Episode 45 - That Daring Daredevil by Stephanie Philips

Hi everyone,  Kadiah's back and we're talking Daredevil by Stephanie Philips!

Please Send Questions and Feedback to Any of the following:

Bluesky: @comicbooksbeyond.bsky.social
Instagram: @comicbooksbeyond
Gmail: comicbooksbeyond@gmail.com

Check us out on Youtube as well!

Check out Silence Vol 5&6 on Kickstarter:

I personally backed the kickstarter, and was provided review copies of Volume 1-4

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/moomcomics/silence5-6

Artists/visual Storytellers:
Marco Klein Nijenhuis
Sascha Dörp
Soizick Jaffre
Ive Senkowski
Jorge Pautrat
Len Gog

Comic Books Beyond would like to thank:  The Crew of the Talking Comics Podcast, Brandon McNulty, Lisa and Brad from Comic Book Couples Counseling, Alex Jaffe, Jeremy Whitley and Jimmy Gaspero. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:02

Hey everyone and welcome to the Comic Books Beyond Podcast. On this show we aim to demystify comic books and help new readers find their way in. We try to keep spoilers light, but we may need to reference something somewhere. My name is Vic, and I'm here with my wife and co-host for the week.

SPEAKER_00 0:18

Hi.

SPEAKER_02 0:19

Are you living life on a delay, honey?

SPEAKER_00 0:21

Yeah, a little bit. I can hear you talk before too, but I can deal with it.

SPEAKER_02 0:26

Gotcha, sorry. Yeah, we were we're just like going through some weird growing pains with the recording right now. It's a pain, but we'll get through it.

SPEAKER_01 0:33

Yay.

SPEAKER_02 0:34

So before we go on, we have a really quick announcement. Uh this just happened today. So we were recording on April 2nd. This episode is going up April 8th. Uh, someone reached out to me on Blue Sky. This is, I am so sorry, I am probably going to mispronounce your name. Uh, Lukas Macher. Uh, I believe he is German. Uh, he reached out to me, uh, requested to see if I could uh do a little promotion for his Kickstarter he's gone he has going on. Now, this is volume five and six of the anthology series Silence. This will be called DreamSlash Nightmare. This project is very close to uh his heart, along with the uh other creators involved in this. I'll list all the creators in the uh show notes. Uh, this is a collection of wordless comics exploring dreams and nightmares of queer people told entirely through images. Uh, they publish their queer comics independently, and this one really means a lot to them. Just having some bad luck with the algorithms on Instagram and Kickstarter. This one runs through April 27th. There's a lot of tiers, a lot of rewards. Uh, all the price points are more than fair. They do have a digital option. Uh, since they're based in Berlin, uh I do need to just bring up the international shipping. We we all know it sucks. That's nobody's fault. Uh, but they do actually disclose their shipping rates. So uh if you just wanted to pick up a PDF copy, they have that option too. Uh I got to flip through the first four volumes of silence uh today. Uh and I was really impressed with a lot of the stuff I saw. Uh Cotty, you looked through it. Did you enjoy any of the stories in there?

SPEAKER_00 2:06

Well, yeah, I definitely did. Um, I like that there's not much dialogue or really any at all. Um, I thought it was a neat way to tell a story.

SPEAKER_02 2:17

Yep, definitely. There's not enough uh totally silent comics in the world, and it's cool that they're on there like sixth volume of this. And these are all anthology stories, so you don't need to have read volumes one and two, but uh or uh one and one through four, but I I think I did see a tier on there where you can just get it all if you wanted to read it. And I honestly would recommend the old volumes, they are pretty darn good. Um, I I think each story has something for someone in there. Uh all the the art styles are all really unique. Uh, I I really liked the art in these. Um one of them kind of reminded me of the um of like uh uh the mappa animes, like jujitsukaisen and chainsaw man, like the color palettes kind of reminded me of that. Uh and there was a lot of uh there was one that actually kind of reminded me of Jeff Lemir's art style. Uh and and the storytelling's really good too. I I I'm pretty impressed in what I saw on the Kickstarter, what's available out there, it those pages look really good.

SPEAKER_00 3:15

Yeah, I like the art. It was very vibrant.

SPEAKER_02 3:17

Yep. And uh some of the stories do get a little dark and mature, but I mean that's good. It's it's important parts of storytelling. So I do want to uh rate this one. This is probably more aimed at uh, you know, teenagers, adults, uh that rather than any kind of all ages, but uh it's it's really, really good. And like some of the stories are heavy, but heavy's good. And I think we're gonna try to get a uh YouTube review up, uh promotion maybe a little closer to uh sometime this week where it might already be out. Uh by the time you have it, I'll I'll try to link in the show notes if I can, and I'll promote it on Blue Sky as well. All right, so do we want to get into today's episode?

SPEAKER_00 3:57

Uh yeah. So we are reading Daredevil. It was published April 1st, 2026. The writer is Stephanie Phillips, artist and cover artist is Lee Garbit, colorist is Frank Martin, letter is BC's Ariana Maher, designer, Kat Wilkington, assistant editor Drew Baumgartner, group editor Devin Lewis, and editor-in-chief Phoebe Sabolski.

