Writer- Charles Soule

Artist- Ron Garney

 

Confession time. Daredevil is my favorite Marvel hero. Street level, barely superpowered, fights for the common man in both his civilian guise as well as in costume. Matt Murdock is one of the more interesting characters in the Marvel U, as the duality between his day job as a defense attorney and his nighttime vigilante antics help define his persona. In my opinion, there has not been a consistently better written Marvel book than Daredevil in the last fifteen years. From the dark and gritty era of Brian Michael Bendis through the recently finished and decidedly lighter hearted Mark Waid run, quality storytelling has been of paramount importance, pretty much all killer, no filler. Whenever one volume of this series ends, I get a bit nervous as to who is going to take over. The lowest grade I’d give any recent DD scribe would be Andy Diggle’s short run, and even that was still good stuff, just overtaken a bit by Marvel editorial’s directive to get the Shadowlands story moving.

So when I read Charles Soule would be taking over with a new post Secret Wars #1, I was relieved. Soule, a lawyer himself, wrote a definitive run on Swamp Thing recently amongst other fan favorite titles for Marvel. After reading his first issue of Daredevil my excitement remains high for the continued excellence of this series. As we pick up, Matt is now back in New York City, after his extended stay in San Francisco. The book starts with DD saving a potential gang informant, while he and his new sidekick Blindspot fight off the army of local gangster Tenfingers. Blindspot is training under DD, and utilizes a cloaking device to remain invisible during battle. Matt is now on the other side of the ball in his profession, working for the District Attorney instead of as a defense lawyer. DD’s informant not surprisingly ends up working with Matt to start a case against Tenfingers. As the book ends we are treated to a tease that questions one characters true allegiance.

Soule gives us a tightly scripted issue, and does a good job layering in the new elements of DD lore, such as the secret that Matt and Foggy share as well as shoehorning Blindspot’s intro in and not making it feel forced. Ron Garney kicks the doors in on this book, which is not just artistically rendered beautifully, but a lesson in visual storytelling. The underwater scene in the beginning is as good a sequence as anything I have seen in quite a while. The layout of the panels as Matt struggles to echo locate his prey is as chaotic as the environment our hero finds himself in. Colorist Matt Milla delivers one of the most memorable jobs from anyone I have seen in a long time. Muddled, dark and seemingly absent of color at times, the book almost feels like a reflection of our blind heroes lack of sight…except those reds. Milla makes sure every chance he gets to make something red pop, it pops.

Everything I look for in a first issue of a long running franchise was represented here. Status quo, new elements, new characters and a solid creative team. Soule has my attention story wise, and I cannot wait to see more of Garney and Milla on art chores. If you are not sure what Marvel books to pick up post Secret Wars, take my advice and give this newest iteration of Daredevil a shot, it’s looking to shape up to be the next volume of excellence in the DD saga.

 

5 Underwater Volkswagons of 5