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Game over, Hello and welcome to this episode of Superhero Ethics Today, myself Matthew is joined by Jessica, our comic book expert extraordinaire, to give you a primer as we get ready for Daredevil Born Again. This will hopefully be going out right before the new season of Daredevil's coming out. You know, we know that this is going to be a new continuity, but is definitely going to be sort
of very connected to the Daredevil Netflix Universe MCU. If you didn't see the Netflix MCU and you wanted to kind of get an idea of what it was at all about going into it, if you did see it a while ago, but you think there's something in your life worth doing rather than spending the next thirty six hours watching all three seasons in a day and a half. I don't really understand your life choices, but you know,
there you go. You might think silly things like work or sleep or taking care of your relationships matter more than Matt Murdoch. We're here to support you and those bad choices.
Yeah, So Daredebil has been in the comics since nineteen sixty four. He was created by Stanley and Bill Everett, and the show gets a lot it's the basics are very much the same. He was blinded as a child by radioactive ooze, toxic waste, weird chemicals that changes based on the decade. Fun fact, it's the same stuff that made the teenage Ninja Turtles what they are. That is Ninja Turtles Ken.
Yeah, he's kind of like lying on it. He's lying near like a sewer great ripped down and the dripped through the sewer grading and then teenagem ninten Girls launches from the same stuff. But anyway, go on, Yes.
So whatever it is it gets in his eyes, it blinds him, but it enhances all of his other senses, so he can hear your heartbeat when you lie, and he can smell feelings, and he has basically radar, sonar or whatever. And also he's a ninja because of course he's a Nincia. He grows up becomes a lawyer with his best friend in college roommate, Foggy Nelson. They open a law firm called Nelson and Murdoch with their secretary,
cam Acage. Avocados at law, and U Matt proceeds to never ever ever show up for a single court case because he's too busy being a ninja. So Foggy keeps the lights on and Matt almost dies every night, and the show gets all that pretty much exactly right.
Well, I think I think the toxic waste part of it is important because, like a lot of things in Marvel, the actual explanation for where powers comes from changes canonically a bunch going back and forth. And you know, in the MCU there's been mostly an attempt to keep things a lot more grounded and to have like at least like vaguely pseudoscience explanations for how things happen. But it is important to think to think about, like, you know, there are people in the MCU who have a power
set that is possible within humanity. It's just really extreme. Like the Black Widows for example, are like you know, trained to the height of human ability, but it is still within the realm of human ability. The agents of shields such as like that as opposed to someone who has superhuman abilities. And while it is true in our own world that people can lose one of their senses
and have a number of others become fairly accentuated. That's not what is only happening with Daredevil that there is a supernatural, not like it's mystical or magical or although he certainly has a religious crisis. Yeah, for his perspective, you know, it could be, and it's never.
I mean, that knows a lot of like undead ninjas and stuff, but his his own powers are not magic.
They're comic right, it's comic book science. But it is still this is not like, ohy, average blind person who's hearing gets a lot better. This is like all of that turned up eight. Yeah, so what is then kind of starting with the Netflix show? But also you said it builds on a lot of the aspects of the
character from the comic books and other settings. What's really the essence of this character, Like, we have a lot of ninjas in the MCU, We have a lot of characters who go around as vigilantes and beat up bad guys. What makes Matt met what makes Daredevil daredeel?
I think sort of the essence of his personality, his unique you know essence, as he's a disaster and I mean, I think all most superheroes are disasters if you dig in a little bit. But like again, this is very evident in the in the Netflix show, I expect it to be very evident in the Disney Plus show. It's
very evident in the comics. But he is a character who desperately wants to do the right thing, does not know what that is, struggles very much with it, and has absolutely zero impulse control, which means that he often does what he thinks is the right thing in the moment, but perhaps is not the best thing to do ultimately. I mean, I made a joke about him, you know, never showing up in court and leaving Foggy to do
all the work. But like it really is very much a case of, oh my god, a ninja thing is happening right now, I have to drop everything and go deal with it, which, like in the long run, can be harmful and unproductive, not just to his career in his personal relationships. But like he is not he is very reactive. He does not at all see the big picture or the long game. Ever, he is deeply religious. He's Catholic, and that very much informs his stories as he tries to figure out what God wants him to
do and well. It informs some of his comic book stories, some of them don't hear at all, but that is very much a guiding principle, and a lot of his stories and especially the show, are very much embedded not just in New York City, but specifically in the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood of New York City, which if you're not from New York is about one square mile on the west side of Midtown Manhattan. Which it's very funny seeing people watch the show and then find out how small
Hell's Kitchen actually is. And Matt keeps saying, like this city, and he's referring to a square mile of a city, and I.
Would say some of his best friend grew up there. It largely does not exist. It has been very very gentrified, and like there are still parts of it, but like if you watch the movie West Side Story, West Side Story is explicitly about Hell's Kitchen when it was run by like a little north but like in that same when it was when it and it's about like Irish and Italian gangs and Puerto Rican gangs and a lot of that stuff. A lot of that area has now
been gentrified a lot and cleaned up. There's still some some not great parts, but it's like I have friends who've gone to visit those places. I mean, even this is not what the show is about.
No, I interned at time out New York in college. It's sort of been like two thousand and five, and their office was in Hell's Kitchen, and like just walking commuting in from New Jersey walk from Port Authority to tenth Avenue at that time was kind of dicey for like twenty year old woman, like I felt a little
bit uncomfortable. And now even in the twenty years since then, it's totally gone Hell's kit I mean, the association of Daredevil with Hell's Kitchen is a thing that emerged in the eighties, specifically in comics by Frank Miller, who wrote the comic Daredevil Born Again. That the new show takes its name from. Obviously New York in the eighties was very different. And I will say that the show, the Netflix show does say that Hell's Kitchen is suffering because
of the devastation from what they call the incident. Basically everything that happens in the first Avengers movie, which happens like three blocks away from the border of Hell's kitchen caused all this destruction, and really the implication is it kind of knocked that part of the city back into the eighties. But yeah, it's it's all brunch places now and the Jabbet Center. So if you go to New York Comic Con, you're.