SPEAKER_02 4:24

So I really like having Katya over the other hosts do credits. One, so I don't have to, and two, just because your voice is cute.

SPEAKER_00 4:31

So thank you. I was nervous about messing up the names, but I get practice every day trying to come up how you say names of people you've never met. So that's fun.

SPEAKER_02 4:44

If it makes you feel better, I once pronounced an art artist named Jorge Himnas as George Gymnas on this show. So, you know. I I I I butcher names and I am so sorry every time I do it. I am never trying to make fun of anyone. I'm just bad at it. Alright, so what's your uh history experience with Daredevil?

SPEAKER_00 5:04

Jessica Jones, it's kind of just the Marvel Netflix series, um, and now the Disney series, too. But I really enjoy it overall. The show Daredevil is my favorite Marvel Netflix show, even though Jessica Jones is my favorite character. I just think the shows overall were a little bit better. I just really enjoy Charlie Cox.

SPEAKER_02 5:26

Yeah, I I pretty much agree with that. I think as far as you know the Netflix shows goes, season one and three of Daredevil and season one of Jessica Jones are like the high point of that whole thing. Um, I think overall Daredevil is better. I think uh season two of Jessica Jones isn't great, but season three, if I remember right, got a little bit better. Um the Luke Cade show was pretty good, the first couple episodes at least. Um I didn't make it through Defenders. Somehow I think you got through it, didn't you?

SPEAKER_00 5:58

Yeah, you fell asleep and I just powered through.

SPEAKER_02 6:01

Yeah, but I fell asleep. I mean, I think I ate a slice of pizza and uh I was asleep by the end of the first episode, and I woke up and I saw episode four playing, and I'm like, oh well, I'm just gonna go back to bed.

SPEAKER_00 6:13

Yeah. I think you watched the first like three. Yeah, it might have been like the dragon.

SPEAKER_02 6:21

It the I didn't even know there was a dragon, so um I I did not care for Iron Fist. I did not um You mean the Immortal Iron Fist? Yeah, he was very clear, and he was the Immortal Iron Iron Fist. It came up a lot in that show. Um and the Punisher show wasn't great. I liked the season of Daredevil with the Punisher, but I only really liked the episodes with the Punisher and some of the Electric. It wasn't great. Yeah, it was actually a it's one of the I'm not a big Frank Miller fan, but the Daredevil uh electro comics are better than the show. The Punisher stuff is it was good in that season, and it felt like you weren't watching the same show and he wasn't there.

SPEAKER_00 7:14

I do remember, I also am familiar with Ben Affleck's Daredevil.

SPEAKER_02 7:18

Uh so what what's your memory of the Ben Affleck Daredevil?

SPEAKER_00 7:22

Honestly, I remember Elektra better, but just that they exist and that they were very campy and bad.

SPEAKER_02 7:28

I mean, they were definitely bad. Uh I'll give it that. You are 100% right that that one was a really bad movie, and I did not watch the Electra film. The Ben Affleck movie, there was some okay stuff in that movie from what I remember, but it was just overall really, really bad. And yeah.

SPEAKER_00 7:46

Oh, I also know that Daredevil got his powers in the same accident that caused the Ninja Turtles.

SPEAKER_02 7:52

Yep, that's a good little bit of trivia. And we really should do a Ninja Turtles thing at some point, because everybody's really hype about the Ninja Turtles right now.

SPEAKER_00 8:01

I was never a big turtles personal. Yeah, me neither. I liked the video game.

SPEAKER_02 8:06

I didn't actually play much of the video game.

SPEAKER_00 8:10

It was really hard.

SPEAKER_02 8:12

I think the first time I ever played it was uh Justin's Bachelor Party like two years ago. Um but it was like those Streets of Rage and like the Simpsons arcade game and the X-Men arcade game, right?

SPEAKER_00 8:23

I've never played any of those.

SPEAKER_02 8:25

Gotcha. Uh side scroller beating punching game.

SPEAKER_00 8:28

Yep, absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 8:30

Yep, that's that's cool. I I that's what I played when I played with the guys uh like two years ago. Um apparently I was really bad at it, but that sounds right. That was before my surgery. Oh, uh, and by surgery I mean I have carpal tunnel in both wrists and had to have both my hands hacked open years ago. I'll show you the scars on Blue Sky sometimes. Um so uh my background with Daredevil, the first time I remember seeing this character, uh he showed up in a couple episodes of Spider-Man the Animated series, uh season three, episode six through eight, I had to look it up. He was also in issue 128 of Silver Surfer, and I got this in a box of comics that I got when I was much, much younger. Uh it had Silver Surfer choking both Spider-Man and Daredevil on the cover. And that really bummed me out when I was a kid. Because I was sad, you know, the good guys are fighting, and I still to this day don't like the trope of superheroes fighting each other. It's a very rare, I think it is ever done well. Uh I I was always really interested in this character because you know he just kind of reminded me of Spider-Man, but in a way he was more interesting. Um, the only thing I ever thought was like silly about him was uh, yeah, you can comic book up, you know, the blind powers and all that stuff. The thing that like ever took me out of the narrative was uh he has more or less Spider-Man's powers, and the cane uh using that as like a grappling hook is where I thought was like the silly thing, but it it kind of works.

