By Roy Thomas, Gene Colan, Barry Smith, Gerry Conway & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-1724-7
Marvel Comics built its fan-base through audacious, contemporary stories with spectacular art and by creating a shared continuity that closely followed the characters through not just their own titles but also through the many guest appearances in other comics. Such an interweaving meant that even today completists and fans seek out extraneous stories simply to get a fuller picture of their favourites’ adventures.
In such an environment, series such as ‘Essential‘ and DC’s ‘Showcase‘ are an invaluable and economical format which approaches the status of a public service for collectors and fans. This particular edition, reprinting the exploits of a very different Daredevil to the one radicalised urban vigilante of Frank Miller and his successors, covers the period from February 1969 (#49) to March 1971 (#74), and includes Iron Man #35-36 wherein two complex extended storylines converged and somewhat confusingly concluded (see what I mean about cross-collecting?).
Matt Murdock is a blind lawyer whose other senses hyper-compensate, making him a astonishing acrobat, formidable fighter and a living lie-detector. Very much a second-string hero for most of his early years, Daredevil was nonetheless a very popular one, due in large part to the captivatingly humanistic art of Gene Colan. He fought gangsters, a variety of super-villains and even the occasional or monster alien invasion. He quipped and wise-cracked his way through life and life-risking combat, utterly unlike the grim, moody quasi-religious metaphor he’s been seen as in latter years.
In these tales from the pivotal era of relevancy, social awareness and increasing political polarisation the man Without Fear was also growing into the conscience of a generation…
The action commences with Stan Lee’s final scripts on the sightless crusader. ‘Daredevil Drops Out’ (#49), illustrated by Colan and the great George Klein, saw Murdock as the target of a robotic assassin built by Mad-Scientist-for-Hire Starr Saxon; a tense action-packed thriller which grew into something very special with the second chapter ‘If in Battle I Fall…!’ when neophyte penciller Barry Smith stepped in, ably augmented by veteran inker Johnny Craig.
Lee left comics Boy Wonder Roy Thomas to finish up for him in ‘Run, Murdock, Run!’ (Daredevil #51, with art by Smith & Klein), a wickedly gripping, frantically escalating psychedelic thriller which saw Saxon uncover the hero’s greatest secret as the Man Without Fear succumbed to toxins in his bloodstream and went berserk. The saga ended in stunning style on ‘The Night of the Panther!’ (Smith &Craig) as African Avenger Black Panther joined the hunt for the out-of-control DD and subsequently helped contain, if not defeat, the dastardly Saxon.
Moreover the ending blew away all the conventions of traditional Fights ‘n’ Tights melodrama and still shocks me today…
Colan & Klein returned for #53’s ‘As it Was in he Beginning…’ as Thomas reprised, revised and expanded Stan Lee’s origin script from Daredevil #1 whilst the hero came to a bold decision, executed in #54 as ‘Call him Fear!’ featured the “death†of Matt Murdock and the triumphant return of long-lost villain Mr. Fear. ‘Cry Coward!’ (beginning a superb inking run by the legendary Syd Shores) revealed DD’s desperate reason for faking his demise and saw the end of one of Horn-Head’s greatest foes.
‘…And Death Came Riding!’ opened a tense two-parter which forever changed Murdock’s relationship with the perennially loved-from-afar Karen Page and introduced a stunningly sinister new menace in Death’s-Head. By the end of ‘In the Midst of Life…!’ Matt and Karen were enjoying the most progressive and mature relationship in mainstream comics…
‘Spin-Out on Fifth Avenue!’ started to re-establish some civilian stability as the resurrected Mr. Murdock became a prosecutor for New York District Attorney Foggy Nelson and went after a mysterious new gang-boss dubbed Crime-Wave. As the soap operatic plot-threads took hold new threats were waiting such as the amped-up biker Stunt-Master and #59’s far nastier hired assassin who proved ‘The Torpedo Will Get You if you Don’t Watch Out!’
‘Showdown at Sea!’ finished the career of the insidious Crime-Wave and signalled a return to single issue action-based stories beginning with ‘Trapped… by the Trio of Doom!’ featuring a spectacular struggle against Cobra, Mr. Hyde and The Jester whilst the Batman analogue from the Squadron Sinister (see Essential Avengers volume 4) attempted to destroy DD in ‘Quoth the Nighthawk “Nevermoreâ€!’
Horn-Head stopped deadly psychopath Melvin Potter from busting out of jail in ‘The Girl… or the Gladiator’ at the cost of his love-life, then followed the star-struck Karen to Hollywood and took out his bad mood on a handy hood in ‘Suddenly… The Stunt-Master!’ Murdock stayed in Los Angeles to oversee Karen’s first acting gig – a pastiche of then-hot spooky TV show Dark Shadows – and stopped her becoming part of a murder spree in ‘The Killing of Brother Brimstone’, a classy whodunit which cataclysmically climaxed in ‘…And One Cried Murder!’
Still stuck on the West Coast DD tackled another old enemy as ‘Stilt-Man Stalks the Soundstage’ with the now-reformed Stunt-Master ably assisting our hero. Matt finally left Karen to the vicissitudes of Tinseltown, landing in New York just in time to become embroiled in a plot blending radical politics and the shady world of Boxing – ‘The Phoenix and the Fighter.’
The Black Panther returned seeking a favour in ‘A Life on the Line’ as kid gangs and the birth of the “Black Power†movement leapt from the news headlines to comicbook pages and youth protest also inspired the seditious menace of ‘The Tribune’ (written by Gary Friedrich) as youthful ideologues, cynical demagogues and political bombers tore the city apart. The unrest peaked in Daredevil #71 as Roy Thomas returned for his swansong to script the concluding ‘If An Eye Offend Thee…!’
New sensation Gerry Conway took over the scripting with the next issue, easing himself in with an interdimensional fantasy frolic as DD encountered a mirror dwelling mystery man named Tagak in ‘Lo! The Lord of the Leopards!’ before plunging readers into an ambitious crossover yarn which began in Iron Man #35 wherein the Armoured Avenger, seductive free agent Madame Masque and Nick Fury all wanted ‘Revenge!’ (Conway, Don Heck & Mike Esposito) for the near-fatal wounding of S.H.I.E.L.D agent Jasper Sitwell by the mercenary Spymaster.
Their efforts were somehow fuelling an alien artefact called the Zodiac Key and, when its creators sucked DD into the mix to battle Spymaster and a bunch of super-villains affiliated to the cosmic device, everybody got shanghaied to another universe in ‘Behold… the Brotherhood!’ (Daredevil #73, illustrated by Colan & Shores) before the epic concluded with extreme briskness in Iron Man #36.
Oddly though, ‘Among Us Stalks the Ramrod!’ (Conway, Heck & Esposito) concludes the crossover by page 8, yet continues for another 12 with the remainder of Shell-Head’s battle against an alien terra-former. Moreover the episode ends on a cliffhanger you’ll need Essential Iron Man Volume 3 to see resolved…
Daredevil #74 concludes this impressive outing with a mercifully complete conundrum as DD finds himself ‘In the Country of the Blind!’ and must thwart a criminal plot to cripple New York…
The social upheaval of the period produced a lot of impressively earnest material that only hinted at the true potential of Daredevil. These beautifully illustrated yarns may occasionally jar with their heartfelt stridency but the honesty and desire to be a part of a solution rather than blithely carry on as if nothing was happening affords them a potency that no historian, let alone comics fan, can dare to ignore.
And the next volume heads even further into uncharted territory…
© 1969, 1970, 1971, 2005 Marvel Characters, Inc. All Rights Reserved.