In and in a kind of really amazing way. A lot of the first season is about the attempt to gentrify Hell's Kitchen in the wake of all that's happened, and so it is very, very real in that way.
I want to go back to the religious part though, because I've said before I'm a person of faith, I'm a Christian, I'm a former pastor, but I'm obviously very on the progressive side of things, and I'm generally very frustrated with how religion is treated in shows like this because either it's like the gods are literally real, like Thor and Loki are legitimate characters in this, and there's sort of an idea of like people are silly to
build religions because like, you know, they're not real, they're actually they just more like people whose power set seems like god like to other people. Or if heroes are religious, they're kind of delusional. And I really appreciate that with Daredevil, it isn't approached as like there's a there's never a burning bush that talks to him. He there, God is
never a character on screen. Instead, it's that, like a lot of people, he has moral questions about what he's doing, but that the moral framework that he has learned is the one that he has learned as a Catholic, and that the Catholicist, you know, and and I think that both is like the religious aspects most specifically, but like also guilt is a big deal for a lot of
people who are Catholics. And a part of his story is that his father died in like the to give a very very brief summary, his father's a boxer and his father was never very good, but like had a fight that he thought he could win, and the mob asked him to throw the fight, and he decides not to because he wants his son to like experience him winning,
and that he winds up getting killed by it. And you know, knowing that your father like got killed because he wanted to make you, as a ten year old proud, is going to be a little traumatic for a ten year old, And like, I'm not Atholic. I'm Christian. I know you you've spoken about it before, being being you know, one Jewish parent, one Catholic parent. I love to hear your you're like to you connect with the Catholicism specifically of this character and like the role it plays for him.
I mean honest, to be honest, not at not at all, specifically the Catholicism. My father is Catholic, but I was raised Jewish, Like yeah, yeah, my mom had custody most of the time, so we celebrated Christmas. But I didn't, you know, I was never raised Catholic at all. But I will say one thing that I do appreciate about the show, like rewatching and again revisiting it, it's it's uh evident that Matt is not the only Catholic character.
Like Claire Claire Temple Rosario Dawson's character is Catholic and she talks about that, and it's never stated explicitly, but Foggy is also pretty clearly Catholic, like when he references like a teacher, he says sister something or other, like he clearly went to Catholic school. And I appreciate that the show shows a range of how characters can relate
to the same religion. Oh and of course Matt's priests is a major supporting character in every season, and in season three we meet his mom, who is a nun. So there's you know, it's the show focuses on. And also Frank Castle is a Catholic. The Punisher is Catholic. The show focuses on Matt's relationship to his religion, but it also shows people who have a much more casual relationship with it or are lapsed or have made it, you know, their calling. And I think it's very well rounded.
In that way. Yeah, and also it tracks with the popular of Hell's Kitchen, like I said, like it is often for a long time it was very much an Irish and Italian and then like Hell, as you said, like the exact events of West Side Story are kind of the northern end, maybe a little past the border of it, but it's those same populations of you know, Irish, Italian, Polish, Puerto Rican, other Latino, all Catholic in somewhere or another.
Uh comes in there. And as I said, but what I like about it is it's not it's not theological. It is someone in the third season, but but but it's much more about just that's the framework of his ethics and r I think is kind of like the framing questions certainly of the first season, but but in some ways, I think of his entire character is a question at one point that his priest puts to him because he's kind of going to confession and his priest
figures out what he's doing. And they never quite explicitly say it, but its prison understands where it's coming from. And you know, one of the things that Matt is really wrestling with is does he have to kill Kingpin, the kind of main villain of the show that that he that he is dealing with in season one and then again in season three, and also just this idea
of violence in general. You know that there is the part where the Daredevil name comes from, is that they talk about how the Murdoch men have the devil in them and that sometimes the devil would just come out, and which was a very like it's presented as kind of like, yeah, we're really tough, but I mean that's a very ominous statement, you know, And that's the kind of statement that's often made like about in a family where like, you know, there can be abuse, right, there
can be people who are just overly violent in bad ways, but he talks about that like at times he enjoys what he's doing. And that's exactly the question the priest puts to him, is he's I'm perfectly the exact wording. I think it's he says, are you afraid that you will have to kill this man and you don't want to? Or are you afraid that you won't have to kill
this man and you want to? And And I just that hits so hard because I feel like that's the heart of Batman, that's the heart of on this podcast. For remembers out in the episode, we did something specifically about vengeance and sort of where is the line between like working for justice and working for vengeance? And I think that's exactly what Matt Murrock is all about, is about I am transgressing in both Catholic law and you know, American legal law by taking violence into my own hands.
But am I doing it to protect people? Or am I doing it because I had terrible things done to me by criminals and so I want to do terrible things to criminals.
Yeah, And again, I think it's a big part of like Matt not having that filter of like, yes, he spends a lot of time on the show agonizing about what he will do, but he does that when he like when he's agonizing about whether or not he has to kill Wilson Fisk the Kingpin, he has no actual means to do that, so he has the space to agonize. When he's in a given situation. There is no thought, There's just that impulse and that anger. That rage is
a huge part of that impulse. But he also talks about, like the reason he became Daredevil is because he has these enhanced senses. He lies in bed at night, he listens to the city and he hears how many people are hurting, and he cannot he is unable to stop himself from going out and intervening and helping. And those are sort of the two sides of that coin. That he cannot stop himself from helping good people, innocent people, or however you want to put it, and he cannot
stop himself from hurting bad people. And then of course, once he's done whatever the thing is, then he agonizes about it. He feels guilty and he's like, oh, what have I done? And praise and stuff it's the cycle.