SPEAKER_01 10:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 10:10

Um and I I think in this issue they do some cool stuff with it too. You know, I I unfortunately didn't actually get to read much Daredevil my whole life until like 2010-11 when I had my first real job and could like buy comics and not just find the ones that were available. And I read uh Guardian Devil by Kevin Smith and some of the uh Mark Wade and Charles Sowell comics around that or those early 2010s. Uh right now I'm currently working my way through uh the rest of that stuff, and I'm on the uh so I read all of Guardian Devil, then I read all of Brian Michael Bendis' run, uh, and I'm currently in the uh Ed Brewbaker stuff, and there were two writers in there uh before that. There was um David Mack, and I think his name was Bob Harris. He only had like three issues, but uh a lot of that stuff was really cool, and I'm I'm really enjoying the uh Ed Brubaker stuff. And uh I I have to say that even though I've only read maybe about a seventh or a sixth of all the Daredevil issues, which is remarkably less of most properties I've read from Marvel, it might be their overall like highest quality book from year to year. Because there are some dips in quality in the other ones. Like X-Men is a joke where like you can roll a die in uh whatever side you land on. That couple of years might be just some unreadable garbage. Or and I'm not talking about now, I'm not gonna hate on X-Men now, but in the 90s, some of it was just bad. Early days of X-Men was rough. Spider-Man is waxes and wanes and like highs, peaks, and valleys in comics. Uh Fantastic Four is usually considered uh pretty solid most most of the time, but uh, I unfortunately just haven't read as much Fantastic Four. I'm working my way through that too as well. I've been I went back to about 2000 on that one and I'm working my way up. I'm through the mid-2010s on that one. So do you have anything else you want to contribute before we continue on talking about the issue proper?

SPEAKER_00 12:16

Um nope. I think I got all my personal background out. Cool.

SPEAKER_02 12:21

Uh who do you prefer as Daredevil, Charlie Cox or Ben Affleck?

SPEAKER_00 12:24

Charlie Cox.

SPEAKER_02 12:27

Uh so we read this as a single issue. Uh I did actually get two copies from my shop. I got the standard cover and I got one of those dumb blind bags, but they were the same price apparently. So, what a blind bag is, is you it's like gambling a booster pack in a TCG player or a TCG game, and that's how you get variants. Um the one I got, I think it was I don't even remember which one. Um uh it looks pretty cool. I'll I'll put a picture up with this episode if I can. Um yeah, it was shiny. It was one of the foil variants. It's maybe worth like five, ten bucks, so I'll probably sell it or something. Um I'm not really a variant cover guy. I like the regular cover, and honestly, I'm just getting to the point where I'm getting rid of most of my singles these days. And whatever I buy these days, get the run together, put it up on eBay and sell it. That's kind of my plan. Um now you can get a digital copy of this, but this one should be heavily printed. And if you have a local comic shop that doesn't suck, we definitely recommend supporting them because I don't like uh buying digital single-use items ever. But, you know, I spend your money locally if you can. Uh so we picked this particular issue uh because it's a brand new issue one, and it's by Stephanie Phillips, who's one of my uh favorite new writers that I've recently discovered in the past year. Uh Daredevil's rocketing to the top of some of my favorite books, and I know Katia's been interested in the character from the Netflix stuff, and she this is the first time you've read any Daredevil, right? Yes, that's correct. So we've got a really good fresh opinion. My opinion is mostly based around uh pre Zadarski era Daredevil, because I haven't read any of that newer stuff, and I have some gaps in there. Uh so as far as like Daredevil that I've read, I've read all the Frank Miller stuff, which I know unpopular opinion, I'm not that big on the Frank Miller stuff. It's fine. It's I understand it's you know revolutionary b uh for the time, but most pre-1990s comics don't do a whole heck of a lot for me. I loved the Brian Michael Bendis stuff. I really enjoyed Kevin Smith's from what I remember of it. It's pretty important to read that one. If you don't uh skip that, you kind of just need some of that stuff in there. I mean, the rest of the books will tell you, but you'll miss a big spoiler. That's that that's my only take there. Then I read uh Daredevil Yellow by Jeff Loeb and Tim Sale, which anytime those two names run a book, it's worth reading. Rest in peace, Tim Sale. Jeff Loeb's other work, I can take or leave. Then, you know, I'm just currently working my way through the main series. So as far as disclaimers, uh, I didn't really have anything noteworthy. Did you have anything noteworthy noteworthy?

SPEAKER_00 15:16

No, I literally wrote no trigger warnings.

SPEAKER_02 15:19

Yeah, no trigger warnings. I mean, there's some street violence. Daredevil's a darker tone than say Spider-Man, some of the time. Uh, this one is, I wouldn't call it light and happy, but it's not as dark as like, say, the Bendis or uh Brewbaker stuff that I'm reading.

