Daredevil Message Board

[Kuljit Mithra]

DAREDEVIL #10 by Soule, Garney and Milla ships August 10th, and here's a preview!



http://www.manwithoutfear.com/gallery/Daredevil-V5-010

Please use this thread for all discussion on the issue!
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Kuljit Mithra
www.manwithoutfear.com

[Dimetre]

This is Charles Soule's tenth issue -- eleventh if you count the (pretty bad) annual. I have to say, I'm feeling whatever interest I have in this book waning. If this book wasn't called Daredevil, I probably would have dropped it by now. It isn't that Soule is doing a bad job, in my opinion. It just feels like he's doing only an adequate job.

This issue sees Garney returning to the series, after strong work by Matteo Buffagni and Goran Sudzuka. Garney's work is fine here, but I felt we got a little more diversity in the books the other two artists drew. With Garney's return we get more of the monochromatic feel of the Tenfingers arc.

Maybe the monochromatic thing is contributing to my malaise, and perhaps Daredevil's black costume is contributing to that. But, for sure, I am getting bored, and I think last week's pitiful annual has something to do with that too.

Blindspot's hopping around the elevator shaft Matt calls his office is, at the very least, insensitive. Doesn't show much depth of character. However, there is a shrine down in his neighbourhood where people leave him messages? That's pretty cool. That's an interesting detail, and kind of makes you think it would look good in a Blindspot series.

This, like the Tenfingers story, feels like it's going to be a Blindspot-centred story in which Matt is only helping. While this story has a grisly beginning, I don't see, based on Soule's previous Daredevil stories, it having a strong payoff. I also don't see how Daredevil could have arrived at the estimate of 113 in the final panel.

Obviously, I'm losing hope in Soule. Perhaps my sour mood isn't helped by my recent viewing of Suicide Squad and The Killing Joke, or having just read Civil War II #3 yesterday. (Bendis doesn't just not read Totally Awesome Hulk, but also Daredevil. Matt would never be assigned to the Clint Barton case after the Tenfingers debacle.) I need Daredevil to be an interesting book again. Soule just doesn't seem inspired. It feels like he's just putting in time. Blindspot may interest him, and he should probably be allowed to try at least a Blindspot mini, but I think we need to give another writer a try. Soule's has had an adequate opportunity to show what he can do on Daredevil, but he's just not doing it for me.

Also, after the promise of #9's ending, there is still no sign of the mystery of the memory wipe being uncovered. Yes, that's annoying, but I am starting to not care anymore, and that is an even bigger problem.

[Mike Murdock]

I'm glad to see Daredevil actually do his law job. Having Sam Chung work for the District Attorney's office is a creative way to have them interact in a non-superhero setting without revealing Daredevil's identity (I'm curious how long they'll keep it up). Unfortunately, he gets sent off for superheroics while Matt minds the night shift (which is one good reason for a sidekick given the dynamic). Either way, it's good to see more lawyers. Ellen, the paralegal, is by far the most reoccuring character in the DA's office. But I do like the animosity with the no-name ADAs who were there first. Obviously, Matt's going to piss off more people this way. It's a fine dynamic, although it's a bit frustrating not having any personal life to explore.

But it's a start to what could be a promising, creepy case. If anything, I think the horror of it could be played up a bit. It should read grusome, but it comes off a bit to clinical. I feel it almost should fall on the art, hard to say. But there's more to see next issue.

I'll go Four Stars. Really hard to judge this whole thing, but it's good to see them explore the status quo a bit rather than bounce around a lot.

[Rand]

First, a couple Annual 1 questions:

(Spoilers for that issue, obviously!)

1) Why did Klaw release his sonic virus via some random piano concert? Presumably, as a super-villain, he put some thought into this latest plan of his... yet it took DD just a few seconds to think "Hey! Let's go to that place where a counter-signal can be broadcast throughout the city!" Shouldn't Klaw himself have thought to make *that* place the origin of *his* signal?

2) I hadn't realized that Echo had recently died. Does it seem to anyone else like Soule was similarly unaware of this? Editorial is forced to open the issue with a note that "mysterious circumstances" have brought about Echo's resurrection. Are we just supposed to accept that the same way we've been asked to blindly accept the "mysterious circumstances" that made Matt's DD identity secret again? Was telling this story so important that it justified resurrecting a character who only just died?

And now, some thoughts on #10:

1) If I remember correctly (from now-months-old news on this site), #10 was originally supposed to be #8. That would make a lot of sense, since this issue does a fair job of following up on the *opening* story arc while making no effort at all to follow up on the "super-important briefcase" stuff from last arc!

2) Two entire pages of this issue are, respectively: Sam simply activating his Blindspot costume to become invisible, and Sam (invisibly) opening, closing, and then re-opening a door...