And I think one of the things that really hits into it as well is that, I mean, in many ways, I feel like he's a zealous he's a crusader, and that he's kind of aware of that, and that one of the things that can happen is zelots don't often care a lot about clateral damage. And one thing, especially Season one, focuses on is that there are times whereby taking some of the actions he does, not only is he putting himself in danger, but he causes his friends
in danger. He causes innocent like Claire Temple, who becomes kind of night nurse. So I don't think they're officially use that term, but she's kind of one of the anchors of the entire Netflix MCU in a very wonderful way, as this nurse who takes care of everyone and and also gets asleep with a number of really attractive people. And Luke Cage treats her a lot better than Matt Murdoch does, and God bless him for it, because they're great together.
But yeah, if you're gonna pick a Defender's guy or a defenders anyone, like if you're gonna date a defender it's there's no question, it's Luke.
Yeah, like I think Matt Colter and god, well, who plays Matt Murdoch.
I can't remember his name now, Charlie Cox.
Charlie Cock, like they're both beautiful, beautiful men, but lue Cage is a little better. But like Daredevil gets connected to her because she finds him, and he's immediately like, oh, yeah, I'm gonna from your apartment start like beating people up. Oh by the way, now you have to leave for six months, like just you know, he just doesn't think about it, and she gets I think I understood, like every by the end of season one, everyone in his life is really pissed at him because.
Well, she also like actually gets kidnapped by the Russian mob and beaten trying to get answers for the because they're trying to get answers on his identity. I referred to this to a friend as I was rewatching, as like, oh, I like you know how you like vaguely remember things, but you don't remember just how bad they are. I'd forgotten about Matt and Karen's shared quest to get every brown person in Hell's Kitchen killed, because yes, it's It's like how Matt's carelessness with Claire's safety.
Is bad and the safety of a young again not white, brown boy who is I think, I think a neighbor of you know, I think, yeah, but who Claire takes care of them, and he also gets I mean he gets kidnapped even before Claire does. Yep.
He also he gets aimed to get information on where Claire is, who then gets beaten to get information on
where Matt is. But missus Cardinis, client that Nelson and Murdoch are trying to keep from getting gentrified out of her apartment, is murdered, and most egregiously, Ben Yurick, who is a reporter that Karen is working with to expose all of this, gets killed very directly as the result of Karen's complete recklessness and utter lack of concern for both Ben's safety and his feelings in that like dogged pursuit of I must have the truth and it doesn't
matter what else happens. And in that way, she is very very much like Matt.
I don't want to go too deep into like critiques of the seasons, you know, they're not perfectly any me, but just because I want to be focusing this momently
on a primary but just to build on that. To me, the most frustrating thing about Karen's character is there's a scene in the first season where another character who's one of the bad guys is directly threatening her and talking like, look, I just want to make a deal with you, but he's kidnapped her, and it's clear that like he's gonna do terrible things to her and her family if she doesn't go along with it, and she winds up, through a series of events getting the drop on him and
killing him, and she's haunted by that, And on some level I appreciate that because a lot of times in these shows, like our heroes kill bad guys and feel nothing about it, And every indication I have from you know, reading about stuff from like soldiers or cops or anyone, is like, you can kill the worst person in the world, and like the fact that you have taken another human life like that does something to a psyche and like maybe you're fine, but a lot of people are gonna
have nightmares, a lot of people are gonna have a lot of trauma about it. And in this case, she's very upset about the white person who she who was like very very threatening to her. It doesn't seem like she's sad about the fact that these other people around her keep getting killed. But you're right, she doesn't seem to be personal responsible. She doesn't feel a personal accountability for it, which is frustrating.
Yeah, and to be clear, it is not that that Matt and Karen are being intentionally written to not care about people of color. It's that the show overall often does not treat people of color very well, which is the thing that was fairly consistent across Netflix MCU shows, with the obvious exception of Luke Cage, like Jessica Jones, also had some real similar problems in this vein. And
the less set about Iron Fist, the better. So, you know, I agree with you, like we don't need to get bogged down in critiques of the seasons, but that is a true thing, and I really really hope that the new show handles that better than they have in the past.
Yeah, you know, I think so. And I do think that's one way in which one part of the gentrification of a lot of those areas is that white is white flight. And I bring them up because, like it is written at a time when there was a lot of poor white people living in those neighborhoods, and that's
not the case for the most part anymore. And so like one of the things that happens is you have like Foggy and Matt and Karen as white people who were in the neighborhood, but almost everyone that they're working with as either criminals or people they are saving is a person of color, with except of the Russians. The whole other thing. But yeah, getting a little too bog down there, but just kind of pulling back to what more of kind of like what we need to understand
about Matt Murrock going through this. Let's talk about him as a lawyer, because he is a lawyer, him and Foggy, Like I remember, I went into the show wanting, like I love legal dramas, I love law and order. My parents were lawyers. We watched a lot of those kind
of shows growing up. And there's less of it than I would like, but I do think there is some of it, and it feels like one of the real kind of themes of the show that I think is a theme in a lot of superhero stories is can you work within the system or you have to go outside the system and so like in the as I said, part of that idea at the end, part of the that theme of season one is can he trust the legal system to deal with Kingpin or does he have
to do it himself? And he winds up like using a lot of his outside the system violence and the like in order to get confessions out of people so that Kingpin can get arrested and that he kind of like he can be the lawyer side of it again. But then Kingdon brings out breaks out, and so he has to fight, you know, fight a street fight about it, and his themes come up again in season two and
season three. How would you sort of say, like, how is this an important part of his character, this conflict of do I do think do I win as a lawyer or as a vigilante.
But I also think it's important to note that he is specifically a defense attorney that you know, in the sixty years he's been around in the comics, he has not always only been a defense attorney. He's definitely worked on the prosecution side. For a while. In the seventies, Foggy or maybe the late sixties, Foggy was the district attorney and Matt was an Ada. There was a run where Kingpin was the mayor and Matt was deputy mayor. He's done all I mean, he's been a line cook, like,
he's done all sorts off. But I do think the fact that he is specifically a defense attorney is really interesting because it puts him in a lot of these stories where he will literally catch somebody as Daredevil and then be in the position of representing them, which is something that we see in season two with The Punisher, And it really sort of highlights that that contrast and that contradiction in what he's trying to do and that he so often doesn't know what the right thing is.