SPEAKER_01 15:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 15:36

So I'll do my story recap. And honestly, if you want to just fill in any of the holes I miss, go for it.

SPEAKER_01 15:41

Yeah. Cool.

SPEAKER_02 15:43

Uh, so my story recap is pretty quick. Uh, I'm gonna keep this as spoiler-free as possible. I need to give you give away a couple concept things. Now keep in mind, I have not read the Zadarsky stuff at all. I have not read the Seladine uh Ahmed stuff at all. Uh, I haven't read some of the Red Band stuff. I haven't even read Shadowland yet. I've uh so I don't know what happened the last couple issues, and it doesn't matter. Uh so Matt Murdoch is a law professor by day and a daredevil by night. Uh he's been at it a while very clearly, stating he's getting older, but he's still able to, you know, kick ass like he could. Uh there's a new player who's entered the playing field, and he seems to be targeting Matt Murdoch, not just Daredevil. So my recap was very, very light. What do you got?

SPEAKER_00 16:28

I have an in-detail one, but it's spoilery, so I won't really say it.

unknown 16:31

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 16:32

Did you uh is anything you just want to like add in that you think is relevant that's not super spoilery?

SPEAKER_00 16:38

Um, just some cool new characters, which we'll talk about in character introductions, but sure.

SPEAKER_02 16:44

Um do you want to take that take that away since that's our next section?

SPEAKER_00 16:50

Um I liked Matt. I like that it is a story about him needing to change things around in his life. I liked him going back into the gory details of Hell's Kitchen. That was kinda interesting because I like how it treats Hell's Kitchen as its own character, usually.

SPEAKER_02 17:13

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 17:13

And I really liked the professor lady that they introduced, Dr. Sari Ellison. I just thought it was cool that she was teaching professional ethics, but still had tattoos, which is pretty cool from law school.

SPEAKER_02 17:26

I didn't even pick up on that, but that's awesome. So they so they're totally gonna bang, right?

SPEAKER_00 17:30

Like that's that's yeah, I actually have written they're obviously going to fuck.

SPEAKER_02 17:34

Gotcha, gotcha, yeah. It's uh my um uh it I know there's a joke in Marvel about how uh Daredevil is the biggest lady killer in the Marvel U. And uh we have there's a series of books called like Daredevil Kills the Marvel Universe, Punisher Kills the Marvel Universe. If I ever get to work at Marvel, I'm gonna write Daredevil Bangs the Marvel Marvel Universe.

SPEAKER_00 17:58

That's a good one.

SPEAKER_02 18:00

Yeah, and I just gave that away in a podcast. And yeah, honestly, I'll never work at Marvel. So someone out there, please write that book.

SPEAKER_00 18:08

I mean, I think it works well because there's something inherently flattering about being pursued by a blind guy because you know he's not after you for your looks.

SPEAKER_02 18:17

You know, I always wondered like, is that part of the appeal?

SPEAKER_00 18:21

I mean, I could see that. And it seems funny. Those two things together will get you very far.

SPEAKER_02 18:27

So blind and funny. I um I'll work on both. I'm already like can barely see, so I'll just work on being funny. There was a joke in like the first or second season of Daredevil where Foggy Nelson goes, like, how, how do you always pick up these insanely hot girls when you can't even appreciate how hot they are? Which kind of just tells you all you need to know about like Foggy's not a bad dude, but you know, he's definitely a little more objectifyy than Matt could be. Granted, I I Matt does have that joke of hey, what'd she look like once in a while, which I think that's just funny and cute. Uh what other characters you got here?

SPEAKER_00 19:09

That was all I had written down, but I think the detective's interesting, but that's just because I'm a sucker for a good serial killer.

SPEAKER_02 19:17

Fair enough. Um so you talked about Hell's Kitchen being its own character, which I totally agree with. Uh so first of all, do we want to talk about what Hell's Kitchen is? Um, like that's a real place that exists in New York.

SPEAKER_00 19:31

Yes, it is. I don't know like the boundaries or anything, but it is a real place. We um ate really good dumplings there once.

SPEAKER_02 19:41

Yeah, I so I don't know the exact boundaries, but I think it's technically lower Manhattan, like just right below Midtown, and it's kind of close to Port Authority on the west side, I want to say. So uh to all the New York.

SPEAKER_00 19:56

Uh it's located in Midtown, generally bounded by 34th Street to the south, 59th to the north, 8th to the east, and the Hudson River on the west.

SPEAKER_02 20:05

So yeah, we've we've been there. We we had really good dumplings, like you said. Those were I still think about those dumplings. Um yeah. Hell's Kitchen, like it wasn't bad from when I remember being there, but we weren't all over Hell's Kitchen. So uh to all our native New Yorker listeners, we apologize if we're just misrepresenting your city.

SPEAKER_00 20:24

Yeah, we only live in the state.

SPEAKER_02 20:27

Yeah, we we live in upstate New York. We don't go to the city very I I we haven't been to the city since like 2019, which I'm probably gonna go down there. I might go down later later this month, depending uh how much time I have on my hands.

