At this point, I am wondering, "is this a masterpiece?" Disney/Marvel have had quite a few shows from, 'The Falcon and the Winter Soldier', 'Loki', WandaVision' (and I believe this was the initial order they were going for until the Pandemic happened and they had to move shows around), but you also had 'Hawkeye', 'Moon Knight', 'Ms. Marvel', 'She-Hulk', 'Secret Invasion', 'Echo', 'Agatha All Along' and now 'Daredevil: Born Again'. I am not counting the 'What If...?' show or 'Your Friendly Neighbourhood Spider-Man as those are animated. I can also hazard a guess that the shows that felt undercooked and did not resonate well with the fans, were the shows that 1). started just before the pandemic and 2). during the reign of Bob Chapek who wanted everything to come out thick and fast. I am not making excuses for Disney/Marvel as I am well aware that it is quite possible that Disney took a swing and missed with such shows as 'Hawkeye', 'Moon Knight' & 'She-Hulk'. The first two were decent and could have been developed more but a complete miss with 'She-Hulk' (although I enjoyed it), but ultimately did not hit like it probably should have. 'Secret Invasion' had all the potential and seemed to me as though it had to be pushed out. What we could have had would have been great, amazing even, but the correct people or the money needed or both, were not there. Nobody even dares to mention the show although it did have some great moments. acting, dialogue and energy. And 'Echo', a show where I personally feel that Echo was stuck at a crossroads. Echo leads onto Daredevil and of course, they were bringing Daredevil back, but they were not sure if they could or wanted to go "Netflix-level" dark with the content for Daredevil or Echo due to it being Disney. I think they changed their minds repeatedly and we ended up getting what we got, something that felt like it was halfway in and halfway out of the grittiness that was the Marvel Netflix series. They couldn't quite get it there. Plus the character should have been written better and given more. The character of Echo is unique and cool, but I mean, you can tell which shows they fully focused on and had a clear vision for, 'WandaVision', 'The Falcon and the Winter Soldier' (although that had issues due to the pandemic and had to restructure and re-write it), 'Loki' (especially 'Loki season 2'), 'Ms. Marvel' and 'Agatha All Along' (off the back of the success of WandaVision). This leads me to believe that the changes they made with this show, 'Daredevil Born Again', they truly focused on this show. It was said that Daredevil would not suit up until maybe the 5th or 6th episode and the show was more of a court procedural until they cut it up and made changes and started from scratch. Watching the show now and having got to episode 4, I gather the show has made some significant changes but had left the skeleton of what they had and if I am honest, it has been great!
I did not think I would shed a tear during this episode. The last episode almost caught me, ALMOST, but this episode, wow! The fact that I have seen the initial Netflix series which this show is a continuation of, having that level of connection with the characters built up over the years, I shed a tear, seriously. I will not go into specifics due to spoilers, but the episode really got to me because sometimes, we will press on with life and say everything is alright when deep down, it is not. You could bury or try to bury your feelings as deep down as you can, but they will resurface at some point and in this show, in this episode, you bare witness to that. Just like Season 2 of the Netflix series, there is a very well-written and important conversation happening and the internal battle is strong. This episode for me, was brilliant in every way because the streets are talking, Mayor Fisk and Vanessa are finally opening up and we now have the (re-)introduction of Muse. Remember in my last review for the previous episode, I said something along the lines of, "Things are bubbling under the surface", I can only assume that, from episode 5, maybe even 6, everything is kicking ALL THE WAY OFF! There are 9 episodes this season and the next 5 episodes are going to be absolute fire. Maybe Matt puts on the costume at the end of the Next episode, but I feel like I can almost guarantee with all the parallels, that face-off is about to go down really soon!