And yeah, I think it like, I think it helps to articulate that this is a character who is very much constantly thinking about what is the correct way to proceed and what is the right thing to do and what is the right way to do it in a way that for example, iron Man, iron Man doesn't really want to worry about these things. He's like, Oh, I have a problem, I'd better build a robot, like right, that's his only solution to anything.
Yeah, a lot of the heroes are looking for, like what feels like the right thing to do, and from that it is feeling but he's looking for the rule. He's looking, which I think is again a very kind of like coming from a Catholic Jesuit education, Like you know, that's very much about like what's the moral code, what's
the moral thing to do? And while I said there's a lot in season two that I don't love, one thing I really like about it, especially the first half, is it kind of sets up Foggy and Punisher as these two extremes that he feels like he is somewhere in between. Because Foggy is the we have to trust the law, we have to work within the system, even if the cops are corrupt, finding the good cop, even if the judges are corrupt, finding the good judge, and
he doesn't want to be that. But the Punisher is the one who keeps saying, like, you're stupid, even if you do beat them up outside the law, but to then arrest them because the pun you know, he has a line like you know, you you beat them up, they go to jail, they get out, I shoot them, they're dead, they don't get back up again. And I'm mangling the quote I'm not quoting it exactly, but they're kind of position two polls that he's trapped between.
Yeah and it. I don't know. I don't have this thought fully articulated, but I feel like there's like a step further that I don't know. Daredevil story is necessarily go to because there it's like, Okay, do we follow the law or do we not follow the law? And then what if the law is corrupt? What if the cops are corrupt, what if the judges are corrupt, what
if the politicians are corrupt? But it rarely interrogates it pretty much it Daredevil stories tend to position the what is right and what is following the law without corruption as the same thing.
Yeah, I think it's and I.
Think that's another layer there that could be unpacked more.
Yeah, I think so. I think so. And I want to talk more about that because in some way is actually one more part of one more of the kind of like foils against which he's played is Kingmin himself and Kingvin we know is gonna be in the new series,
and I definite want to talk about that. But let's talk for just a minute about Matt Murrock Ladies Man, because and it's presented in this interesting way where part of it is both like, Charlie Cox is a very attractive man, Matt Murrock is attractive man, and watching Charlie Cox kiss a number of people is a very fun thing to do, and people like doing that, and I think but they also kind of make a joke of it even within the show that he is kind of a player, and he does, and Foggy is both jealous
at him, but also kind of rolls his eyes at him, and like, as someone who both I will loudly advocate for my right as a disabled person. I'm an amputee for those who don't know, and for like, you know, the rights of disabled people in a in an ablest injust world. I'll also like, you know, get away with bullshit because like, you know, oh, I'm in an off I'm in a wheelchair officer. I'm so sorry, my life
so hard. Please don't write me that ticket. I don't think I actually said that directly, but like I've cut to the head of a number of lines because people have lett, you know, wheelchair and so I both have this like grudging admiration but also kind of rolling my eyes that like apparently like you know, understandably, Matt doesn't see people, so he can better see a person's face if he touches it, and it's a very kind of
like intimate thing to do. And as Foggy points out, he never seems to want to do that except with attractive women, and so he's kind of using this as a flirtation technique, which I'm both like, exception, uh.
Huh, he did. Foggy confirms Matt did it to him too. They're very good friends.
That's just that's that's fair. That's fair. But yeah, talk a bit about kind of what we saw from Netflix and the comics about the role of romance in because she has both like it's like kind of this joke that he's a player, but also that it's a sign of just how fucked up his life is that he cannot have a healthy relationship because you know, he is such like a pat like his life is the mission.
Yeah. Well, first I will note that from what I've seen blind people saying the touching somebody's face to h to know what they look like is a myth, it's not a real thing, which I actually love because that it confirms that this is just a line. Then it's totally just looking like hilarious.
And come back to my room to see my art collection.
Yeah, it's exactly. He literally goes to an art gallery to flirt with King Pinn's girlfriend and tells her he's getting art to impress ladies as his flirting method.
Like he's yeah, he as can her take his arm and show him around?
Yeah, it's yeah, he absolutely uses it. He's like, can you show me? Like in the very first episode when he and Foggy is their their office for the first time and they meet their realtor, who is a woman. Matt's like, oh, can you show me around the space? And she's like oh, and like takes his arm and Foggy is rolling his eyes in the background, and it's very funny. Yeah. I think it's such a fun and
interesting aspect of his personality. And it's also one that I think again goes back to, like the complete lack of impulse control, because he knows he's charming, he knows that he can generally get ill. I mean, the show just treats it as women, but I'll say people who are attracted to men and people who are attracted to Matt Murdoch specifically to go along with what he wants.
If he turns on the charm, it does not always work, but I love that you can repeatedly see him pulling it out when it's not a good idea, like again, flirting with Vanessa at the art gallery, or like.
She's a great character, she sees right through it and calls it out.
She does, but she's like, like, it's a great scene, the way they're bantering back and forth. And I always laugh when Fisk walks in and Matt's like, oh shit, yeah, it's so good. Oh sorry if I just have to put an e on your podcast a long time now, okay, good. But like there's a bit late in season one. This is after he's had like an almost romance with Claire.
They've kissed, they think that something's gonna happen there, and then she realizes how violent and ruthless and you know, out of control he is, and she's like, actually, none of that, thanks, and they break it off and then he almost dies and she shows up to patch him
back together, and he tries to flirt with her again. Yeah, and it's like, buddy, what And I think he just he's like reaching for these scripts, like I've seen I've seen a number of people interpret him as being neurodivergent, possibly on the autism spectrum, and his his what you were saying before about his always looking for rules, but also the way that he falls back on scripts, on this sort of charming women thing that he does over
and over again. He does it to Jessica too, like it's it's very Jessica Jones, not me Jessica, although I would let him. I have met Charlie Cox in real life and he doesn't do that. But he's extremely nice. But I think, I think that's really interesting. And then once he gets into a relationship, he's the worst goddamn
boyfriend on the planet. Like he's yearrible. And there's a very funny stretch of like the back half of season two where he's like bouncing back and forth between Karen and Electra, and the question of who he's in love with seems to be whoever he had a scene with most recently, Like he cannot focus, and it's like he's constantly flirting with women and trying to get like, you know, cuddle up to them, and then flames out disastrously the
minute that he gets anywhere. And I think that's extremely in character, and it'll be interesting to see where this goes in the new show because they're adding they're keeping Karen, who I hope they don't go back to a romantic plotline with the two of them, because that did not go well and I think Karen should have more self
respect than to try it again. But they're introducing two new characters, Heather Glenn and Kirsten McDuffie, to the cast, and they are both former loving trysts of Matt in the comics.