SPEAKER_00 20:41

Fair.

SPEAKER_02 20:42

I don't want to say too much about the villain, but I think the villain was cool. That's and I don't know enough about them.

SPEAKER_00 20:53

Yeah, that's where I'm at.

SPEAKER_02 20:55

Like I think I know what they're doing, but yeah, so where you kind of getting there's minor levels of precognition involved.

SPEAKER_01 21:04

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 21:05

Okay, so what I'm taking away from this villain, and I think there's more than one villain involved in this story, and I don't want to give away too much. It seems like the villain is new, had a cool design, kind of reminded me of like John Paul Valley from uh Batman. Do you know that character at all? Um look it up really quick and tell me if you agree.

SPEAKER_00 21:29

John Paul what?

SPEAKER_02 21:31

Jean Paul Valley, you can also look up Azreel from Batman.

SPEAKER_00 21:35

Yeah, the coloring's really similar.

SPEAKER_02 21:37

Yeah, like that's it, it just kind of reminded me of that a little bit. And I think this character might be kind of pre cogn cognitive, like able to predict Matt's moves, which I thought was pretty cool.

SPEAKER_00 21:50

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 21:51

So the other character that I kind of liked was, and I don't know if this is going to be a um whatchamacallit, like an ongoing. Character, a new one, but I think the um the classroom that Matt's teaching in, the student who uh spoke where they uh kind of did a Matt did a really cool like on the spot lesson that I I really don't want to give that one away because it was I thought a really well done moment. I'm going to assume that the class, so either that one person is going to be um kind of like a pupil role, because that's exactly who she is, or um the class is going to be a stand-in for uh whatever the plot needs for different um for different, you know, for for different lessons we want would want to talk about with the law or thematic elements. That's my my guess there, what they're gonna, how they're gonna leverage that.

SPEAKER_00 22:47

Oh, I had a question. Did you did they say something about Matt's not a lawyer anymore?

SPEAKER_02 22:54

That's what I thought I picked up on. I honestly don't know. That I don't know if he lost his lawyer license or if he had to give it up or if it's called disbard. Yeah. Or or if he's just no longer practicing law and he's just teaching. I don't know. But I also don't know. So we're gonna look like sillies when uh we don't know this one, and everyone's like, oh yeah, of course, in issue the five of last run, he did he lost his lawyer license because he I don't know. And you're doing a great job at it. But no, I don't so I I I don't know, but I I don't know if he was disbarred or if that's just saying, like, yeah, not practicing law anymore. I'm just teaching. Like that's kind of something you might do one day where you don't practice medicine anymore and you just teach.

SPEAKER_01 23:51

Is that uh yeah.

SPEAKER_02 23:54

Uh any any uh other characters you wanted to chat about on this one?

SPEAKER_00 23:57

Uh no, I think we picked up all of them.

unknown 24:00

Cool.

SPEAKER_02 24:01

Um, so uh totally this is pretty like this is not dark dark. It's not grimdark or anything, it's just good straight level action, right?

SPEAKER_00 24:13

Um, so I think we're a bit jaded because I initially thought the same thing. Then I remembered there was a panel of a person's eyes carved out.

SPEAKER_02 24:22

Yeah, you're right. Okay, so yeah, we may be not be the best judges of this. So uh I'm glad I have Katia here to balance me out. Uh okay, so what she said is accurate. That's it, that's a thing you're gonna have to just deal with going in. Uh Daredevil tends to be a little darker than your average Marvel comic bear. I'm kind of interested in your take on this. Would you say that this is a good story on its own, or is it a good or just a good setup? Or is it neither?

SPEAKER_00 24:47

I think it's just a good setup. I think it is a really good setup, but it's not really its own self-contained story. There's just not enough of a through line. It's just seen, seen, seen, seen, seen, but there's no plot and resolution.

SPEAKER_02 25:05

Yeah, I'm kind of with you on that one. Uh, I think it's a great setup. Um, based on the price of comics, which I'm not happy about, I think this is worth the current standard rate of comics. Now, I do need to just throw this out here. Um, the uh first issue was six bucks compared to a normal issue, which is four or five. And I don't think there were really extra pages in this. I read this really slow to try to get anything, but like I wasn't sitting there going page one, page two, page three.

SPEAKER_00 25:40

Yeah. Um, but yeah, it's I felt like there was less of it than when I read Jessica Jones when I read Alias.

SPEAKER_02 25:46

There, there very well might be. We could do a page comparison at some point. Um, but like, yeah, the you know, the the story, it was a good comic book, good setup. Uh, there was a lot of good scenes. I I liked the dialogue, I liked everything. I I there's nothing like I'm sitting here saying I hate this or I didn't like this. But to your point, exactly, it was not um, there there was no real resolution. It was all setup. And, you know, that's there are some writers who I think are doing a pretty good job at, you know, writing really good, self-contained stories that are part of something, part of something bigger. Like Matt Fraction is writing Batman that way. And I've I've heard him on podcasts say he's trying specifically to write uh issues that way, because he says, you know, these things are five bucks. I want people to get their money's worth out of them. And that's that's a tough skill. And he's a pretty phenomenal writer, I'll give him that much. Even if a lot of his work isn't for me, I I can't discredit that he's a very good writer. Uh David Peppos, who's writing uh Space Ghost, and you know, a personal friend of mine, David Peppos, who I've chatted with like twice. Um he uh he he's he's really good at that with his Space Ghost and uh Speed Racer books. And I think to a slightly lesser extent, uh Kelly Thompson is right there. Her books are just super satisfying no matter how you swing them. So what did you um think of the themes of this story? Because I I have a lot written for this, but I I want your take more than anything.

