One of the first articles I wrote for the Odyssey several months ago was about binge watching Netflix/Marvel's original series, "Jessica Jones." If you read that article, you may remember I also spent some time talking about that same partnership's "Daredevil" series which had come out several months earlier, and which I also binge watched. Well, this weekend, season two of "Daredevil" was released, and I gave it the same treatment. So here I am to give you my report.
First of all, I will be keeping this spoiler free--at least I won't be telling you anything that you wouldn't know if you have seen season one and/or seen the promotions for season two. I don't want to tell you what happens, I just want to tell you why you should watch it despite anything you might hear from critics. That being said, go watch season one. It's insanely good. The character of Matt Murdock/Daredevil might be tainted for you after the Ben Affleck movie version, but I guarantee that this series will fix that for you.
The first season of "Daredevil" did something that no Marvel production has done effectively or consistently. It went dark. There weren't just ambiguous references to "drugs" as a blanket term, or organized criminals in a part of some made up gang. Matt Murdock is fighting the Yakuza, Russian mob, Mexican cartels, all of which absolutely exist. And they aren't just committing crimes; they are selling heroin and selling teenage girls to become sex slaves. Heroin, you guys. The worst drug. And human trafficking? Not just a character saying those words, but actually going into a heavily guarded mob warehouse with young girls to be their cargo. Dark.
None of the characters actually refer to Daredevil as "Daredevil" until the last five minutes of the last episode of the season. Even then, Matt Murdock thinks it's a stupid name. It was just something a newspaper made up to sell papers. Up until that point he is usually just referred to as "the man in the black mask" because he does, in fact, wear a black mask. He doesn't get his red costume (which in this case is justified because it is also body armor) until the final episode as well.
Season two keeps both of these things going. Even though the Daredevil moniker has been established by now, it's still used very few times. The season also brings in the characters Elektra and The Punisher, which you already know if you've seen any of the teasers or promotions. Elektra's name is Elektra, which is the kind of name that only a super hero or a stripper could have, and The Punisher doesn't even cover his face or try to hide his identity. He is Frank Castle.
You might remember the first Punisher movie from way back when, starring Thomas Jane as Frank Castle, and John Travolta as the guy Frank Castle wants to kill. As far as I can tell it was the first 'R' rated movie that Marvel had produced until "Deadpool" was released last February, and its lack of success was frequently cited as the reason no one tried to make another one until recently. It wasn't terrible--not nearly as bad Daredevil's first depiction--but neither was it particularly successful.
However, you can't tell a PG-13 version of Frank Castle's story. The exact circumstances may vary depending on what you're reading or watching, but he is always some sort of highly trained special forces agent who witnesses his wife and children being murdered by organized criminals. Then he gets revenge. With bullets. Lots and lots of bullets. He doesn't hunt these people down so that they can be punished, by the way. He hunts them down to punish them himself. Hence the name. He doesn't actually have any super powers unless you count the destruction he leaves behind, which could be confused as the work of an army of people rather than a single man.
In season two of "Daredevil," Frank Castle is played by Jon Bernthal, who you might recognize as Shane from "The Walking Dead" on AMC. He is what keeps this season interesting. I will fully acknowledge that this season was not nearly as good as the first, which is what most critics will tell you. But that doesn't mean it wasn't good. The issue is that season two was very obviously setting up season three, and that seemed to be most of its purpose.
The first few episodes are fantastic. Just like the first season, it's not clear what the bigger plot is right away. But you can recognize that they are putting pieces on the table for something bigger, and that something bigger doesn't reveal its entire plot until later in the season. Unfortunately, many of the pieces brought out this season were never used and the something bigger wasn't revealed until much too late and was fairly underwhelming.
That could also describe Marvel's film production strategy. Consider "Daredevil" the original series equivalent of the first "Iron Man" film. Both were sort of testing the waters. Larger plans were clearly in the works, but they had to wait to see how successful their original gambit would be before they could start implementing anything. You can imagine there probably wouldn't have been an "Avengers" film if "Iron Man" had completely tanked.
Similarly, "Daredevil" set the stage for the next Netflix original "Jessica Jones," which took the darkness baton and ran off the track with it. The two series overlap and occasionally borrow a character from one another, much like the Marvel films. Not only will "Jessica Jones" have at least a second season, it also introduced the character Luke Cage, who is getting his own series coming out this fall. Since these Netflix shows take place in the same Marvel universe as the films, with references to both Avengers movies scattered around, it's pretty clear that after proving their potential for success they're merely becoming more cogs in the larger Marvel machine.
As much as I love what Marvel has been doing, and I do so very, very much, their focus on the larger universe often takes away from the individual bodies of work. Many of the writers and directors have noted in interviews, after finishing their work with Marvel, that Marvel has a very heavy hand in the final decisions of what goes into the films. For instance, Edgar Wright was originally meant to direct "Ant Man," but he quit when Marvel continued forcing their larger plans on his script. Joss Whedon finished his contract with Marvel after the second Avengers film and was glad to be done with them for the same reason. Whedon became increasingly frustrated with the scenes that Marvel forced him to include, since their only purpose was setting up future films. The vague scene where Thor goes to some kind of vision pool was just setting up the third film in his franchise. And it was an excuse to get Chris Hemsworth shirtless, which I think he is contractually obligated to do at this point. But that scene stops any and all momentum of the movie it was actually a part of.
And that was the problem with season two of "Daredevil" as well. It was too dedicated to setting up plots and characters we weren't going to see pay off until at least next season, if not later. It's the "Iron Man 2" of the Netflix portion of the Marvel Universe--although its mistakes may have actually been more egregious. And it still wasn't that bad. It started out great, lulled in the middle, picked itself up toward the end. There were great moments peppered throughout, but it was too obvious of a tool. That being said, I'll be damned if I'm not excited for season three and the possibility of a Punisher spin-off.