That'll be fun. Well, yeah, and I really love this part of his character for a couple of reasons, and one of them is for me as a disabled person. Like disabled people often presented in media as kind of like childlike or innocent, and very often there's a lot of great research on this, very strongly desexualized, and there's a lot of conversation about, like, to what extent you know Daredevil is or is not good disability representation. And while I am myself my disability is mobility and mental
health related. I don't have a vision issue. I do not have a disability related division. I've heard from a number of people within that community, but also disability more generally, who got to share my attitude of like because he basically has a superpower that, for all intends and purposes,
erases his disability. He's not the best disability representation by any means, but in this one regard at least him not being the perfect guy, him being kind of a player and a little bit sleazy, but in like like, he never like, there's never a moment of non consent in any way. There's never a moment where he he puts people in danger, but it's never the James Bond kind of like I'm going to seduce the girlfriend of the bad guy, and who cares that the bad guy
will find out and hurt her because of this? Like, there's none of that.
But they're not disrespectful.
Yeah no, he's just kind of you know, like you said, he's got a line. You know, he's a bit of bloody. Yeah, I mean, I want to defan sloodiness. There doesn't have to be like, oh yeah, a player like that, but he definitely is. And it's also one reason why, well, I don't love the representation of him in She Hulk.
I do really like that, Like, you know, She Hulk is like I smash you know, gender stereotypes, and I smashed mad Murdoch like it's very much about her having been the sexual aggressor in that relationship, which is a lot of shame.
Is it was everything to me. I loved him in She Hulk. I would say that the Netflix Daredevil is in keeping with like most modern portrayals of Matt Murdoch, but there is there is a version of him in the comics that is much closer to the She Hulk version, and I love that version. I so enjoyed h And I know that Charlie Cox does love that version because he's read the Mark Wade comics, and I so enjoyed getting to see him play that and knowing that he was probably having a great time.
Good for him, Good for him. Yeah, and it's fun to see that, and yeah, I am. I want to get back to one of two things about the Netflix show, but I will just say, like seeing him in now
kind of a bit. The fact that this show is supposed to be more specifically in the larger MCU I'm really interested in in part because it does make me think we might get more of the legal side of things, because I don't know many of the comics, but from some of the like if you've listened to this podcast at all, you know that Civil War is one of my favorite stories, both the comic book and the movie.
And we don't get this in the movie of Civil War at all, but that in the comics, like a lot of the battle over the Zakovia Accords and registration and all this is fought in the courts, and Matt Murdoch is often the lawyer who is like arguing on behalf of the superheroes who are getting in legal trouble because of the accords, and Jessica Jones is the private investigator working for him. Like it's just all these characters get played into that. But yeah, so like I like
the Netflix version a lot more. I'm dark and EMO. I want the darken Emo. But the fun player part with Sheeahaulk is great too, And I wouldn't mind if there's a little If we can find a way to make it congruous with each other, I'd be very happy.
Yeah, I will say, I don't know how much legal stuff there will be in the new show. It doesn't seem like there is a comic called Daredevil Born Again, which I think I mentioned earlier. This the new show doesn't seem to have anything to do with that plot wise, like they seem to be, except for the fact that Kingpin is a major character. But one of the characters I mentioned is the love interests of Matt's in the comics. Kirsen McDuffie is a lawyer as well, so and we have Dad wise lost stuff.
I think this was before she Hulk, but either way, one of his other introductions to the MCU is that he was the lawyer for Peter Parker Spider Man in No Way Home, So you know.
Some of that, I will say watching some of that Punisher trial, particularly the part where he asks he's supposed to question Frank and he asks the judge for permission to treat his own as a hostile witness, makes a speech and then says no further questions, I was like, you gotta stop lying a teenagers. You are not a really good lawyer.
Yeah, yeah, all Foggy, Yeah, Foggy does most of the work there, and Matt comes very close to sabotaging it. But you know, he catches the brick that almost hits Peter Parker because he's a very good lawyer.
He learned that at Columbia Laws it's brick catching one oh one. It's a really important class there.
It's true, it's true. Well, the last thing then I really wanted to bring in because I think it is such a part of the Netflix MCU version of Daredevil is Kingpin. I partially I think, like I think Charlie Cox is a very good actor. If you told me there's one person who gets to win an Emmy for Daredevil, I would say, thank you, Charlie Cox. But Vincent Deinofrio
is taking this home. He plays Kingpin in what is I think, just a phenomenal performance and really make they really kind of highlight the idea of how similar Kingpin is today Daredevil in that both of them had traumatic childhoods that involve the deaths of their father due to
the criminal underbelly of this part of the city. Very different involvements in it, though, And I do think that while I know in other portrayals, Kingpin is just like a guy who wants to get lots of money and have lots of control in the Netflix MCU, and I think in some of the comics he is very much presented as he has just as much of a protective love for his city, New York City, as Matt does,
but he has a different version. A. He has a different version of how to protect his city, and B he's a lot more willing to hurt other people intentionally to get it done. Talk a bit about how you saw Daredevil, how you saw Kingpin in the Daredevil story and his importance in relation to Daredevil and kind of what that might look like going forward.
