Daredevil

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This isn’t a review.

Last night, I wrote a long and lengthy review about Marvel’s new show Daredevil. It had a lot of good points, and I referenced my love for the comic books from way back. But, in the morning, I looked at it what I wrote, and I hated it. I’ve already read this review on a dozen other sites, and they were done well. So, why add to the echo chamber? That’s not what this site is about.

Instead, I’ve decided to do something a little different.

First, some housekeeping: if you haven’t watched Daredevil yet, go watch it. Now. It’s an amazing show; I didn’t realize how much I really wanted and needed it in my TV-watching life.

Ok, so at this point I’m assuming you’ve at least started the show. I don’t consider this a spoiler, but what comes next discusses the second episode of the show. Particularly, the fight at the end of the episode, which was flat out one of the most amazing fight scenes I’ve ever seen.

What made this fight amazing, after the amazing oneshot and exceptional choreography, was that Matt Murdock took as many hits as his opponents, perhaps even more. It shows us exactly what Daredevil is made of. Despite his heightened senses and awareness triggered by his blindness, despite his training, despite his reflexes, and despite his fearlessness–he’s just a man. When he takes a fist to the jaw, he gets rattled. Fighting multiple opponents tires him out. But Murdock gets back up time and time again. He’s tough as nails, and in this show hes calling on all his strength and resources to prevail, each and every time. That struggle is part of who Daredevil is, and it is portrayed beautifully in this fight.

There may be one other reason I love this scene, and it goes back a few years to the last karate tournament in which I fought. It was a full-contact fight, and it was for the black belt finals for the day. I had been training for this fight for months, and I was ready. But, when the match began, my opponent landed two fast hits to my face, and my contact lenses were knocked clear out. It’s funny, I could handle the punches fine, the issue was the contact lenses!

All I could see was splotches of color. I have terrible, terrible natural vision. The referee wanted to call the fight, but I didn’t want to stop now. I had trained so hard, I had come this far, and I wasn’t going to let those two hits go unanswered. So I went back into the ring, even though I could barely see.

I took one last hit, and from there I was able to lock on to my opponent, and I never lost him. It was weird; he was fast, and I couldn’t see his fists coming at this point–at least not fast enough to see them and react. I was fighting more on his movement, and on my instincts. I dodged the next two punches, and then landed a first kick, then a second, then punch, punch, punch, punch. He went out of the ring and over the judge’s table. My opponent was rattled and his coach took him out of the fight right there. It was over–I won.

Listen, I get it–I’m not blind, and those who are deserve more credit than I could ever give, because overcoming  their challenges make them true heroes. I recount that story because, while I was watching Daredevil, I couldn’t help but think about what it was like to fight with my terribly poor vision.

It would’ve been so easy to give up the fight. Everyone was so quick to count me out. But, I got back up and fought, and that’s what mattered. Charlie Cox makes me believe a blind man can fight better than most people with typical vision, and makes me believe he has what it takes to get back up no matter what. This scene was moving to watch, and what cements this series as an instant MCU classic around here.

JT

p.s: Here’s a photo from just after my fight, for the doubters!