SPEAKER_00 27:17

Um it's hard for me to even pin down a theme because it was so just disconnected stories that will eventually connect, I can tell, but right now they're just so disconnected. Like you said before, or maybe it's just that I read this in your notes, but Matt getting older and having to kind of navigate a new role in life, being the lawyer or the law teacher.

SPEAKER_02 27:46

Yep, and um kind of your thoughts are mine. I I think this is thematically about compromise, getting older, and the outlook of the future. There's a couple lines in there that I don't want to take away from anybody. Sorry, kitten alarm went off. Uh, and that the they're not trying to escape or anything, that's just their nightly pill that they've already gotten. Or well, she's already gotten. Only one of our cats gets a pill. She also gets uh she also gets a can of wet food and she got tube treat, because she's she's very special and she deserves extra good treats.

SPEAKER_00 28:22

And spoiled.

SPEAKER_02 28:23

Yeah, they're both spoiled. Our cats have better lives than we do. God, they haven't made uh anyway. Um, so there's a couple lines in here that I think kind of reinforce the future outlook. Uh like kind of how I was talking about the precogn cognitive stuff about the villain. Uh so I think that thematically might tie in, and there is kind of a funny line about Matt saying something, not in a shitty way, but he said something about slang that he didn't understand. And that's just the nature of the world changing. That happens with every generation. I don't understand people younger than me's slang. Uh maybe someday I will.

SPEAKER_00 29:00

Six seven.

SPEAKER_02 29:01

I I don't get six seven. That's the only one I've I've literally just got like every other bit of like Gen Alva Alpha slang I've heard, or Gen Z slang that I've heard, or even younger millennial slang I've heard. I'm like, okay, you've explained it to me. I get it. I wouldn't use it. There's plenty of millennial slang I don't use. Six, seven, nope, I don't get it. Uh, but but you know, this is also Matt talking about getting older, but he's still kind of like in his I guess he's still kind of in his physical physical prime, but like, you know, it's kind of the trade-off when you're you know a fresh athlete in a new sport, you have all the health and energy. You may not have the skill, but maybe Matt doesn't have all that vitality, but he's got more of the skill. So it's a trade-off, and he's still out there doing stuff, which that's stuff I like. Um, because presumably Matt and I would be similar age. I'm 37, he's probably late 30s, early 40s, and this is kind of how I'm taking that. He's been lawyering and daredeviling for a while. Uh so you know, I I think you know, the three-part harmony that I call it, I think it's kind of there, but it's honestly just too early to tell because this was more of a setty uppy issue.

SPEAKER_00 30:20

I would agree with that.

SPEAKER_02 30:21

Yeah, but like I I don't think there's anything out of place here, and I think it's off to a good start. So, what'd you think of the art?

SPEAKER_00 30:27

Oh, I like the art a lot. I think the coloring was really nice. I always like coloring, that's what grabs me to art.

SPEAKER_02 30:35

Oh, yeah, I'm right there with you. For this one, this one especially.

SPEAKER_00 30:39

And I thought this is gonna sound weird, but the panel with the cut out eyes, I think they did a good job on. It was pretty creepy.

SPEAKER_02 30:48

Oh, yeah, that one I definitely spent some time there. So yeah, like the cutout eyes are a lot, but I really like it. Um, so based on what you know of uh Daredevil, would you say this is true to character? Like, is this a good story for Matt to be doing? Like, even if you just want to say from the Netflix stuff.

SPEAKER_00 31:08

Um, I said yes, Daredevil is devilin.

SPEAKER_02 31:11

The devil is devilin in the devil's kitchen.

unknown 31:14

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 31:14

Uh like he's getting a little bit older. He's not a green superhero anymore. But honestly, in all the Daredevil I've run, I've read, and I've read some of the early, early issues. He never felt like a young, young man to me. He always felt like more competent.

SPEAKER_00 31:30

Well, I think that's because he's a lawyer.

SPEAKER_02 31:33

Yeah, I think it's it's that. And I mean, you just naturally would be older going through what is law school, four years. So you're he you'd be talking, he'd be minimum 26, 27. Yeah. Uh so does this make you want to read more in any direction?

SPEAKER_00 31:47

I would read more, but I don't know if I'd pay the four to five dollars an issue for it.