Yeah, I mean, so Kingpin is absolutely the number one Daredevil villain from the comics. He's the most important Daredevil villa, which is funny because he's actually originally a Spider Man villain, and he continues to be a Spider Man villain to this day, Like he fights Spider Man as much as he fights Daredevil. But yeah, there's there's no contest. Like if you're asking, like, who are the most important Daredevil villains,
it's Kingpin. And then you go like way further down the ladder and you're like, I guess the hand, and then you're like, I don't know stilt Man, which I cannot believe We're getting a fourth season. We have still not seen stilt Man. I'm furious and I would like all the money for my Disney Plus subscription back. But he's he's a got a suit that it has like extendo legs that make him really tall.
Move right along.
He's amazing anyway. Yeah, I think I think giving Kingpin a motivation does make for good storytelling, although I don't think it necessarily makes it more believable, or maybe it's I don't know. I had this debate with a friend the other day where I was like, I don't think villains need a reason to be greedy and cruel because I can see what's happening in our world. And she was like, yeah, but that doesn't work for a story, even if it's true in real life. And I do.
I mean, obviously it's perfectly fine for most super villains in comics, but I do think that it adds nuance to fisks portrayal in the comics that yes, he is he very much. I'm gonna alter the phrasing of what you said, he very much believes that he is doing something for the good of Hell's Kitchen. I don't know that I would agree that he loves Hell's Kitchen, or my question is, what is it about Hell's Kitchen that
he loves? Because he seems to want to raise it to the ground and kill everybody in it, and so it's not the buildings, that it's not the people, but he has convinced himself that he does, and that is very compelling. I will say I did get kind of tired.
Of him after a while, especially in season two, when they bring him in for two episodes even though he's not really a character in that season, and then they just let him like give a bunch of really long speeches that don't go anywhere, and it feel like the writers were so enamored with their own writing for him and with Vincentinofrio's performance that they just kind of they.
Gave it way more air than it needed. Obviously, he is in fact a major character in season three, and so he's like earned his position there. It's a different situation, but I I do hope that they remember that Matt Murdoch is the main character and don't like because I think sometimes the show forgets that and it thinks the Kingpin is or it thinks the Punisher is and they're not. And I will also say, and I feel like you and I have had this conversation, I'm real tired of
men with daddy issues. I'm real tired of villain saying we're not so different you and I, which I did note at least one character saying in at least once in every season. Fisk says it in season one, Frank says it in season two. I think uh, Sigourney Weaver says it to Iron Fist and Defenders. I was like, okay, enough, we're all the same. I get it, kumbayah, stop it.
So if the version, I got a bad feeling about this.
Exactly, and like, I trust in Santinofrio. I think he'll do a good job, but I think that the character is more effective and has more impact when he is used with restraint.
That's fair, That's fair, I'll I will say I saw season one very differently, and probably because I had no connection to Daredevil before I saw season one.
I don't need either that. I started reading the comics because I like the show so much.
Okay, well, because what I was gonna say is, I do think that in many way, like to me, season one is two origin stories. It is the origin story of Kingpin and the origin story of Matt Murdoch, and like, yes, I think they're both great actors. But if you told me Vincentinofrio is going to get best Supporting Actor Emmy, I'd be like, no, No, he's just best actor because I think he is, like, is just as much his story as Daredevil's story. And I don't mind that because
I think it's so good. I do think you're right. By season three it gets a little much. And in season two I think an objection to how invested they got in writing uh, Derek Kingpin into season two is that they forgot to write an actual compelling villain prom most of season two into it. So that was kind of bad. But that that's a topic of another car bick.
But yeah, I have we can have our extremely negative and here are all the problems episode another time.
Well, although actually I think what you did bring up as forgive me. You volunteered yourself now for the members only episodes, which, by the way, you can have a member for only five dollars a month fifty five dollars a year. You get every content, you get bonus content, and you get full bonus episodes, and you get to help us keep the lights on. Please look at the show note. Please look at the.
Link that sounds like a bargain to me, right, please.
Look at the link in the show notes. But in those the bonus episodes that are fully just remembers each time, we're looking at kind of a core question. And so we looked at like accountability and civil war, and we looked at like Vengeance's motivation. And one of the ones actually that now I want to do is should criminals
should villains be relatable? Because I'm very big on the idea that, like, because I do think like, even in our own world, I think there is some explanation to how the villains of our world became the greedy, horrible
people that they are. Uh and yes, this in part because I recently watched The Apprentice, but you know, also stories, right, but also just but yeah, that being said, like I think it's a very ancient question to have, and and I really do love that about Kingpin and so let me like get so, yeah, I think that'd be a really fun episode to have about like should every villain have it a relatable backstory or should they all be? You should at least some of them be, just like mohaha,
Ultimate Power. Let's talk about Vanessa then, because Vanessa, I think is one of the most interesting characters. She is the woman who Kingpin uh is his girlfriend becomes his wife by the three season. And this is a very different portrayal than we've seen her in a lot of other things. And my understanding is that this is a
little unique. Like to give another perspective, if you've watched the Spider Verse movies, In the first Spider Verse movie, Kingpin is the villain, but part of what he's doing is that in that movie, Vanessa and his child have left him because they've seen his his violence, and so they're trying to reverse time so that like they die.
Too, Like the they like got hit by a car while they were leaving him.
Yeah, they were like running away from him and got hit by a car. And yeah, so he wants to go back in time. But in other words, like whereas in this, like Vanessa is like a true believer in his vision and like stands by him. And what do you think of the way Vanessa is portrayed in that? And I would you want to see her in this?
So I'm actually gonna contradict myself here because my frustration with Vanessa is that I don't feel like we know why she's doing this or why she is the way she is, Like, we get that whole We get a whole episode dedicated to Fisk's backstory, and we have flashbacks to him as a child, and it's all setting up like who he is and how he became the person that he is, and he meets this woman who seems
to be a normal person. He's like, by the way, I'm committing murder on a massive scale, and she's like, great, I'm so on board, and there's no like I think the actress Isolette, sure if I'm pronouncing that right. She's brilliant and she makes the character feel so complete and so magnetic. But I'm like, lady, what, why are you okay with this? And I would love to know more about that, and I'm frustrated that we don't in terms of other Oh, go ahead.
