Daredevil Message Board

[Mike Murdock]

After several delays, the Black Widow movie is finally coming out - next month. So, to build up to that, I wanted to do the story that led to Daredevil and Black Widow together. It's actually a sprawling story featuring about the mysterious Mr. Kline. Written by Gerry Conway, penciled by Gene Colan.

Daredevil Vol. 1 #78 - The Horns of the Bull

[Mike Murdock]

The opening scene bothers me. Not because of the ongoing melodrama of Matt Murdock and Karen Page - that has continued even after Karen left him to go to Hollywood. No, it bothers me because Matt is blind and I'm not sure how he knew that Karen's movie was playing at that theater or that there was a picture of her on the wall. Just having Matt touch the picture doesn't retroactively push his blindness front and center. At least so far, Karen's movie career is doing good enough to get her billing on the marquee itself, which seems pretty impressive. At least, I don't think this is an adult film...

We cut to two random people being harassed by people working for someone named Mr. Kline. I have to say the dialogue here is impressively terrible. It's awkward and stilted and doesn't sound like anything real people would say. Some of Matt Murdock's dialogue previously about him being a cool cat was equally painful, but I at least felt I could chalk that up to the era this was written, but this scripting isn't good.

There's an extended fight scene that Gene Colan does a decent job of, but the issue keeps jumping around really quickly. We get a very quick flash of Karen before cutting back to the Bull. Nothing really seems to get time to breathe properly. Probably the most interesting part to me is Foggy getting blackmailed. That's a pretty dramatic event for the character who is generally portrayed up to this point as a likeable goof. Unfortunately, it's just a tease.

Three Stars. I think there's some interesting potential here, but there's too much stuff going on and not enough of it works.
_________________
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

[Dimetre]

Gene Colan does some excellent artwork in this issue. Go to page 15 and check out the panel showing the perspective of the one who becomes Man-Bull as he gets injected with a crazy substance. It's so trippy, and nobody would normally associate such imagery with Colan. More conventional is the gorgeous panel of of Daredevil's dark silhouette swinging down to street level against a blinding sunset.

Unfortunately I don't count Gerry Conway as one of Daredevil's best writers. Basically there's a gang of goons roughing up a sweet yet poor couple, trying to kidnap them for some medical experiments run by someone named Mr. Kline. Conway gives us a good amount of pages getting to know the couple and the thugs, but now that I look over the entire issue, I think we could have cut back on those pages and brought Daredevil in earlier to intervene. We get another couple of pages of Daredevil freeing the couple and beating up the thugs, as if there were any doubt.

Then, after Daredevil swings around the skyline for a spell, he hears the thugs' jeep and causes it to overturn. That seems out of character. The thugs hadn't done anything illegal yet. I think he would track them and find out more about their operation. Here, he attacks them and gets jabbed with a needle for his troubles. He's not too smart in this issue.

Conway lays Matt's pining for Karen very thick, a little too thick for my tastes. Karen calls Matt's place, but he was nice enough to put up George and Dia at his place, and Dia answers Matt's phone. Karen hears her voice and of course thinks the worst. It's a misunderstanding worthy of Three's Company.

This issue is all set up, with the Man-Bull showing up in the final panel as Matt wakes up. I just think we could have moved the story along faster. We could have had the Man-Bull fight Matt for a few pages, and had a cliffhanger with Matt in danger. I think that would have been better.

At best, Conway's story is average, but Colan lifts the proceedings high with his excellence. I'll give this a three out of five.

[Mike Murdock]

Daredevil Vol. 1 #79 - Murder! Cries the Man-Bull

[Dimetre]

The credits are weird this issue. Gerry Conway, who was credited as "writer" last issue, is simply down for "plotting" this issue. Instead Gary Friedrich is credited as writer. So, if we assume the Marvel Method was still being employed in 1971, I guess Conway gave artist Gene Colan a rough outline, and Colan drew the issue from there, but Conway was otherwise occupied or away on vacation, so Friedrich supplied the dialogue and captions. It's an odd situation, and I don't know how well this worked.