SPEAKER_02 31:52

Oh, that's that's fair. Yeah. I'm I'm gonna keep buying the singles of this because I think this is worth it for me, and I'm just in a daredevil, devil daredevil train right now. Like I've just been really hyped upon it, and it uh honestly doesn't have anything to do with the show because we were talking about this last night. Um, we're both enjoying the show, like the current season of the show. Uh, it's just not as strong as it could be.

SPEAKER_00 32:15

Yeah. The action's really good. I've liked the choreography a lot.

SPEAKER_02 32:19

The actions and the messaging we can both get behind. Some of the writing issues are a little it's not bad. It's just what what do we even want to say here?

SPEAKER_00 32:29

Like, well, the big thing we said is about focusing on characters where the where we're like, why do we care about this character right now?

SPEAKER_02 32:38

Yeah, it's it's it's stuff like that. It's some of the focus on the other characters that I'm just not enjoying. We even though we tend to like we tend to like the actors and what they're doing. It's just that like that that it's not as connected as it could be, I guess, is the way it's like you like I I hate bringing up tight storytelling, because honestly, I think that's a bullshit compliment. Because some stories need to breathe and need to be decompressed and need to take time off away from them. That's how serialized storytelling works. But like this almost feels like I don't know, you've got um a piece of machinery that you just need to tighten the screws just a little bit, just a little bit to get everything to be more cohesive and function better.

SPEAKER_00 33:26

Yeah. You also can't dangle Jessica Jones in a preview to me and not give me her immediately.

SPEAKER_02 33:31

Yep. So uh if this episode goes up at the same time, just know we haven't seen Jessica Jones yet in the series. So I guess that's like an anti-spoiler or whatever you want to call it. Um but well, I I can almost guarantee she's gonna show up like the day this issue drops because I think the episode comes out what the night before the these goes out. So this we'll we'll look silly when that happens. It's fine though.

SPEAKER_00 33:57

Fine. All right.

SPEAKER_02 33:59

Uh, do you have anything else to say before we go into ratings and closings?

SPEAKER_00 34:03

No, I think we covered it all.

SPEAKER_02 34:04

Cool. So what's your new reader-friendly rating?

SPEAKER_00 34:08

I gave it a two. I think it was pretty good. I have questions like, wait, is Let Matt not a lawyer anymore? Things like that. I feel like they kind of dangled it in front of me and didn't explain it all. But I think it was relatively easy to understand.

SPEAKER_02 34:23

That's fair. Uh I gave it a 1.5 because and I and I actually think this is really close to being a one, but they're exactly what you said. Like, is Matt a lawyer anymore? But on the same token, if this is your absolute first time ever reading Daredevil, you just know he used to be a loyal lawyer and he's not a lawyer anymore.

SPEAKER_01 34:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 34:41

And I don't know if that knowledge necessarily hurts the story. And like I don't think it would. Yeah, it doesn't hurt my understanding of the story. It just shows me that there is a world out there that I'm not getting the full picture of, which is kind of the purpose of the new reader-friendly scale. Like we we both followed this fine, right?

SPEAKER_00 35:01

Yep. I'm just impatient and I want everything when I want it now.

SPEAKER_02 35:07

Well, you have to wait 30 days for the next issue, which I will be buying. Yeah, so my rater, rate, my new reader-friendly scale is like 1.5. It's call it a two, maybe, since I don't know. Uh, maybe I'll be less of a coward like you, because you don't do 0.5s. Um, I've that's something I gotta learn from you. Uh, what's your quality rating on this one? And your and your recommendation. Quality and recommendation.

SPEAKER_00 35:31

What I recommend. Yeah, I would give it a if you are interested in comics, it's a good one to read. And my quality rating, I give it a four. I'm interested, I'd like to keep going.

SPEAKER_02 35:42

Yep, I'm kind of right there with you. I'm also giving this one a four. Um like my only uh my my only thing I'm really deducting points off is just uh we have some comics right now that are being written as complete stories that are part of a stilla serialization that feel just more satisfying than this. So it's possible to do that. Um, and that's not a criticism against Stephanie Phillips. It's just not everyone is doing that. It's a writing choice. I I just tend to prefer that other writing style. There's really no major points off. Um, so I would also recommend this. I think if you're interested in Daredevil, this is a great starting point. It doesn't really spoil anything in the past for me, except Matt's not a lawyer right now. That's and all we know is he's not a lawyer. And honestly, he'll probably be a lawyer again by the end of the run or something. I don't know. Uh, but like there was no major callbacks to uh other characters you might know from the show. And there's stuff that like I kind of know about Daredevil that uh I was wondering if you would ask about, but I it just didn't come up. So we're I'm not gonna talk about it.

SPEAKER_01 36:50

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 36:53

Uh so do you have any recommendations for any of the creative team on this or any Daredevil recommendations?

SPEAKER_00 37:00

Not the Ben Affleck one.

SPEAKER_02 37:03

That's good advice, yeah. Just whatever you're doing with your evening, just don't watch the Ben Affleck Daredevil movie unless you just want to want to laugh or cry anymore.

SPEAKER_00 37:13

Definitely season one in the first half of season two of the Netflix show. And then that is my only exposure to any of these. I would like to hear what you have been liking from Stephanie Phillips.