Just say something on that. This may be because I re watched the show in November of last year, but to me, like there is a mystery of it. It's the same mystery of how do so many people vote
for Trump? Like because more than anything, it's that she she doesn't want to be afraid she does and she like feels like he is the man who will make her not have to be afraid, and I it's both like totally baffling, but I also feel like I have to believe what she's telling me of why she likes him, and it's like, yeah, I agree with It's like, can't you see through this? Can't you see that he is
just as dangerous. But there's a whole storyline of where she knows that he's a dangerous person and she gives him her gun. She learns like she doesn't have to be afraid with him.
And it's both I never got the sense that she was afraid before, Like, I that's fair, Like that's an ex I think that's a it would work, And I don't know that they did the work to.
Set that up well. And here's where the like connection to the modern politics when I'm like, what are you people so afraid of? Like let people use bad rooms, let people come to this country, Like that's kind of where I was coming from, is that like the fear isn't actually justified, but someone can still speak to it. But anyway, moving away from my own feelings, in.
Terms of how she's been portrayed, I don't know that she's been in other media, necessarily outside of this show and Spider Verse, but in the comics she's actually totally the opposite because when Sophisk is a Spider Man villain and then he meets Vanessa and she doesn't want him to be involved in crime, so he gives it up. He quits like he's he's done, He's entirely done, and then he has to come back to or she they're living I don't know, I don't remember Italy somewhere, they're
living out of America. She has to come back to New York for whatever reason, and some of the Fisk's enemies try to kidnap her, and in the ensuing brew haha, she is seemingly killed, and that is what triggers his return to being the kingpin, and that is what triggers him like that's the first time he appears in Dareduvil comics, that storyline, that is what puts him back on this scene. And so she is she is totally opposed to his criminal enterprise. She is, of course not dead. She ended
up in the sewers. She is now the it's implied sex slave of the sewer king who rules the sewer people. It's very messed up. Matt rescues her. It's a whole thing, and then she some like twenty years later, there's another fascinating story with her where they have a son that who we see in Spider verse, Richard, who tries to kill Fisk because that family is not healthy, and so Vanessa has him killed. She's like, I love you, but you went after my husband, so now I'm killing you,
even though you're my son. And then there is a very very very long storyline where like Matt's life is falling apart in every single possible way, and there's one mastermind at the heart of it, and it turns out to be Vanessa, and she's like, I could have had a happy life with my husband if it hadn't been for you screwing everything up. So I screwed everything up for you. You're welcome. By the way, I'm dying of cancer. Goodbye forever I think she dies, and he's like, huh.
I can support women's rights and women's wrongs when it comes to Vanessa.
Yeah, I mean she is a great character in the comic. She is fascinating. Again. The Sewer People's story is very gross and upsetting, but like when she comes back in the two thousands, even if it is very brief, she just and this I think is something that Isoletzer's performance really captures. She exudes power, yeahink, she's on the page or on the screen, there is something about her like this is a woman who is totally in control of herself and what she's doing and will always figure something
out and stay one step ahead. And that is what makes her so so compelling and so magnetic.
And I will say that that goes into I think one of the things that again I think maybe I get the readation too much credit, but I think is very intentional is we do see the romance between her and Fisk developed, and Fisk as a romantic character is one hundred million miles different from Murdoch and he's it's some of I think Vincent Binafia's best acting. He's he's awkward with her, he's he's and he is so heartbreakingly vulnerable. I mean, I think it's part of why I fell
in love with the character. And then you watch him
do these horrible, terrible things. But it's like, you know, like Matt Murdoch has Risen and Dnafio, like you know, Wilson Fisk does not and I do think that it's like I don't necessarily think it's that like like Matt goes after vulnerable women in any kind of like a predatory way, but I do think that there's an extent to which, like part of why Vanessa just laughs him off, like she banters with him, but it's just not falling forward at all, is very much the reason why she's
so much more taken in by Fisk in his vulnerability. And I think that's a wonderful contrast because to me, it's it's not saying that Fisk is better than Matt. Matt is genuinely trying to do right things, and Fisk is a monster in a lot of ways. Like we see him what Matt's devil is that they'll punch people a lot. Fisk does things with a car door that just I don't want to spoil, but everyone knows. Anyone it knows what I'm talking about, and it's it's brutal.
And but also like to think the times that Fisk is the most brutal is when his mother is threatened, or when the Vanessa is threatened, or when I think him in Hawkeye is very bad. I think him and Echo is good, but also again where his family is threatened, and just with.
The car door scene, that's less that she's threatening, more that he was embarrassed. And he says, you embarrass me in front of her.
Like that's fair, that's fair. I'm more thinking about like what happens later when again, like when Karen gets Manilra killed and stuff like that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, and like it's a very sort of like the masculine, like I possess these people and so you're threatening me and embarrassing me and stuff like that exactly.
Although to give him credit, he I do think he is extremely respectful towards Vanessa, Like he is very he listens to her boundaries. He even listens to like sometimes very in the very early interactions between them, she'll be bantering with him and he'll take it as a rejection and sort of like very politely back off and she has to be like no, no, no, I was kidding, It's okay,
keep going, which you're right, it's very sweet. And yeah, he's he's a monster, but he's also talking to a girl he likes, and he's not good at it, but it's working.
It's so like and he also was incredibly rich. So he does things like I just I rented out the whole restaurant because I wanted to have a nice dinner with you, you know.
Yeah, but again it doesn't come off like a douchebag move because he did it because he can't like be around Like when he's like, yeah, and I got this really nice bottle of wine for you, and she's like, wow, you did a good job picking it, and he's like, I didn't pick it. It was my employee, who I guess is also my only friend. Yeah, he doesn't die by the end of the show.
And again another part at least is like I'm going to go into a homicidal rage because you did something mean to one of my people, includes that guy who's male. Yeah.
