Daredevil Message Board

[DesignDevil]

Dear lord what a pointless series.
Art that reminds me of the 90s.
An absurdly told story that I can't believe Andy Diggle actually wrote. Non-existent characterizations half the time.
The other half people were so out of character it was embarrassing.

"Hey guys we have to kill our friend Matt who's obvioulsy possessed."
"Look Kingpin is taking over the Hand's giant fortress in the middle of NY. Who wants to go get some lunch?"

Daredevil 512 was better written (as were the other DD Shadowland issues) but at the end of the day, just as pointless and absurd. Shadowland my be a financial success in the short term, but it is a massive failure on every other level.

By far the worst Daredevil story since the pre-Joe Kelly 90s. Even some of the other lesser stories since then have at least seemed like the creators were trying. Shadowland comes across like it was written by a Marvel editor while he was on the toilet one day, which is where this story belongs.

To sum up, I did not enjoy Shadowland at all.

[The Mast]

It could've been amazing. The first issue was excellent.

Then it just became a dire, pathetically poor mish-mash of mismanagement and spoiling solicits that fell out of step with EVERYTHING Daredevil's series and character had established itself as being.

Not much more you can say.

[qtmxd]

Echoing every previous statement about what a travesty this was.
Bendis's run was one of comic's greatest series, and Brubaker's a solid follow-up. (I also disagree , btw, with the dumping on Chichester - I liked him). While I absolve Diggle of nothing for his truly awful writing (there is no Murdock, there is only the Beast!) may be the worst line in 45 years), I 'm still wondering whether the whole ridiculous possessed by a demon thing came from him or the editors (side note - remember Decalogue for a an excellent and horrific demonic possession story). Brubaker appeared to be setting up a genuine Matt leading the Hand story line, with its attendant moral ambiguities, and Diggle initially appeared to be continuing it. But then Marvel doesn't do that anymore... ambiguity's for grownups.
For many years, DD was one title where Marvel would settle for middling sales and go for the Eisner awards. What's maddening is that they would take this title to trash when they already have so much junk to play with.

[Gee]

I actually thought that there were a couple of things in Shadowland which were not terrible, keeping DD killing Bullseye was good, if he had not then the whole thing was a waste of time, we could have totally dismissed it as possession, now we get some Matt guilt and maybe some character growth?

Someone said he should have resolved his parent issues? Sorry to tell you dude, he has not and will not, none of us ever do, ask any middle child.

The last scene was good, actually felt like I was reading DD comic for the first time in an age, his senses were describing the scene (DD has supersenses? No way!) and we had a normal guy beating himself up about something a normal guy may well have done (his NOT killing Bullseye was starting to get silly, let us be honest).

Overall tho the series was a mess and very lazy, even the demons name was rubbish and just way too easy.
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when walking just walk, when sitting just sit, above all don't wobble.

[Taskmaster]

I liked it.

Failure? Oh yeah. Narratively, it was a disaster. Shadowland #1-5 were a piece of crap if i ever saw one. A big, hollow sales event with sometimes 4 words to a page. Waste. Almost purposely for people who like lame superhero cartoonishness. BUT as far as the big picture, I get it, loved it, and I'll explain it in a minute. It was all a means to an end. Cheer up, folks, they took risks like we want them to and it wasn't the most successful but.. it was a pretty brief Hal Jordan job, and Matt's alive, and it's not like they rewrote the Marvel Universe, k. And I've stuck through some truly bad periods. This was pretty awesome compared to the story Snakeroot came from. Check that out why don'tcha. (Fall From Grace...good lord..Tree of Knowledge..*eugh*... Jack Batlin..armor..horrible art.. oh wait k back to status quo...wait this is boring...so borrring. --> that's 1993-1998 in a nutshell.)


The DD book was beautiful throughout. Great final issue, except that without Shadowland 5, it doesn't flow on its own. The rest all worked as a good TPB of its own. It was human. Like the tv show Heroes which was amazing but only in Season 1 when it was about extraordinary things happening to real people like us (people discovering powers, not about the powers themselves, cause that's empty and boring just like Shadowland 1-5). Once we calm down and forget about how the hype betrayed us, I think if you read straight through 508-512 you'll see it in a new light, I promise.

But there's much more.

Here's why people didn't like the whole event: Matt wasn't in it. That is the whole point. Matt's not here, man. We're supposed to not understand anymore. He is the villain of his own book. The blacksuit DD was more demon than man. . . but even two years ago during the end of Brubaker he was distant! It felt like he was just one of the characters. Remember how he was fallible even for Matt....hardheaded and numb to us even then. I've found it fascinating all along but I guess some people dropped it at that time, fair enough, but see . . it all made sense and what Diggle has done is fix it - put us back inside "Matt".

The epilogue should've hit you on the head so clear -- inner monologue again, the specific kind that's been absent for YEARS. It seems he's back to who we want him to be.

He'll always be unstable, that's why he's interesting, that's why we're on this site. I like that he blames himself for the killing of Bullseye. Which...who really knows. Catholic guilt. Matt's never been the most reliable narrator anyway. Who really knows. To put it mildly, when we're pushed, people make mistakes. Stress. Temporary insanity. He had been pushed too far for too long not to go crazy. [And I'm on the side that says it's not that crazy.] When you're unstable it may not even take much. But it certainly affects the character and that's cool. I've seen the "I won't kill you, Bullseye" issue many many times. Give Diggle at least that much credit. Matt has killed before and has been on the brink of murder as many times as he's gone insane (lots, last time in prison), I'd say it was inevitable. I'm glad Matt will go on with this regret. And on paper, I'll take the recovering, regret-ridden Matt over Bullseye being alive & overused all over Marvel. If there's even anyone that would disagree with that.... as pleasantly surprised as I was that Bullseye wasn't immediately resurrected, who thinks Bullseye's permanently dead? If only. It better be a long damn time anyway..

In conclusion: thank god Shadowland is over, it was all over the place, but there was a lot to love about the whole Hand saga with the Daredevil ninjas and sewer prisons early on, remember? Yeah you do. And the DD issues of Shadowland (especially the awe-inspiring art) were great as ever if you ask me.

*spoilers for DD 512 ahead*

And more than a satisfying end. I love that he's alive and walking the Earth like Caine on Kung Fu It's been done (over 20 years ago) but that was one of the coolest eras which I badly wanted to see again and it is the most logical conclusion that could've happened. So that's a dream for me if that's the case - the awesome old Ann Nocenti forlorn mystery man Bill Bixby Kwai-Chang Caine

We need to find Matt again - he does too. We're "him" again reading this book. The slate's wiped and I hope it'll last! Bring on Reborn!!