Comics / Comic Reviews / Marvel Comics

Daredevil #1 Review

By Dan Horn
July 20, 2011 - 14:53

I don't think I've ever been this excited about a Daredevil book. Considering all the critical backlash aimed toward the recent Shadowland dud, I wasn't really expecting to like this one either. I was a bit skeptical, but still curious. I was first relieved when this title was announced as being helmed by Mark Waid and Paola Rivera instead of the obvious choice of Bendis and Maleev, who are off mucking up Moon Knight as I write this. To me "Bendis" spells "disappointment." He's one of those guys that came up and became a superstar while our confidence in mainstream comic books as more than kid stuff was pretty low, and he hasn't really been able to sustain that image as the medium catches up and leaves him in the dust. Mark Waid, however, was perfectly capable of handling a new Daredevil series, in my mind, and Rivera's artwork only sweetened the pot.

Still, I went into this bracing myself. A new series can go any number of ways, so it's always good to pad your expectations a bit, at least for the first issue or two, assuming you're that patient and have the money to throw away on comics that may never recover from poor starts. So, the cover: gorgeous and symbolic of the eponymous hero's "blindness." Ok, so far we were off to a good start. On to the first page...

The opening sequence, by Fred Van Lente, Marcos Martin, and Nate Piekos, is instantly eye-catching, a sort of introduction to new readers and a refresher for the old, an invocation of Frank Miller's panel work on books like The Dark Knight Returns.

The next flip of a page transitions us into Rivera's beautiful interiors. Paolo really knows how to direct your attention to certain things, siphoning his grandiose scope down to a pinpoint at times, wonderfully aided by Rodriguez's color saturation and contrast and Jose Rivera's precise inking. The opening sequence, in which Daredevil crashes a mob wedding to prevent a kidnapping perpetrated by that long-lost B-villian, the Spot, introduces Daredevil's radar sense in a bold and interesting way. I felt I was looking at an artistic team that could go toe-to-toe with Francesco Francavilla on his best day, assuming artists have You've Been Served-esque face-offs to prove their superiority, of course.

We quickly learn that Matt Murdoch, Daredevil's alter ego, has returned to NYC after a soul-seeking journey that saw him disappear for some time, leaving Hell's Kitchen in the hands of Black Panther. The fallout from his outing as Daredevil is ever-present, even after his previous exoneration, and it's having a lasting, negative effect on his career in law. When he finds that one of his clients may be in more trouble than it at first seemed, Matt sets out to tackle the problem head-on as Daredevil, but someone is waiting for him, ***SPOILER*** someone with a movie premiering this week! God, I loved that classic Daredevil-Captain America bout.

Waid's narrative is crisp, clean, descriptive, and at times lyrically alluring. It's like a script for the best super-hero film you could hope for; textured, character-driven, and fraught with action and suspense. Even the "bonus tale" was a heartfelt character study, which tied together the loose ends of Matt's departure and return while exploring his powers, motivation, and past. And I'm not one for stories that are overly sycophantic toward NYC (we get it: you love the city you grew up in), but I found this vignette tolerable, maybe even charming.

Daredevil #1 isn't just a solid start for the hero's new series; it's a powerful portent of greatness to come. Really fantastic, sincere stuff. All comics should be this good.

Rating: 10 /10

Last Updated: August 31, 2023 - 08:12