The 4th episode of Daredevil: Born Again saw the return of Jon Bernthal’s iteration of Punisher. After failing to keep his client, Leroy Bradford, out of jail, Matt Murdock decided to confront Frank Castle for his alleged involvement in the murder of Hector Ayala. Of course, Castle hadn’t killed Ayala, but Murdock wanted Castle to understand that his brand of vigilantism and violence was inspiring the wrong crowd, i.e., New York’s “finest.” Meanwhile, Castle wanted Murdock to accept that he had failed Foggy Nelson; he wasn’t happy that Benjamin Poindexter had gotten life imprisonment, and he was raring to cross some lines in order to ensure true justice was served. While these two screamed at each other for a bit, it was revealed that Wilson Fisk had Adam—the guy that Vanessa had an affair with—imprisoned in his personal art museum and was punishing him each day for romancing his wife while he was away or incapacitated. Anyway, let’s talk about the two episodes of Daredevil: Born Again that have been released today where Murdock fights a bunch of bank robbers and Muse.
Spoiler Alert
Matt Murdock Sort Of Foils A Bank Robbery
Episode 5 of Daredevil: Born Again opens on a sour note as it brings back Mohan Kapur in the role of Yusuf Khan. Last I checked, the actor was allegedly accused of sexual harassment, but I guess Marvel Studios and Disney don’t care all about that and are more interested in connecting this show with Ms. Marvel and The Marvels. Anyway, if fans enjoy this kind of stuff, who am I to judge? Well, I will judge; there’s no stopping me from doing that, but I am well aware of the fact that my judgemental criticism won’t change anything when it comes to hiring alleged sexual harassers into million-dollar franchises. Anyway, Murdock is at New York Mutual to get some funding for his law firm, Murdock and McDuffie, but his proposal is rejected because most of their clientele are people who can’t afford to pay Murdock and the lawyers working for him. So, Murdock takes Yusuf’s leave, and, right after he exits the building, Devlin (one of the members of the Five Families) and his gang walk in with the intention of robbing the place so that their boss, Luca, has the money he has been ordered to give to Viktor by Fisk. So, Murdock reenters the bank, after telling Kirsten McDuffie to dial 911, in order to do some covert vigilantism.
Detective Angie Kim, Officer Rodriguez, and the NYPD cordon off the surrounding area and begin establishing a line of communication with the robbers. Very long story short, Matt figures out that Devlin and his crew are there for a diamond that’s in the vault. When one of the masked men takes Yusuf to open those highly secure chambers, Murdock makes an excuse to go to the loo. He incapacitates Devlin’s henchmen and takes the gemstone so that he can bargain for the lives of all the people who are being held hostage there. Also, Murdock is aware of the fact that the NYPD are about to barge into the place, and he wants to avoid as much collateral damage as possible. Of course, Devlin is not willing to negotiate, but Murdock manages to stall him until the police arrive. Chaos ensues, and Devlin passes on what he thinks is the gemstone to one of the hostages, who is actually an accomplice. He himself exits the bank by masquerading as a police officer. However, he is cornered by Matt, who proceeds to absolutely shatter Devlin’s knees.
At the end of Daredevil: Born Again episode 5, it’s revealed that Matt had switched the diamond with a piece of candy. Therefore, while the fake hostage only has something to satiate her sweet tooth, the real prize is sitting in Yusuf’s bowl of sweets. Yeah, that’s it. This would’ve been a great bottle episode if it had some good dialogue, some semblance of tension, and some well-edited action sequences. Also, it would’ve been great if it didn’t have an alleged sex offender in the cast. But, hey, we can’t always have it all. Moving on!
Matt Murdock Puts On The Daredevil Costume Again
Episode 6 of Daredevil: Born Again, oddly enough, opens with a recap of the events that have happened so far. FYI, this is the 6th episode. Are things so bad in terms of storytelling, and are the showrunners so unsure about the audience’s ability to remember what’s gone down that they have to do this? Well, if that’s not a sign that things are going swimmingly for this Disney-fied soft reboot of the story of the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen, I don’t know what is. Anyway, Murdock has a conversation with Heather Glenn about the book that she is writing on vigilantes, while Fisk has a chat with Luca on the topic of the money that he has been ordered to pay to Viktor for inconveniencing him (Luca can’t fulfil that demand because Murdock foiled the robbery that he conducted via Devlin). These are really badly written scenes, but it’s enough to set up Heather’s run-in with Muse and Fisk’s falling out with the Five Families. Until that happens, Fisk resumes his mayoral duties, and he learns from John Santini from the Sanitation Department that a supervillain called Muse is going around draining the blood out of people and using it to paint murals all across New York City. Murdock learns about Muse as well from Angela, Hector’s niece.
As per Angela, prior to his untimely death, Hector was looking into the kidnappings that were happening in and around the old Q line, and she thinks that they need to look further into it so that the work that had been started by White Tiger can be completed. While Murdock beats around the bush about putting the suit back on again and partaking in some good old vigilantism, we see Fisk chatting with members of the NYPD, then with Vanessa (something about power and whatnot), and then with the second cameo-of-the-week appearance: Jack Duquesne a.k.a. Swordsman. Fisk eventually tells Chief Gallo to organize a task force made of every corrupt cop in the NYPD. He says that he is doing this to go after masked characters like Muse, but it’s obvious that he is going to use this task force to commence his reign of terror over the city. So, while Fisk arms his hitmen with the latest weaponry, Angela goes looking for Muse and gets abducted by him. When Murdock gets a call from Soledad Ayala that Angela has gone missing, he finally puts on his Daredevil suit and tracks down Angela.
Matt Saves Angela From Muse
At the end of Daredevil: Born Again episode 6, we finally get the show’s first decent action sequence where, on one hand, Murdock fights Muse, and on the other, Fisk fights Adam. Murdock and Fisk incapacitate Muse and Adam, respectively, but while Muse gets to escape, Adam has nowhere to go. Fisk is seen marinating in his latest bout of violence, and Murdock rescues a half-dead Angela. The end. I suppose the repercussions of this event will be seen in the remaining two episodes of this season of the show. There are several vigilantes and masked supervillains running around in NYC, and Fisk’s task force is going to kill or otherwise hunt down all of them indiscriminately. Since Matt has put on the suit again, thereby breaking his treaty with Fisk, he is back on his radar again.
Also, I’m sure Muse is going to go after Heather because he did show up in the second episode in his unmasked form at her book signing with the intention of getting therapy from her. I don’t think Muse knows that Heather is Daredevil’s girlfriend, but he probably is aware of her work on vigilantes and their psyche. Therefore, maybe he is going to seek her counsel after his altercation with Murdock, thereby unknowingly extending his rivalry with the man without fear. Well, stay tuned for some more boring storytelling and prepare yourself for an abrupt ending to Season 1 of the show so that that lack of closure gets you to watch the next season. Isn’t this fun?