3) Someone PLEASE correct me if I'm forgetting a scene or just being an idiot here, but: since when does Blindspot know that DD is blind? (DD literally says "Blindspot, tell me what I'm seeing", and Blindspot equally-literally explains that they're standing in front of a mural-sized painting seemingly executed in blood.) So... Sam knows that DD is blind... now works for Matt, who he also (obviously) knows is blind... and furthermore knows that Matt and DD share some "special relationship". Even if we're dealing with a thorough mind-wipe that happened during the past in-universe "year"... shouldn't Sam have (freshly, on his own) figured out by now that Matt is DD? Honestly, it's bothered me from early on that Matt has insisted that he "trusts" Sam, yet he's been keeping his DD identity a secret from him. (Not that I would prefer that Matt share his secret identity! I'd much rather he instead make it clear that he doesn't fully and completely trust Sam.)

The Verdict:

3 (out of 5)

PS: I met Mark Waid for the first time at Boston Comic Con this past weekend, and I scarcely had enough time to tell him how much his run blew my mind. I really wish I'd made sure to ask him what he thinks of *this* run, but maybe that would've been in poor taste? (Something to ask him next time, perhaps!)

[Dimetre]

[Mike Murdock]

She got killed in Bendis's Moon Knight if I'm not mistaken.
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Matt Murdock's cooler twin brother

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I'd give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety's sake!
Thomas More - A Man for All Seasons

[Dimetre]

Mike Murdock is correct. According to Echo's Wikipedia page, she was killed by Count Nefaria in Moon Knight's series. Would that have followed Secret Wars?

[Mike Murdock]

No. Before Secret Wars, which means before the eight month gap before Secret Wars and before the eight month gap that followed it. So there are 16 unaccounted for months she could have been resurrected, even assuming the actual resolution in Secret Wars 9 didn't fix the problem.
_________________
Matt Murdock's cooler twin brother

Not sure what to read next? Check out the Book Club for some ideas!

I'd give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety's sake!
Thomas More - A Man for All Seasons

[jriddle]

[jriddle]

[Daredevil24]

Is it me or does Soule seem more interested in Blindspot than Matt Matt Murdock? Murdock can't stop singing his praises. The partnership in last issue also started to feel like Batman and Robin to me.

[Mike Murdock]

I think that's badly overstated. Obviously, he's more significant than previous issues (not featuring Black Widow), but Daredevil rarely has a sidekick so that makes sense. Blindspot wasn't in many issues so far and wasn't really in the majority of this issue (which focused on Matt Murdock in court).
_________________
Matt Murdock's cooler twin brother

Not sure what to read next? Check out the Book Club for some ideas!

I'd give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety's sake!
Thomas More - A Man for All Seasons

[Daredevil24]

Badly overstated? Really dude? Most of the issues he was a part of he's very much at the center of the plot and involved. Besides, this was only mp personal feeling .I ways always good with Daredevil never having a sidekick. I stillp prefer him to fly solo but that's just my taste. I never looked at Natasha like a sidekick. I was onlys seeing if others felt like I was feeling .

[Dimetre]

I kind of feel that Soule feels more attachment to Blindspot than Daredevil. Tenfingers had a more personal connection to Blindspot than Matt. When it came down to it, that first story was Daredevil helping Blindspot take down the cult, not the other way around.

There have been a couple of flubs over Matt's senses: the time when Matt heard someone's heartrate as "cool as a cuke" when, after the door opened, they were clearly in distress. There was the annual where Echo had Daredevil listen to music over headphones while he navigated the city, and we all know that would debilitate him. Those are mistakes that a long time reader would never make, but a newcomer might.

This issue has me suspecting that this new story will be another Matt helping Blindspot case, meaning Blindspot will be front and centre. Blindspot is not a bad character, and Soule has written some good Matt moments. I loved the poker issue. I loved it when Steve Rogers sent him to defuse a bomb. Soule isn't a bad Daredevil writer, but it's becoming clear to me that Blindspot fires him up in a way Matt doesn't. Soule seems to know who Blindspot is, where he lives, who is in his world, what he eats for breakfast -- everything. That little detail in this issue about the shrine is pretty cool. Soule should be given the chance to write a Blindspot mini, because he clearly wants to, and it would probably be his best work. Writers should write the characters they care for the most.

[Mike Murdock]

I thought the first story arc was intended as an intro to Blindspot (I think it was a mistake to do it since there were so many other elements that needed to be addressed), but I don't think the rest of the run reflects that.

I also don't think the heartrate being calm was a fluke so much as the effect Tenfinger's cult had on people.
_________________
Matt Murdock's cooler twin brother

Not sure what to read next? Check out the Book Club for some ideas!

I'd give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety's sake!
Thomas More - A Man for All Seasons