Torre’s art, owing to his rough lines and shading.  Better still, thanks in part to Matt Hollingsworth’s colours, the interiors of Shadowland remove some of the darkness in exchange for an undertone of disease and sickness.

Daredevil #510 – Review

by Andy Diggle & Antony Johnston (writers), Marco Checchetto (art), Matt Hollingsworth (colors), and Joe Caramagna (letters)

The Story: Foggy and Dakota find themselves hunted by the Hand while Iron Fist and Luke Cage find themselves swayed by the Kingpin.

What’s Good: One of the things that’s made the last couple of issues of Shadowland, or the last couple of issues of Daredevil for that matter, somewhat underwhelming has been that they’ve tried to focus on too many things at once, winding up feeling insubstantial and mediocre throughout.  Daredevil #510 goes against this trend and is a significant improvement throughout.

Instead of even attempting any half-assed gestures towards focusing on Matt and his shift in character and internal struggles, Daredevil becomes a book focusing on Daredevil’s friends, particularly Dakota and Foggy, a wise choice given that these two are integral to the Daredevil franchise who we don’t get to see in any other book.  This makes this issue feel more meaningful and more necessary.  While I would, of course, rather that Daredevil be devoted to shedding light on Matt’s character, Diggle and Johnston’s decision to focus on Dakota and Foggy at least gives the book a strong direction and a unique one.

It’s ultimately a good choice if only because Dakota and Foggy are naturally sympathetic characters.  Not possessing any superpowers or martial arts prowess, it’s easy to root for them amidst the madness of Shadowland.  When they’re assaulted by a horde of ninjas, the threat feels a lot more real and the danger much more substantial; this isn’t a case of Luke Cage busting the faces of a horde of faceless goons, but rather, this is two people fighting for their lives in a dingy apartment hideout.  Honestly, Dakota and Foggy felt more heroic this month than any other characters have in the entirety of Shadowland.

Daredevil #508 – Review

by Andy Diggle & Antony Johnston (writers), Roberto De La Torre (art), Matt Hollingsworth (colors), and Joe Caramagna (letters)

The Story: Foggy and Dakota try to get to Shadowland to talk some sense into Matt while Hell’s Kitchen finds itself in a state of martial law.

What’s Good: This issue of Daredevil does an absolutely fantastic job of establishing the mood and atmosphere of Shadowland, immersing us in the grim NYC of Matt Murdock’s construction.  If Shadowland #1 set the narrative groundwork for this event, this book sets the tonal groundwork.

In this sense, Daredevil #508 feels like it puts meat on Shadowland’s bones.  Hell’s Kitchen feels nightmarishly sinister and Diggle and Johnston do solid work in putting forth a really oppressed environment.  Daredevil’s Hand ninjas create a sense of foreboding, particularly given how they seem to be everywhere.  It’s a paranoid atmosphere where Daredevil and his ninja are constantly watching.  More than anything, we really get the sense that Matt has reshaped and isolated Hell’s Kitchen; the roadblocks are ugly and cops are not welcome.  I loved how in this new Hell’s Kitchen, wearing a badge is dangerous to oneself, not protective.

Things only get darker when we see Matt’s new brand of justice in action.  His dealing with a group of thieves is unsettling and darkly iconic.  It puts an evil, nasty twist on a traditional, superhero action and it’s sure to give chills, especially thanks to De La Torre’s efforts.

Speaking of De La Torre, it’s great to have him back on Daredevil and he’s really well suited to this arc.  Everything is bleak, pitch dark, grimy, and generally unpleasant in the best way possible.  It’s the very darkest sort of noir artwork you can ask for, really, and that suits Shadowland perfectly.  De La Torre’s gritty style only makes Hell’s Kitchen all the more sinister.

Daredevil #507 – Review

by Andy Diggle & Antony Johnston (writers), Marco Checchetto (art), Matt Hollingsworth (colors), and Joe Caramagna (letters)

The Story: Matt’s conflict with Bakuto comes to a head while the Hand continues to pull the strings.

What’s Good: I’ve really come to love Marco Checchetto’s artwork, particularly as it works in tandem with Hollingsworth’s colors.  The book looks unique in Marvel’s line, equal turns gritty and polished.  I especially enjoyed Daredevil’s fight with hand ninja in the snow; it’s always interesting to see a darker style forced to work with a mostly white palette.  Seeing Daredevil’s red stand out against a white background and a horde of white adversaries works out great and is something different from the usual red on black.  The snowy, feudal Japanese landscape has been a nice change from Hell’s Kitchen and it has made the story feel fresh as a result.

Diggle and Johnston use this vibe to work their way towards telling another story where Matt finds himself in an impossible situation, only faintly aware of the danger surrounding him, manipulated on all sides.  Great Daredevil writers have often found success in putting Matt under tremendous strain and Diggle and Johnston are certainly moving in that direction.  We’re just heading into Shadowland, so it’s just yet a full-on pressure cooker, but already it’s beginning to feel suffocating.  Partially because of his being on alien, unfriendly territory and even moreso because of White Tiger’s betrayal, which he’s still unaware of, Matt Murdock seems completely isolated.