My problem this issue is the flow of action from panel to panel. First of all, we're never told by Friedrich where the first scene is set. I turned back to the last issue, and we were never told by Conway where Daredevil woke up. It seems to be this weird lab with wooden pillars and ceiling beams. Colan has followed two close-up panels of the Man-Bull and Daredevil respectively with a close up of the billy-club cable fastening to a ceiling beam. It's confusing, because it's hard to keep track of where beams are, and where wooden crates for Man-Bull to smash are. A gurney appears on page four after vanishing for three pages. Colan shows Daredevil being knocked out of a window, but he doesn't show us the impact. He ought to know better than that. It's a curious omission.

I can't help but roll my eyes about how pathetic Karen was in these early Daredevil comics. She actually flew across the country because a woman answered Matt's phone. I've typed it before: Karen was unbearable until Ann Nocenti gave her some strength. To be fair, Conway does address the way the woman are written in his forward to Daredevil: Marvel Masterworks Volume 8 (from which I'm reading).

[Mike Murdock]

[Mike Murdock]

Daredevil Vol. 1 #80 - In the Eyes...Of the Owl

[Dimetre]

Matt's contentment off the top of the issue was a refreshing change of pace from what has come before, and Gene Colan supplies some gorgeous panels to accompany it. I like how mysterious Mr. Kline has remained three issues in. We know precious little about him, and what he's trying to pull. Once Daredevil catches up to the Owl in the helicopter, the sense of danger is thrilling. Those are the positives.

On the minus side, I can't stand Karen in this issue. She comes off as highly selfish. She's watching Daredevil stop criminals, but all she can consider is how him wearing the costume is hurting her. I consider it a failure of the character to not be able to find any value in what Matt does.

I also think Conway, or any writer assigned to Daredevil, should know better than to type the following:

[Mike Murdock]

I actually really enjoy the opening of this issue. It felt set up to be another mope-fest where the Matthew Murdock pity party is at full steam. Instead, he decides he is free and should just enjoy life and promptly does that. Then we're treated to some nice panels of Daredevil swinging around the city. It's a refreshing change of pace.

I remember the broad contours of the Mr. Kline story. That being said, in this story he talks about being in service to the Master. I'll have to see if this makes sense and I'm forgetting something. However, here his job is to be a jerk to the Owl so the Owl will think he's a free agent who will rebel against him all while fighting Daredevil. In the immediate sense, his plan is to send his goons to gas the public and knock them unconscious. I love that they all have owl masks. I don't remember seeing that before or again.

The enthusiasm and excitement earlier turns into a glee for fighting. The narration suggests that Matt truly isn't over Karen and all this was just a coverup. At the same time, we see Karen out on the west coast struggling to be over Matt. By having everything covered through news footage, there's a wonderful narrative distance where we can get a sense of what he's doing without truly understanding it. He just comes off as obsessed and driven. Also, by having Karen watch, we can see her reactions to everything. It all leads to a very dramatic cliffhanger that, imo, works very well. Conway does a good job of capturing the fear and emotion of that moment.

I think this is actually a very good issue, which surprised me considering how week this story has been so far. I'm going Four and a Half Stars. It's overwritten with narration and the melodrama can obviously be tiring, but I think it serves this issue really well and the cliffhanger is really good.
_________________
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

[Mike Murdock]

Just in time (finally) for the Black Widow movie coming out this upcoming weekend, the introduction of Black Widow!

Daredevil Vol. 1 #81 - And Death is a Woman Called Widow

[Mike Murdock]

I love the way the pacing of this issue starts. Everything just slows down and drags out to show Matt drowning. We can Gene Colan's large panels so it's spread over many pages. We get Gerry Conway's purple prose so it takes longer to read each panel. And we get cut away to Karen Page's drama to spread it out even further. It really creates the sense that Matt has been underwater a long time. It's four pages until there's a glimmer of hope and seven pages before he's rescued. All in basically ten seconds. It's something that pretty much could only work in this format.

Commenting on the various plots:
It's interesting that Mr. Kline was the one responsible for Matt and Natasha getting together and even explicitly says that he is hoping they have a romantic relationship. I don't think it's ever commented on again that the whole thing was precipitated by a villain's scheme. It's also interesting that he's a robot but I'm not sure if it's interesting in a good way. I've always thought it to be silly.

Karen is deciding to hook up with her agent. Obviously, if we set up Daredevil and Black Widow, Karen Page needs an exit. It's nothing too exciting here, but I will point out that Colan draws one of my favorite versions of the character. Foggy's blackmail plot is once again addressed just for a second to remind people it exists.

