Daredevil Message Board

[Blind Alley]

This question is somehow linked to another thread's discussion where we were asked whether or not DD kills.
In DD:Ninja, Bendis writes a speech of Stick where he tells Matt's got to be a Samurai (Honor and that kind of stuff) and not a Ninja (whose methods are "Whatever it takes to get the job done").

And recently, in DD:Father, Quesada gave a sort of Samurai costume to DD to fight the Santerians...

But in his run, Bendis insists several times on the "Ninja" side of DD (sneaking, disappearing...)
And Stick is a member of the Cast that are, basically, "Good Ninjas".

Your thoughts ?
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[rgj]

Bendis is the one that goes nuts calling DD a "ninja." Truth is Matt has all forms of fighting training.

Personally, I don't like either term. I think of DD as more of a boxer .

rgj

[james castle]

Really? I've always though of him as a "scrapper".
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[Gee]

hello, i think its fairly obvious that dd is a bit of both, that said however i have a few thoughts on why he is a ninja -
i) to be a samurai you need a master to serve (dead masters don't count, a masterless samurai is called a ronin, don't start me on the nonsense 'ronin' issue! f*ckin bendis!),
dd serves no master, stick was a teacher not a master by the way.
ii) dd sneaks, hides and attacks from cover a samurai would not do this, they value honour too much.
iii) if the dd costume was black it would be a ninja suit.
iv) as someone else said stick was a ninja and trained dd to be one.
v) electra in a book of her own series (last volume not the current one) told dd that he 'would not understand, its a samuria thing', when discussing death.

any thoughts?
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[daredevil99x]

I always thought of samurai as more honorable and ninja's as sneaky, so I went with the former.
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[Teklock]

He has ninja training, not that of a Samurai.

While his moral code and ethics would be more toward Samurai, his training and skills is suited toward the ninja. It's just as simple as that. But really, he only uses those skills in the way that he conceals himself and things of that matter. And yes, I agree that his costume is basicly that of a ninja's, except red and with horns added.

However, his fighting style doesn't really reflect either. He's a scapper, using techinques from not only several different sorts of martial arts, but also American Boxing.

That's something I've always thought was cool about him. He uses an algamation of several different art-styles to create something totally unqiue to himself. So, he's not nessacarily ninja, or Samurai, or even some other form of martial-artist or a boxer. He's all of the above.

[Forrest]

Matt is a boxer.

I've always thought of ninjas as ruthless assassins (i.e. Elektra) and samurais as noble knights. In that regard, DD is most certainly a samurai. Despite all of Bendis's rants, DD more resembles Captain America than he does Elektra, Wolverine, etc.

[Teklock]

He's not even -really- a boxer, though. Like I said before, he doesn't just use boxing, he uses a combination of that and various other martial-art and fighting styles that he's picked up along the way.

And in the strictest sense of just training and only looking at the two options given to us, and not looking at his personality or moral ethics, then it has to be ninja. He's had no formal training in the ways of a samurai. However, he does in the art of ninjitsu. Stick was a ninja and did pass on the knowledge and skills of one to Matt.

Again, though, I believe he only uses the stealth and art of concealment from his ninja training, not in his fighting style.

Truthfully, I don't think it's possible to acturately label his fighting style.