I think it'll be a good thing if they can start moving the Daredevil franchise beyond Frank Miller's stuff, or just ending the franchise altogether.
On one hand, Miller's stuff is definitive, both for Miller creatively, and for Daredevil as a concept. That isn't to say there aren't any other Daredevil stories, but that after Miller's work, there may not be any stories that work within the context that Miller so concretely delivered. Just about every other major run on the franchise has heavily borrowed, if not outright copied, Miller's work. Very few creators even want to TRY and expand the franchise beyond or apart from Miller's framework because they fear that the character will lose whatever it is that made it special to them.
That said, I've actually enjoyed some of the attempts to wildly depart from Miller's work - particularly Karl Kesel's early run where it was clear he was trying to create a new set of enemies that provided a good thematic balances with Matt Murdock, without being Bullseye, Kingpin, Gladiator, Nuke, Elektra and the Hand. I liked Mr. Hyde, and the Eel, and some of the more off-the-wall ideas that Kesel threw in there. No one was quite sure where he was going, or if it would be any good, but you had to respect his courage to TRY and move things beyond that tired old set of toys.
On one hand, Miller's stuff is definitive, both for Miller creatively, and for Daredevil as a concept. That isn't to say there aren't any other Daredevil stories, but that after Miller's work, there may not be any stories that work within the context that Miller so concretely delivered. Just about every other major run on the franchise has heavily borrowed, if not outright copied, Miller's work. Very few creators even want to TRY and expand the franchise beyond or apart from Miller's framework because they fear that the character will lose whatever it is that made it special to them.
That said, I've actually enjoyed some of the attempts to wildly depart from Miller's work - particularly Karl Kesel's early run where it was clear he was trying to create a new set of enemies that provided a good thematic balances with Matt Murdock, without being Bullseye, Kingpin, Gladiator, Nuke, Elektra and the Hand. I liked Mr. Hyde, and the Eel, and some of the more off-the-wall ideas that Kesel threw in there. No one was quite sure where he was going, or if it would be any good, but you had to respect his courage to TRY and move things beyond that tired old set of toys.
1 comment:
I began reading Daredevil at the start of Kesel's run (by pure coincidence), and absolutely adored every line he wrote. Still think he was one of the best Daredevil writers ever, and that the character has room for both the grim-and-gritty take and the lighter side. Whatever happened to the guy who could mouth off to Spider-Man when Spider-Man needed it?
If I were writing Daredevil at this point, I would kill him off. Dead. Mess around with the title as Daredevil-without-Daredevil for a while, clear out some deadwood, then bring him back without a lot of the baggage. Maybe even get him out of Hell's Kitchen for a while (I know, sacrilege!) and send him on an interesting little odyssey.
Part of what made Miller's run so great was that he filled in gaps that no one had thought to fill in. That's great, but now that the gaps are filled in, it's time to build.
I buy Daredevil every month because he's my favorite character, but he has really had some godawful writers in the last few years. Ed Brubaker left him in a fairly good place, but Andy Diggle has not impressed me with what he's done with Brubaker's golden setup.
Kill him off. Reboot him. It's time for some new stories. (It's really sad when you can say this about your favorite character.)
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