This is especially the case because Diggle and Johnston seem intent on delivering a clear message with this issue:  the most crippling, dangerous, and threatening enemies are those you can only ever, at best, suspect.  Even if they have yet to make their move, their planning and bad intentions alone make for something of a crushing narrative.  At issue’s end, there’s no doubt that the headfirst animosity of Bakuto is nothing compared the greater machinations of his peers.  Hell, Bakuto’s such a lesser evil that he’s almost a sympathetic character by comparison.

Daredevil #506 – Review

by Andy Diggle & Antony Johnston (writers), Marco Checchetto (art), Matt Hollingsworth (colors), and Joe Caramagna (letters)

The Story: Matt tries to gain Bakuto’s trust, but he doesn’t realize the traitor in his midst.

What’s Good: With every passing issue, Diggle carves out Daredevil as his own, continuing to distinguish his take on the title from those who came before.  This month, that becomes all the more clear.  This is a far cry from the noir tinged brawling in Hell’s Kitchen that we’re used to.  Instead, this is a straight up ninja story in an environment that is essentially a pocket of feudal Japan in the  modern Marvel Universe.

This time, Diggle expands this further by re-introducing Hand magic.  There are exploding bodies a-plenty here.  All told, it’s a good amount of fun, if only because it’s different from what we’ve become used to in Daredevil, setting the book even further apart from the rest of Marvel’s offerings.  Diggle has crammed more or less every variety of ninja related awesomeness he can into this book, while distancing it from the gritty realism of his predecessors’ work on the title.

Daredevil #503 – Review

by Andy Diggle (writer), Roberto De La Torre & Marco Checchetto (art), Matt Hollingsworth (colors), and Joe Caramagna (letters)

The Story: Daredevil continues to use the Hand as an instrument to battle corruption.

What’s Good: I continue to enjoy Diggle’s take on Dark Reign, which remains one of the most unique in Marvel’s stable.  While most series simply have Osborn stomping about and occasional cameos by the Dark Avengers and/or the Thunderbolts, Diggle’s book best depicts how the world and society itself has changed thanks to Osborn’s rise.  Daredevil is used to occupying his own little corner of the Marvel Universe, and much of this issue is a wake-up call that even the farthest/lowest fringe of that Universe is subject to this major shift in status quo. The series’ own isolation stands in relation to Matt’s obliviousness to the larger state of things, absorbed as he is in his own crises.  Matt, and the comic itself, can now no longer ignore larger events, which do have an effect on Hell’s Kitchen, whether Matt realizes it or not.

While the theme is great, Diggle also writes some great dialogue this month.  The conversation between Daredevil and Izo was a particularly good.  Both men seem to be speaking in veiled threats and what seems to be the same old conversation we’ve heard a million times between the two takes on a tone of menace, where we’re forced to wonder who is trying to intimidate the other.  Is Izo getting impatient enough to threaten Matt?  Is Matt becoming inflated by his leadership of the Hand?  And which character is the initiator and which the respondent?  It’s a fascinating, multi-layered conversation that bears reading twice.

Other than that, the issue gives us everything we’ve come to expect from a good Daredevil comic.  Diggle writes the kinetic, thrilling action scenes that have been the signature of his career,  Kingpin is an absolute badass,  Becky, Foggy, and Dakota are as lovable as ever, and seeing Matt hold a pep rally for his horde of devil-horned ninjas definitely gets the blood pumping.  Meanwhile De La Torre continues to put out the best work of his career, as it’s clear that he was meant to draw this comic.  It’s shadowy, grimy, and gritty in the utmost, but with no loss of detail or clarity.  It’s quite the achievement, and he makes action and dialogue scenes equally engaging.

Daredevil #502 – Review

by Andy Diggle (writer), Roberto De La Torre (art), Matt Hollingsworth (colors), and Joe Caramagna (letters)

The Story: An out of touch Matt Murdock becomes familiar with the current Dark Reign environment.  Meanwhile, the power shifts continue in Hell’s Kitchen.

What’s Good: It seems that most Marvel comics are more focused on Osborn and his Avengers running about and appearing at inopportune moments.  While this can be fun, it glosses over the larger, overall effect of Osborn’s rise to power.  This issue of Daredevil is thus somewhat refreshing as it takes a street level look at Dark Reign, a world where the police and the entire justice system are under Osborn’s sway.  Daredevil isn’t battling the Sentry, but rather Osborn’s diseased system itself.  In many ways, this approach only makes Osborn seem all the more powerful: we never see or hear him, but we see his effects on the world and the people he has in his pockets.

This ultimately makes Matt’s use of the Hand all the more interesting.  It’s the always-fun trope of beating bad guys by becoming a bad guy.  Matt’s using the ninja deathcult to combat police officers, and this really encapsulates what Dark Reign should be about, as the positions of good and evil are reversed.  Meanwhile, behind this all, the Kingpin still lurks, plots, and consolidates.

