Its been three episodes already of Daredevil Born Again season 2 and the show is finally starting to remember what it used to be, first two episodes were kinda draggy specially the premier, because the older Netflix run had this particular quality and this episode gets closer to that feeling with all the fights and specially with potentially a new White Tiger been born, which makes me both relieved and a little frustrated that it took this long to get here, I was expecting this kind of action right from the start but it is what it is. Matt Murdock is still carrying around all that blinded by justice guilt, still moving between justice, range and anger like a man who cannot decide which version of himself he wants to be, and Karen and the remaining allies on his side are trying to hold things together while Fisk get closer and closer to them, but you already knew all that if you have been watching because the show has been building this particular pressure cooker for weeks now. What this episode does differently is that it actually releases some of that pressure and puts Matt in situations where he stops talking about what he should do and just starts doing it, and I forgot how much I missed watching this guy work because the courtroom version of this character is fine but the version who uses every sense he has to tear through a room full of AVTF guys while bleeding all over the place is the reason any other DareDevil fan wants to watch this series. The vibe throughout this one feels heavier than the last couple of weeks, like the show took a step back and said okay enough setup, pedal to the metal, and the result is the closest thing to the old show this season has delivered, which for me personally after being on the fence about this whole revival is exactly what I needed to see.
- IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt18923754/
- Platform: DISNEY+
The episode builds the story of Matt getting back into his badass mode during a really good damn fight sequence inside Fisk Red Hook prison, where he teams up with Jack Duquesne and helps free the prisoners while Karen is working the escape from the outside, and the whole sequence is the kind of tight fast choreography that reminds you why this character works so much better in motion than in a courtroom. Although its not just the action itself but the way they use the environment to show how Matt operates differently from everyone else in that space, because the bad guys are spraying bullets and hoping for the best while Matt is using every sound and surface and air current to know exactly where each person is before he even gets close to them, and it is a detail that a lot of superhero productions skip entirely but this show has always understood it. Jack Duquesne as swords man, getting some actual shine here felt right because bringing more muscle to the good guy side makes the fight feel more real when Fisk sends people to clean things up, and the cast carried every moment even when they were just two people moving through darkness trying to find an exit before the whole situation turned into a graveyard, there were a lot of prisoner and the AVTF was instructed to shoot them down to stop escaping, this were mostly non vigilante just regular people, innocent people. It is the kind of sequence that wipes your memory of the slow parts because you are watching a human being work through a crowd of thugs with nothing but his fists and about forty years worth of anger, and it is dope to see, it is the show operating at the level it is supposed to operate at.
Everything about the introduction of Angela Del Toro as the new White Tiger felt rushed to me but exciting too, you can see it coming a mile away, she is still early in her story as a hero so her tough talk came across flat and the whole thing felt too compress, because she is standing there trying to talk big to seasoned criminals and it just sounds like someone who has watched too many movies and not enough actual street level violence, the girl weights 100 pounds at most, any guy from the AVTF slaps her and put her to sleep. The character is not trash but they need to give her a real situation to react to instead of just having her stand in the corner looking intense while the people who actually know what they are doing handle the hard stuff. The whole story is simple but it gets cold when Fisk moves to destroy the wrecked Northern Star and control the aftermath in a way that keeps his hands clean on paper, and you could see he felt like garbage during his conversation with Vanessa about it, but he went ahead anyway because that is who Wilson Fisk is, he is not just a power hungry businessman but a monster who will bury any evidence that threatens his grip on the city and feel bad about it for exactly thirty seconds before moving on. The ship related scene is probably the most disturbing part of the episode because it shows how deeply that control goes, and the way everyone around Fisk just executes without asking questions shows you how completely he owns the people in his orbit right now.
The psychiatrist situation is the one thread that really has me looking sideways at the screen, because she is keeping Muse mask in her desk drawer and acting like she is hearing things in between sessions creating this spark that she might turn into Muse soon or latter, btch be crazy. The whole psychological aspect of her scenes reminds me of how Hannibal used to play with its supporting characters before they became something dangerous. Her scenes are quiet and unsettling creating this massive contrast to the explosions, shooting and bone cracking fights happening everywhere else in the episode its like the perfect silence before the storm and one of the biggest problem I find is that she might have inside info on Fisk and Matt when she turns into the new Muse, and that contrast is doing a lot of work because we already know roughly how the physical battles are going to end but the mental games are where things get unpredictable for Matt and the people around him. She is sitting there looking like a completely put together professional while hiding the face of a serial killer in her drawer, which is some next level unhinged behavior, and it makes you feel discomfort at every other potential stable adult on this show creating this suspicion of who will turn next because you have no idea who is secretly working for which side, living in a city where the Kingpin basically runs the law.
After watching this episode Im 50/50 with it, I feel disappointed that the middle section drags in places with people going in circles over paperwork and corrupt justice theater because the scenes at the courtroom during Swordsman hearing was nothing special, but the ending was fkn nuts and it saved the whole hour from being just another bridge episode that you have to sit through to get somewhere interesting. The episode also gave us a real look into how the criminal side of this city operates, this series have many seasons in it ngl at least five season imo but I bet Disney going to cut its wings, the show is giving us a city where everyone is positioning to be smarter or faster or just breathing long enough to collect their cut and it is exactly the kind of moment the show needs more of because it reminds you that Fisk is not just a threat to Matt personally but a machine that runs on loyalty and fear and keeps grinding forward regardless of what the only hero standing could be doing, seen all those prisoners walking away was like nothing because he controls the media and who is going to believe them?. I give this episode a 7/10 because the Red Hook prison sequence and the action are dope enough to carry the weight of the weaker scenes, but the show still needs to find a way to trim the corrupt justice and vigilante trial elements down so there is more room for real confrontation, and the new heroes being introduced are going to need real moments to earn their place in this story before they stop looking like just decoration, as long as Matt Murdock keeps giving us bloody battles I will be watching week after week.
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