Featured Reviews
Daredevil #150: "Catastrophe!"; 17 pages
Writer: Jim Shooter
Artist: Carmine Infantino, pencils, Klaus Janson, inks and colors
While Matt wrestles with how to protect his secret identity before Matthew Glenn is framed for Killgrave’s machinations, he has to contend with Paladin, a mysterious mercenary hired to engage the Man Without Fear for reasons known only to his employer.
And as quickly as it started, it ends.
After less than a year, Shooter finishes his run up with this anniversary issue. He does plot the next two issues, and returns to do a Secret Wars II tie-in during Denny O’Neil’s run, but this is his last full script--which is kind of sad, because the quality of Shooter’s work is so very high. And his last full script is not a resolution of his major plot threads (even the one he could have resolved is used as a cliffhanger for Roger Stern to tie up), but a side trip that introduces a new character with great promise who quickly sank to D-List Limbo.
Said new character is Paladin, described by Daredevil as a ‘private investigator and gun-for-hire only to the very rich.’ Granted, his powers--enhanced reflexes and strength, a special blaster gun and some protective armor--are sort of generic, but Shooter breathes life into him with his personality. This is a man, we soon learn, who sees nothing untoward in literally stopping a fist fight with DD to flirt with the two women from Indianapolis whose hotel room they’ve just crashed into! Given the way that Daredevil had been subtlely darkening in tone since the end of Gerber’s run, I have to wonder if Shooter meant for Paladin to contrast with Matt, representing the kind of hero our Scarlet Swashbuckler once was!
The fight is very brief and, given how Paladin reveals he was hired by a friend of Glenn whose on the trial of Killgrave himself, comes off as a simple ‘we need to have two guys in costume fight’ requirement. It certainly bears no impact whatsoever on the true throughline with the plot, as Matt becomes so caught up in what to do about the Glenn family and his identity he has a comic nightmare where he’s trying the case and finds out he can’t win. This sequence is actually pretty good and astute in what it tells us about how Matt views the other characters (particularly how Heather Glenn punctuates her sentences with ‘tra-la-las’). There’s also a very well-handled opening set piece with a child sniper where DD admits how deep he’s in. It’s moments like this that make me claim Shooter’s run is so underrated; everything supports his storyline and its central theme, no matter how tangentially.
The big development--the one Shooter himself ends up being unable to lead to fruition--is the one/two punch of Matthew Glenn’s suicide and Matt’s decision to reveal his secret ID to Heather. One is treated off-screen and the other is teased as a last panel cliffhanger. This, to me, seems to indicate that the rumor of Shooter leaving so abruptly because he was having problems finding time to write whole handling his newly acquired E-i-C duties were true. I have to wonder if Shooter had intended to go another direction with the Heather Glenn revelation than where it ended up--namely, basically following in the footsteps of Roy Thomas’ Karen Page revelation. This could be cited as the start of the slippery slope where Matt seemed to reveal his ID to everyone who asked directly except for Foggy, a development that ended with Bendis’ massive outing of Matt during his run. Granted, when we get to that point, his inability to keep his identity secret seems ludicrous, but back then the idea of Matt taking off the mask is still a novelty.
With Gil Kane gone and Gene Colan waiting in the wings, art is provided by the Marvel Designated Fill-In of the moment, Carmine Infantino. During this brief period, Infantino was estranged from his usual publisher, DC, and had fallen into a workman-like, cookie cutter rut. When elevates Infantino’s work is the way his pencils interplay with Janson’s inks. Janson manages to find those elements of Infantino that made his art unique back in the 60’s and brings it to the fore, resulting in a much more vivid art job (compare this to the work Infantino was submitting to such series as Star Wars and Nova to realize just how distinctive this work comes off). And I have to give Infantino credit for his choreography in the jury dream sequence, which has a visual consistency while being totally illogical.
I really wish that Shooter had been allowed to continue with his run; it may have been brief but it had a lot to offer. As it is, “Catastrophe” was a nice little coda to his string of stories.
Daredevil #260: "Vital Signs"; 38 pages
Writer: Ann Nocenti
Artist: John Romita, Jr., pencils, al Williamson, inks
During an anti-nuclear rally, Typhoid Mary sends a coterie of Daredevil’s most recent enemies to take him apart. And the scary thing is, she succeeds....
All my critiques of Ann Nocenti’s hectoring, soap box style aside, I have to admit to loving this issue. Part of it is because the story almost reads like ‘Nocenti’s Greatest Hits,’ as every one of her additions to DD’s rogues gallery shows up, beats on Matt and heads off. Part of it is because, unlike with many of Nocenti’s scripts, it moves at a very brisk clip even with all the usual Nocenti soap boxing. Part of it is how the issue is a tremendous showcase for John Romita Jr’s storytelling skills.
But one of the things I like the most is how it shows how smart a villain Typhoid Mary could have been. Unlike the mess that was her initial storyline, this plan is downright smart. Typhoid carefully determines the line-up in which the bad guys beat on Matt--beginning with Bullit (arguably the most super-powerful of the Nocenti bad guys to this point), then following with Bushwacker and his multitude of weapons, then Ammo (not super-powered, but a skilled military fighter) before finishing up with the Wildboyz. The idea of two goofs like the Wildboyz getting the final licks in on Daredevil and coming this close to killing him before Typhoid intervenes comes off like the ultimate humiliation.
Even taking away the Big Action Scene away, Nocenti managed some excellent touch. The opening sequence, with Matt commenting on the groceries Karen has brought in shows once again that she understood their relationship as well as any writer, and she creates a nice tension by contrasting the mayhem with Matt’s sincere desire to march in the peace parade. The moment where a bruised and torn-up Daredevil emerges from one of his fights pleading for the right to march while the horrified marchers point out that he’s one of the reasons they’re fighting is powerful...and is further mollified by the brief moment of kindness from a stranger immediately afterwards.
But even with all the things that elevate this above the usual Nocenti nonsense (and to be fair, the subplot about the anti-peace march resolves in a real Nocenti-level groaner--namely, with the peace marchers and the veterans parade colliding in a riot), this issue wouldn’t be the classic I claim it to be without the contribution of John Romita Jr. Even moreso than in his other work of the period, Romita choreographs the issue beautifully. It would be so easy for the running fight scenes to be confusing, but Romita manages to convey the energy and impact of every blow. And it’s really amazing how he manages to capture each villain’s uniqueness in the opening splash that accompanies each fight (I particularly like how, when we get to Typhoid toward the very end, she’s not in an action pose, but at rest with her katana pointed at Wildboy Jet’s throat....which speaks volumes for how controlled and contained her own resentment towards Matt has become). This is a high point in Romita Jr.’s career at a time, and even if you dislike Nocenti’s work as much as I do you need to take a look at it.
“Vital Signs” is perhaps the best example of how good Nocenti could have been; Hell, she manages to get in her soap boxing in a way that doesn’t interfere with the story. She won’t get close to this point again until we get into the ‘fantasy land’ period where Matt gets involved with genetic engineering and Inhumans and a trip to Hell. But for that one oversized issue, she becomes the world-beater writer that she always wanted to be.
Next Time: All that praise...seems like we need to be reminded that not everything is great--and you know what that means! It’s Deep Brown Something time! Cringe as we witness one of the most nonsensical stories Chris Claremont ever wrote (yes, even worse than those ‘X-Men Revolution’ issues), and witness how the wheels fell off, rolled down a cliff and ignited in flames on the ‘Wages of Sin’ storyline.