Roberto De La Torre meanwhile continues to put out some of the best work of his career.  It’s clear that he was born to draw Daredevil and is the perfect choice for the series.  Art-wise, it’s a real challenge to think of a book currently on the racks that’s any darker, grittier, or more shadowy than this.  De La Torre’s work is in this sense really quite daring, as its far darker and grimier than you might expect from such a mainstream book.  The design for Matt’s DD-inspired ninjas is also completely awesome.

What’s Not So Good: It’s hard not to be incredibly let down, even frustrated, when Diggle completely reverses the giant twist he dropped on us last month.  It was such a daring move and to see it completely taken back only leads to a bevy of “what ifs” and a feeling that the book has somehow been dumbed down, that it’s become less brave and risqué and more typical.  It also makes me feel like a lot of page-space has been wasted these past couple of months on what is essentially a very simple, even unimaginative, trick.

Indeed, instead of the relentless forward progression that last month’s twist furthered, we end up spending a couple of pages listening to the same old conversation we’ve heard several times already: destroy the hand, or try to use it for good?  It’s as though we’ve gone back to square one, replete with psychological water-treading.  The relentless rush of story progression that the last couple months have seen for DD slows this month to your bog-standard, steady trickle.

Conclusion: It’s by no means a bad book, but it’s hard not to be aggravated by Diggle going back on what made his first issue so great.

Grade: B –

-Alex Evans

Daredevil #500 – Review

by Ed Brubaker (writer), Ann Nocenti (second feature writer), Michael Lark, Stefano Gaudiano, Klaus Janson, Chris Samnee, and Paul Azaceta (art), David Aja (second feature art), Matt Hollingsworth (colors), and Chris Eliopoulos (letters)

The Story: Battles with the Hand and bad guys aplenty sees Matt Murdock finding himself in a role in which he never imagined himself.

What’s Good: Daredevil #500 succeeds where other landmark, giant-sized issues have failed in that it actually has a thrilling, must-read main feature.

The main feature is a kinetic thriller with electrifying action scenes coming one after another at a breathless pace.  The pages fly by and it is definitely a very, very fun read.  After the blandness found in Captain America #600, I almost feel that Daredevil #500 shouldn’t be allowed to be this exciting.

That’s not to say that it’s mindless, however.  Daredevil’s fight with the Owl in particular is brutal, thanks in part to its emotional savagery and DD’s final act this is definitely not for the faint of heart.

Of course, I can’t go without commending the cliffhanger that Brubaker ends his run on.  It really is a case of leaving the reader dying to know what happens next.  It’s so unexpected, it has Matt making a complete 180. Although Brubaker could be condemned, he nevertheless manages to pull it off through making Matt’s change of heart logical; making him grow out of his self-loathing.  It’s a natural choice and Brubaker successfully injects the sense of tragedy always present in Daredevil.

Ann Nocenti’s back-up story is absolutely, pitch-perfect fantastic. Brooding, cerebral, and at times downright surreal. It’s simply amazing work.  After taking a beating from Bullseye, Daredevil finds himself recovered by a retired boxer, Larry, and a schoolgirl, Gina.  The dynamic here is fascinating and both Larry and Gina are uncomfortably interesting characters.

On the one hand, Larry and Gina reflect different aspects of superhero voyeurism.  Larry’s the backseat driver, full of criticism, while Gina is the bloodhound, in it purely for the violence.  Yet, the genius is that despite this seeming division between DD and these two viewers, in their surreal dialogue, they almost seem to be parts of himself, Gina the off-kilter Id and Larry the curmudgeonly superego.

Aja’s art meanwhile is beautifully realized and thoroughly imaginative.  There are some truly inspiring images here, from DD’s fall through a cloud of balloons, to DD preparing to leave Larry’s bar, pausing at the doorway before breaking out into a run.  It’s very dark, yet oddly beautiful, poetic even, and that’s how DD should be.

What’s Not So Good: For the main feature, with so many fight scenes, some of them were just too quick and as a result, too easy.  Essentially, one side just totally steamrolls the other in a thoroughly non-competitive two page brawl.  Lady Bullseye in particular is far too much of a pushover.

Also, though I loved it for its mood, I at times found Aja’s stylized work to be a little too barren detail-wise.

My only real complaint about Daredevil #500 however is the package itself, which is absolutely brimming with filler.  Along with these two stories, you also get a preview of Diggle’s Dark Reign: the List entry, a pin-up gallery, a reprint of Frank Miller’s Daredevil #191, and a cover gallery.  The galleries offer some cool pictures, but  I can’t think of anyone who wouldn’t prefer another story instead.

The Dark Reign: the List preview is even more offensive.  It’s pure advertisement, but it dwells right smack in the middle of the book, not at the end.  What’s worse, Dark Reign and Norman Osborn feel completely out of place in this book, as does Billy Tan’s slick, bright artwork.

Miller’s reprint is, well, a reprint.  A fantastic issue, yes, but also one that I’ve read before and have in a trade.

Conclusion: A very good main feature and an absolutely fantastic back-up in a book that would reach an A, were it not for all the damn filler.

Grade: B+

-Alex Evans