Being A Vigilante Is A 13-Episode Work In Progress

Thanks to having access to a friend's Netflix account, I got to watch that Daredevil series last week. I'm not sure whether binge-watching it over 3 days was a good idea or not. Anyway, there might be spoilers, if you care.

I can't decide how I feel about D'onofrio as the Kingpin. He doesn't match my idea of Fisk, but he might work for this series. It isn't his size, D'onofrio's not a small guy, and the cameras are positioned well-positioned to make him look bigger. Look up at him, lots of close-ups so he fills the frame. His shyness around Vanessa, how out of control and brutal he can get where her safety is involved, that felt right. But the social awkwardness, that was unexpected. I'm used to a Kingpin who is comfortable at those charity galas, glad-handing potentially useful politicians. D'onofrio is so uneasy around everyone, unable to even fake being comfortable around others. It does actually help him in a way, because of how unwilling he is to emerge from the shadows, it makes his claims of concern for the city's well-being ring genuine. The fact it isn't an act is strange.

I saw an argument that Fisk doesn't become the Kingpin until the very end of the season, in the same way Matt doesn't become Daredevil until the very end. The point when Fisk is either so confident or desperate he will boldly flaunt his power with shootouts in full view of everyone. When all the other major players in organized crime are either dead, or have departed on other enterprises. Except I'm not sure what they do with him given how the season ended, so I'm not sure it holds water.

The rest of the cast was pretty good. It's not a cheery show, much more Miller's Daredevil than Waid/Samnee's or the early Lee/Romita swashbuckler, but Charlie Cox does have a little of that cocky breeziness. The glib, cocksure attitude Matt has a lot. Deborah Ann Woll plays a good Karen Page (I like how she struggles with her desire to see the people behind the murder of a friend exposed, and with the fear other people she cares about are going to be hurt. She's been through a traumatic experience, and she's struggling to deal with it, but there's conflicting impulses. Elden Henson works well as Foggy, has his own mix between wanting to make being a lawyer pay off, but also helping people who really need it. He knows Matt is right about helping people, but he also knows they have to keep the lights on. He's a little more practically-minded, which isn't saying much when compared to a guy who puts a mask on and punches criminals. I'd agree I didn't see much romantic tension between any of the three, but that's OK. Let them be friends and coworkers. Also, Vondie Curtis-Hall was a good Ben Urich. Dedicated journalist, good man, bit of a realist, and he has this slightly slumped shoulders, hang-dog look to him. It works for the weight of all his various fears and concerns. On the whole, the casting was solid.

The fight scenes were pretty good, and I liked the lighting in a lot of the scenes. They used this sickly yellow-green light a lot that made everything look alien somehow. Which is strange, because I think it's just the color of streetlights, maybe slightly dimmed by the light going through a window, which would be perfectly normal in New York. But it works. I'm not as sure about how they depict Matt's view of the world. He describes it as everything looking as though it's on fire, which seemed a strange choice. It lead to a good line from Rosario Dawson's character to the effect that if she saw everything as being on fire, she'd want to hit things, too.

I was a little disappointed they wasted Leland Owlsley the way they did - he's essentially a money manager - but hopefully we'll get some of the stranger costumed villains in the other series. The opportunity is there to get weird, but I'm not sure they'll take it. This is silly, but I'm a little concerned about how they show the Iron Fist, when that series premieres. That show is a year or two off, but there were a lot of hints and nods towards it in Daredevil.

It's a decent enough show. At times it feels too much like a prologue, but there is a lot of good stuff in there. I really liked the episode where Matt and Foggy have a difficult conversation about Matt's double life. Foggy's anger and confusion is palpable, and Matt would clearly rather not have the conversation, but he's too beat up to even get off the couch. He feels completely helpless in the face of Foggy's sense of betrayal. So I didn't love the show, but I thought it was worth the time I spent on it.