SPEAKER_02 37:25

Okay, so Stephanie Phillips, uh, she's got a couple things at Marvel in DC. Uh, I think she has a book called Phoenix at Marvel, which I'm assuming is based around uh either the Phoenix Force or Gene Gray. And uh she, I think, was writing some Harley Quinn stuff at DC. What I know her from is a book called Grimm, which uh is one of the early episodes that is now currently lost. Just a reminder for everyone, we're currently re-recording those episodes and we'll get them up as we can. That had the old name of the show on plastered all over them, like said several times, where uh I would I have to just totally rebuild them from the ground up, I think. Um, but Grim is uh about kind of the day in the life of Grim Reapers, and the art in that is amazing. It's by uh an artist named Flaviano. Uh I I think the hardcovers are out, and I do want to pick them up if if I can find them cheap. Uh as far as I believe the in the artist's name was uh Lee Garbit, he's got a lot of work out there, a lot of Batman work, and I think he was actually working on uh Brian Q. Miller's Batgirl Run with uh Cassandra Kane a long time ago, uh, which that is on my list to finish. I I never finished it. As far as Daredevil recommendations. So everyone and their mother is going to tell you to read Frank Miller. Uh, the only one I'm actually really going to recommend from Frank Miller is the book Man Without Fear. Uh, it's kind of an origin story for Daredevil. You don't really need it, but I think it's the best of his work personally. I haven't read Born Again in like 15 years, so uh it's probably better than I remember, but I I was honestly not very impressed with that one, and I know that's a very hot take. As far as other Daredevil stuff, honestly, a great place to start is with the Kevin Smith Guardian Devil run, followed by Jeff Loeb's Daredevil Yellow with Tim Sale. And then from there you can just follow the normal Daredevil series uh for at least 100 issues, because that's what I did. I'm currently on um about issue 110 of uh the uh second volume of Daredevil. And I looked today, it's like I have like 240 issues to be totally caught up. Ugh, all right. Uh and that's all on uh Marvel Unlimited, so that's one of the best uh uses of your money. Like I I know I knocked digital earlier, but the Marvel Unlimited DC Unlimited apps hate to shill for major corporations, but you get your money's worth. It's like eight to ten bucks, and I read literally like ten, four to ten issues every day on those. It's awesome. Well, do you have any closing thoughts before we get out of here?

SPEAKER_00 40:06

Um, I enjoyed it and I'm interested in reading more. Cool.

SPEAKER_02 40:10

Oh, did would you be interested in going backwards at all, or did that not pique your fancy to go backwards in any way out of curiosity?

SPEAKER_00 40:17

It didn't really pique my interest to go backwards, but I wouldn't say I never would.

SPEAKER_02 40:21

That's fair. Yeah, it's it is actually the comic that I kind of want to read all of from Marvel. There's not many in that category. It's like that Fantastic Four, and um what's the other one I wanted to read all of? It's a shorter one. Maybe actually Avengers, strangely. Uh, because that's like just the main title. Um so next week on the show, we're gonna have Mike back. Uh Cadia won't be here. Mike and I are gonna be discussing Invincible Issue One, and that'll air on April 15th. Then the week after that will be April 22nd, and Katia will be back for that to discuss Alias Red Band one. And I have a feeling that one will be a lot of fun. Definitely won't be a bummer at all.

SPEAKER_00 41:07

No.

SPEAKER_02 41:08

All right, guys. Well, I hope you enjoyed the show. If you have any questions or feedback, please leave them in the comments or email us at comicbooksbeyond at gmail.com. You can also read it, reach us on Blue Sky, Instagram or TikTok, and YouTube, all at the same handle, Comic Books Beyond. We ask for honest feedback only and honest reviews only on the show. But if you send us something nice, we'll happily read it on the air. Uh Kadia is at Katia Bear on TikTok, Blue Sky, and Instagram.

SPEAKER_00 41:33

Follow me.

SPEAKER_02 41:34

She's posting uh almost daily videos on TikTok, which you should all watch, which are adorable.

SPEAKER_00 41:39

Fashion content. So if that's not your thing, I understand.

SPEAKER_02 41:42

But she's she's adorable, so it that's that's also a good thing to watch. All right, everybody. Well, have a good night. Take care.

SPEAKER_00 41:50

Have a good night.

unknown 41:51

Bye.

SPEAKER_02 41:52

Well, guys, thank you so much for listening. If you'd like to get a hold of me through email, I'm at comicbooksbeyond at gmail.com, and I'm at comic books beyond on Blue Sky, Instagram, TikTok, and we're also on YouTube. Some of the podcasts are gonna go there, but we're also working on some extra content for YouTube as well. I'd like to give a thank you to the crew of the Talking Comic Books Podcast, Brad and Lisa of Comic Book Couples Counseling, Alex Jaffey, Jeremy Whitley, Bran McNulty, Jimmy Gispero and the crew of Comic Book Yeti, and John Klein III of Shadowflame with Magic. Most importantly, I'd like to thank all of our listeners and supporters. Be good to each other out there and take care of your people. We'll see you next time.