Daredevil Message Board

[Blind Alley]

In showdowns 5, #185 has guttered his opponents whereas showdown 6 has ended with a tie between #225 and #291.

Let's see which contenders will join them for Round 2 !

ROUND 1
Showdown 1 : #169 "Devils" (8 votes) vs #245 "Burn !" (3 votes)
Showdown 2 : #191 "Roulette" (11) vs #247 "The Backwards Man" (1)
Showdown 3 : #192 "Promises" (4) vs #266 "A Beer With The Devil"(5) vs V2 #88 "The Secret Life of Foggy Nelson" (1)
Showdown 4 : #219 "Badlands" (3) vs #268 "Golden Rut" (7) vs V2 #94 "Our Love Story" (0)
Showdown 5 : #185 "Guts" (7) vs #223 "The Price" (1) vs #277 "Of Crowns and Horns" (1)
Showdown 6 : #225 ". . . And Then You Die" (4) vs #291 "All The News That Fits"(4)
Showdown 7 : #208 "The Deadliest Night of My Life" vs #236 "American Dreamer" vs #304 "34 Hours"
Showdown 8 : #220 "Fog" vs #238 "It Comes With The Claws" vs #380 "Just One Good Story"
ROUND 2
Showdown 9 : #169 "Devils" vs #185 "Guts"
Showdown 10 : #191 "Roulette" vs #225 ". . . And Then You Die" vs #291 "All The News That Fits"
Showdown 11 : #266 "A Beer With The Devil" vs Winner of 7
Showdown 12 : #268 "Golden Rut" vs Winner of 8
ROUND 3
Showdown 13 : Winner of 9 vs Winner of 11
Showdown 14 : Winner of 10 vs Winner of 12
FINAL :
Showdown 15 : Winner of 13 vs Winner of 14

Showdown 8 offers a wide range of DD goodness.
- V1 #220, by O'Neil and Mazz, narrates the final fate of Heather Glenn.
- V1 #238, by Nocenti and Sal Buscema, is a tie-in to "Mutant Massacre" with DD facing Sabretooth.
- V1 #380, by Chichester and Lee Weeks, is the last issue of V1 and has the simple ambition to tell "Just One Good Story".

By now you're supposed to know the instructions: try to re-read the issues before voting, tell us what you liked (or disliked), which details you remembered, what makes the story special to you... anything you want that relates to the issue !
Express yourself !

This poll will be running for four days.
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[Blind Alley]

I'm hesitating between #220 and #380.

Fog as amazing Mazz art and a tragic story.

#380 has many touches I like, lots of them typical of Chichester :
- a confident Daredevil (not a victim)
- scenes with New-Yorkers
- good depiction of DD's senses
- Matt in the courtroom
Unfortunately, the storytelling is a bit confusing and the art is not as good as in #220.

If I had to choose between these two issues to give a sample of DD comics for a newcomer to the series, I don't know how he would react.
#220 : "Hey, that's great art ! Hmm, that Murdock guy, he let his ex-GF die ? What an ### !"
#380 : "So, this guy is a lawyer and a vigilante ? Cool... But who is this guy with a target on his head ? And the ninja ? What the #### is this armor ?"

Right now, I can't decide...
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[jumonji]

I went for Fog (#220) for this one. #238 is good and #380 is excellent (and suprisingly relevant in this day and age), but #220 delivers more of an emotional impact. Once again, Daredevil touches on very serious subject matters that are relevant to real life and it's interesting to see what the events of this issue do to Matt. He didn't take Heather's cries for help seriously enough and has to live with the consequences. All around good story.

Now if only Francesco would come along to write one of those excellent reviews he did for the last round. My own fingers are still suffering from acute typing fatigue.
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The Other Murdock Papers

[Gloria]

OK, I went for Fog" too.

Reason 1: the previously stated interest in vindicating O'Neil as a relevant DD auteur.

Reason 2: Heather Glenn. As a Murdock Girlfriend, she was, I believe, the first to cope with both sides of the man (it must be remembered that Karen had broken with Matt for his dual nature)... Even if that had taken its toll in her life: his father suicided in jail, where he went after being manipulated by the Purple man. Mr. Glenn was essentially a decent man who unfairly suffered shame and death, indirectly due to DD's involvement. Yet Heather was able to overcome that, and in the end, she knew that Matt, for all his troubles, was a better man than all the Ricos of the high society she would ever meet. She was spunky and would fight back Dr. Octopus himself on occasion. Also, she had a positive, fun-loving attitude to life.

And then came Elektra. And Heather's life was doomed.

Elektra's apperance screwed Matt's life, and definitely turned our hero into the angst/guilt ridden guy we know today.
Elektra's was the first Murdock girlfriend to die. So far, the worse to happen to Matt was a break-up (with Karen, with Natasha), but Elektra started the sad body count Matt's love life has become ever since.

Sometimes I think that Heather and Matt's relationship being broken had not necessarily have to lead to her going all the way down. Surely Natasha and Foggy would have refrained in their small conspiration to split the pair had they known about the consequences... O'Neil decided to worsen Heather's drinking problem (which was started by Miller), and make her unable to recover from her breaking with Matt. I still have some trouble with this, I mean...she recovered from her father's death quite well. Maybe I would have liked her to go on with her life... even if that meant her getting married to a Rico type...

... I don't know, I really think "Fog" is a fine story, it's only that I feel that heather deserved better, and this story, good as it is, it followed the sad pattern of dead girlfriends in Murdock's life started by Elektra. The fact that Heather and Glorianna (who, alas, was killed in a bad story) doesn't seem to count much to any subsequent Dd writers makes me sad.

"Fog" has so many interesting moments: Is Matt only able to deal with a relationship when it is on the sunny side? His blunt manner to end a phone conversation, plus his denial to answer Heather's calls, surely play a role in her untimely death. In that sense, Foggy is here the more attentive guy: he goes to Heather's place at her first call, only to find he's too late (and possibly he carries his own burden of guilt, too).

Weather, of course, plays a metaphorical role, as fog seems to dampen and blind things around. No sunny prospects in this story. Matt trying to deceice himself thinking that Heather was the victim of murder, when in fact, the criminal was only opportunistic about her suicide.

Matt opening the window to let the fog in... "seems the right thing to do".

O yes, I like this issue: sad but good.

[Francesco]

[train]

all a very good stories. i had to go with 380. the non-linear story-telling is a nice touch. from an artwork standpoint, Mazz and Weeks are 2 of the best DD artists out there (no offense, Lark) but i had to choose Weeks here. part of my decision may be biased towards 380 as it is the last issue of volume 1.

my 2 cents

[Darediva]

A tossup between "Fog" and "Just One Good Story". "It Comes with the Claws" is just not a good story at all to me. Guess I'm not much for these sewer dweller stories.
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Alice




Those who throw dirt merely lose ground.