So it's fun fun fact about Wesley, who's like a major character in season one, he shows up only very briefly in like an early Frank Miller Fisk story. He's like a random minion and he gets killed off like in that story. Like, Wesley is not a long running character. He's just like a it's just a name that they grabbed from the comics. But then after the show, after this show, they gave fisca new Wesley, and I'm like, does he just call everybody Wesley know just He's like,
I'm not going to learn your name. Your name is just Wesley. And then if anybody out there has seen Clone High, it's it's a I'm not going to explain it, but it's a very funny joke. If you've seen Clone High.
I haven't, but I've heard good things. Well, all right, there's probably a good place to wrap up. We are gonna have a bonus section for our members again, five dollars a month, fifty five dollars a year. We're going to talk about some other Netflix MCU characters who might come into the full MCU itself, but Jessica any other the last things that people need to know if they're gonna start watching Daredevil board again.
I feel like we haven't talked enough about my very favorite character, Foggy Nelson.
Yes, let's talk Foggy.
I mean, he's the light of my life. He's the only reason that Matt Murdoch eats booth because he's the one who makes the money and because he probably orders Matt's groceries for him, not because Matt is incapable. He is obviously extremely capable. He just forgets to do stuff.
Yea.
I love Foggy. I think Elden Henson's portrayal of him is fantastic. I'm very worried they're going to kill him off and I'll cry.
Yeah. Yeah, I think Foggy is such an important character for him, and in part because I do think in a lot of these shows, they have a male best friend and all they ever really do is banter with each other, and the male best friend might be a little mad at him for like half an episode when like he finds out that he's really the superhero, but really, you know, otherwise they're fine. You know, like think about like Iron Man, like, yeah, uh, Brod Brody, thank you,
Rody Sody. Yeah, Roady like gets kind of mad at at Tony Stark. But really it's Pepper Potts who he has to have this like deep relationship to finding discussion when she finds out who he is and like all this stuff, and yeah, he gaslights Karen Page longer than
I would have liked him too. But it's Matt Murdoch who finds it's Foggy who finds out that Matt Murdoch is Daredevil and they have this like entire episode and really going on for the whole rest of the show, and like there needs to be a lot more homosexuality in TV, and a lot more male homosexuality, and I'm always okay with that, But I also think that one of the things that suffers a lot is that we very rarely see emotional, important male friendship, and seeing this
relationship that I think, you know, fan fiction writers are going to take it in a romantic direction, and I've no problem with that, but I'm very much happy with the canon that they're just very good friends who love each other very much, and that Foggy feels this very deep sense of betrayal when Matt, you know, he finds out about this, and also the sense of like, you know, he understands why Matt wants to do this, but he's mad in part because he's like, my life is better
with you in it, and you are risking that every day, and I hate that, and I just it made me really Foggy is really the moral heart and soul of the show, like the moral center of the show in a way that I love. But just also the importance that the relationship between the two is really a big part of what made me love it. I'm so i'mally looking forward to seeing foggying me back and hoping we get more of that.
Yeah, he's absolutely He's Matt's rock. He is in the
show and he is in the comics. He's the only character who has been there since day one and is still there now, like he was in Daredevil number one and he's still I mean, they're in a fight right now in the comics, like kur in the comics that are coming out as we speak, Foggy is possessed by a demon and they are in a fight because of how Matt went to Hell to rescue Foggy and then stayed behind and died and then came back with amnesia and was a priest and didn't tell Foggy he was back.
But a lot of friends to things like that. This is very common.
But yeah, he.
Is such a vital component to Daredevil, to Matt's life. And yeah, like the I mean, especially given your love of ethical quandaries and superhero media, like the fact that they have this lengthy fight that is like, I am so upset that you hid this from me. I am so upset that you couldn't trust me. I am so upset that you made me complicit in all of your law breaking as your legal partner. Like the the intro to seees of, like the way that their lives are intertwined,
like personally professionally are so interesting. Yeah, yeah, I'm a foggy. Nelson is literally my favorite Marvel character, like any actual superhero.
I love him, and the show recognizes that he's got some game too. It's a very different kind of riz, but he's got some riz to and even.
And Mary, they're great together and he can kind.
Of bring her back from the depths, and Andrews don't say one of the things. And again, kind of just the gender of it all really matters to me. The dynamic of two best friends, one of whom he is a lot more conventionally attractive and a lot more gregarious and a lot more successful, and so the other one is always in their shadow. That's a dynamic that we've seen a lot explored between two women, or two high school girls, or like Yellow Jackets is a fantastic exploration
of it. I don't see it explore wicked. Yeah, another one. I don't really see it explored between two men very often, And granted it matters to me because this was very much my high school dynamic with my best friend, who is still one of my best friends, and I love them dearly. But if the two of us walked into a room, I'm always in his shadow. And so I start talking, and I maybe that's why I talk so much.
But who knows which is also the foggy thing?
Yeah, exactly, exactly, And yeah, and so foggy being kind of the more goofy one and the more laughable one. But therefore everyone being like, who's that cute guy brooding in the corner? You know that I just don't see that dynamic as much in male friendship, but I think it very much exists, and so yeah, I just imprinted on this relationship so much. Well, thank you so much, Jessica.
To our listeners who haven't gotten to explore a lot more your thinking, I know, there's a lot of places online and in published book where they can find your words and your thoughts on everything from Daredevil in his relationships to Squirrel Girl and her many outfits over the years. Where can they find the works of Jessica?
Yeah, so I do a lot of writing about comics for Kariat, so you can check out my writing there. I will have an article coming out, I believe it's scheduled for March eighteenth, Comics to read if you're watching the new Daredevil show, So that'll have some recommendations for comics that are similar to the show or that are just like really good reads, if you want to check that out. And yeah, I also have some published work
in a book. I have a short story in Swordstone Table, which is an anthology of Arthurian retellings that came out from Vintage Books a couple of years ago, and you should check it out because there's a lot of really cool stories in there.
Yeah, definitely, definitely very worth getting and we should have links to all that in the show notes. So, Jessica, thank you so much to our listeners. Thank you so much to our members. Stick around a little bit more. We'll have a little bit more. Jessica and everyone else made the fourth to it.
What are you have done