I finished the final two episodes this afternoon. There will be some spoilers in this section so if you haven’t watched the show yet you are hereby warned. I still love the show, but here were my problems.
**********************SPOILERS********************SPOILERS****************SPOILERS*****************SPOILERS
I had loved the Ben Urich character because he was the older, wiser man to the kids. I had been worried that he was going to come to bad end which would end up turning the character into Hollywood’s “magic negro”, and unfortunately they did just that. I am also getting quite tired of watching a movie and knowing the sympathetic actor of color is going to die. I half watched Pompei the other night, and yep, Jon Snow’s… er gladiator dude’s best friend ends up dying so he can escape. At least in this one the young lovers don’t life happily ever after. But I digress.
Karen. I had started out caring about this character, and really liking the fact they seemed to be hooking the pretty blond up with the schlubby sidekick/best friend. But that seemed to get erased in the season finale, and it was hinted that she and Matt would get together. Dull. Been there, done that, have the tee shirt.
I know Karen was supposed to be the voice of justice, but she ended up coming across as obsessed and fanatical. I found many of her actions in the later episodes to be problematic if not down right disturbing. Where she really lost me was the manipulation of poor Ben regarding a retirement home. Leading him to believe this was about his beloved wife and then doing the bait and switch made me despise her. There was the hint when she shot Wesley that there is some darkness in the lady so I’ll reserve judgment until I’ve seen more of her. I just have to say that I lost all sympathy with the character, and really wish we had more of Claire instead.
I thought the fact that Leland, the accountant was the snake was telegraphed a little too obviously, but maybe that’s because I write these things that I had figured him for the Judas early on in the series.
I really liked the conclusion where Matt takes down Fisk, but nobody dies and Fisk is going to face judgment in a court of law. Too often these shows devolve to redemptive violence and nothing else. This was a very pleasant change.
Bottom line. I can’t wait for the second season of this show.
I know in the comic that Ben survived his attack from Kingpin and that it was a close thing. I’m sad they killed him as he was a great asset to Daredevil in the comics.
I rather liked Karen becoming obsessed. It makes sense to me. Fisk, and the mysterious “they” killed a man and tried to make it look like she did it. then they tried to kill her. following those kind of events she doesn’t get any sort of crisis counseling. It will be interesting to see how they develop her character in the wake of Fisk being caught. Will she continue to look for someone to blame or will she confront her feelings and the trauma of the attack.
as much as I want to see Season 2, I want to see AKA Nora Jones more. I want to see how they develop the Defenders
It was totally fair to have her become so obsessed, but I liked Ben so much that that stunt at the nursing home just turned me against her. Her line about how “Do you think this is the first time I’ve shot someone?” was intriguing as hell so I began to think there is something more going on with her then meets the eye.
Lots of changes from the comic’s bible, but that happens.
No, Foggy never gets the girl.
Much as I loved “Daredevil”– I think it’s the best thing to come out of Marvel’s Cinematic Universe by a significant reach– I had a couple of problems with it, too, mostly similar to yours, Ms. Snodgrass. By the time it was over, I didn’t much care about Karen Page, and I still don’t think that Ben should have died. I also think that the whole dichotomy between “lawyer by day, vigilante by night” isn’t getting enough focus.
Be that as it may, this was still an awesome show.
That being said, it’s still only second best in my personal list of current superhero visual entertainment. I loved “Daredevil,” sure… but the current TV version of “the Flash” is my absolute favorite superhero show/movie *ever.*
I can’t decide which one I like best. I think it’s between Arrow and Agents of SHIELD. Gotham is okay, but not totally working for me. I like the Flash but I can’t stand his love interest. It frankly squicks me because they were raised together, and the actress just isn’t convincing me. As usual I’m fascinated by the bad guy. Harrison Wells is so interesting.
The love interest thing doesn’t bother me– because for the first eleven years of their lives, they *were not* raised together. By that point, it’s harder to forge brother/sister bonds. Not impossible, no, but harder, so I can understand the feelings going the other way.
The actress… I agree with you there. She’s kind of… blah. She shows up, she reads her lines, but I don’t get the feeling that she really cares about her character the way Grant Gustin and Carlos Valdes seem to care about theirs. In fact, the way most of the rest of the cast seems to be invested in their characters.
AoS is going cold for me– I am sick unto my very death of the GOOD GUYS not trusting each other, and they’ve taken that too far, dragged it out too long.
Of course, I’m about to give up on the non-Netflix parts of the Marvel Cinematic Universe anyway. (All of the Netflix shows are, it is said, going to keep a bit of distance between themselves and the “main” MCU, like “Daredevil” did. And I’m a complete Iron Fist fanboy.) As of “Captain America: Civil War,” I can’t imagine spending the money– as it was the “Civil War” crossover event that caused me to stop reading Marvel Comics.
I love Captain America, and the films so far, and while Tony Stark is amusing he really is a dick so I’m rather looking forward to Civil War, but as I said in a puppies post — that’s why we have lots of flavors of ice cream because not all of us are exactly alike.
I agree with you about the quality of this series, and about the qualify of performance. I especially love the fact that they are portraying Wilson Fisk’s relationship with Vanessa (for whom no last name was ever given in the comics other than “Fisk” after she married the Kingpin). Despite being villains, theirs is one of the great epic romances of all comic book history.
Regarding Karen… something that might not be apparently to people who aren’t aware of the character’s history in the comics is that Karen Paige might seem to be this sweet girl who makes a wonderful love interest for Matt (and Foggy, but mostly Matt), but the truth from the comics is she’s utterly and completely unreliable, untrustworthy, and the moment she see’s a percentage in it she’ll stick the knife in Matt or Foggy’s back and twist it for her own advantage.
The character’s comic book history includes experience in the porn industry and drug and alcohol addiction. The absolute low point for her was when she quite literally sold Matt Murdock’s personal information (real name, address, who his friends were, and so on) to Wilson Fisk for the low-low price of her next hit of heroine. (It led to Matt Murdock losing everything he had that was good in his life, including his license to practice law, his home, his credibility, and the lives of almost all of his friends.)
No one who has been reading the comics for any length of time was surprised that they portrayed Karen as manipulative and dark. They’ve only begun to scratch the surface when it comes to her actual nature.
Thanks for filling me in on that background, Jack. This is excellent! In that case they are handling the character perfectly because I went from sympathy to disliking her and ultimately distrusting her. That’s good writing.
The love story between Fisk and Vanessa was remarkable. Those were the moments when you saw this lost, lonely man, and that he could be courtly and elegant, but D’Onofrio’s performance was breathtaking. He really deserves to be nominated for an Emmy for that performance. That sense of suppressed rage made you just shiver while you watched him.
Actually, in the comics. Karen Page sold *just Daredevil’s real name,* nothing else, to a drug dealer, not to Fisk. The dealer passed it up the line– and died for it, as the Kingpin gave orders that everyone in his organization who had seen the information was to be killed.
Look for the Daredevil “Born Again” trade paperback if you want to read the story– it’s one of the last really good things that Frank Miller did, and has some absolutely amazing moments in it.