The last plot is the Owl. We see him break from Mr. Kline and go off on his own. It's not all that important what he does. The important thing is Black Widow jumps in to save the say and Daredevil meets her again. I think a modern comic might have saved that for the next issue, but having them run into each other twice really emphasizes the point that they'll end up together. Overall, it's a fairly well-done crossover that gives the sense of something bigger to come.

Four and a Half Stars. I think it drags a bit in the middle, but I love the opening of this issue and I think this is a very well-done story.
_________________
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

[Dimetre]

I also liked that Kline was the one who got Black Widow on the scene just in time to rescue Daredevil. It seemed like a contrivance at first until he revealed his machinations.

As well, I also enjoy the way Gene Colan draws Karen, but I can't stand her in this story. She's shown fainting over Daredevil's apparent demise, and when she regains consciousness she comes on to her agent. I'll just repeat that I don't think she showed any strength as a character until Ann Nocenti took over as writer on the series.

I don't understand the rationale of revealing Kline to be an android, and then rebranding him as the Assassin this deep into the story.

Gerry Conway shows obvious affection and respect for Black Widow. He and Colan show her to be a capable fighter. Here's what Conway wrote about her in 2013, in the forward to Daredevil: Marvel Masterworks Volume 8.

[Mike Murdock]

Have to say, the description of this issue is weird.

Daredevil Vol. 1 #82 - Now Send ... The Scorpion

[Dimetre]

So this is the issue of Daredevil that was on the stands the month I was born. So that's cool.

As great as Gene Colan's art often is, there are times in this issue where his panels are too cluttered and busy to make out what's happening. For example, Matt engineers a new billy club, but the angles and close-ups used for its demonstration make it very unclear what it does and how it works in a way its predecessor didn't. Another instance comes on the last page where it looks like Daredevil has kicked Scorpion in the chest, but the dialogue says, "That uprooted plank should take care of Smiley, here..."

Then there's the very odd mistake of a word balloon on page 14 obviously belonging to Matt but sloppily attributed to Scorpion. I don't know if that's the fault of letterer Jon Costa, or something Stan Lee should have caught, but he's Editor-in-Absentia this month, so that could be the reason why this mistake didn't get fixed.

I'm wondering why Kline is so fixated on Daredevil. Does it all come down to the fact that DD rescued that hippy couple back in #78? Had Ant-Man rescued the hippy couple, would Kline be an Ant-Man villain?

The World Trade Center is the setting for this issue's climactic battle, and Daredevil cracks wise about Scorpion making "like a modern-day King Kong!" That wisecrack comes a full five years before the 1976 remake of King Kong hit the cinemas. Did producer Dino De Laurentiis read this issue and get an idea?

I think this issue is pretty good. As I typed above, Colan's art can get a little busy and confusing, and Gerry Conway has a tendency towards exhaustively flowery language, but the story here is solid. Kline is a master manipulator who can take away people's ability to think for themselves. I wish Black Widow didn't fall so easily to the Scorpion at the top of the issue, but she does help Daredevil in the end. This issue is a nice comeback for Daredevil, who was very ineffective in the previous month's installment.

The anonymous old man who pops up to witness the apparent murder of the Scorpion on the last page is a bit of a contrivance. Did people just pop up on the rooftop of the World Trade Center to catch some fresh air often? Perhaps if they had set that character in place earlier in the issue that would have helped. We could have had that instead of the Karen Page scene that just recycled the romance with her agent from the previous month. Honestly, Karen scenes are something I can do without.

I give this issue a 3.5 out of 5.

[Mike Murdock]

There isn't a lot I have to say about this issue. The fact that the villains know Daredevil's secret identity is probably the most interesting part. Most of the issue is taken up by the fight with Scorpion.

The side plot with Foggy has finally progressed a bit. Seeing him fail to kill Mr. Kline was a pretty shocking moment. He's definitely hit a low point.

The ending is the Black Widow killing Scorpion. I know what the reveal will be (and it's hinted at in this issue), but I wonder if this is the first time Natasha has "killed" anyone (later, she seems much more willing to kill as a default, but they had to play this one up as an accident).

Three and a Half Stars.
_________________
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