Fighting Himself More Than The Gladiator

First Look Review of Daredevil #226

The Gladiator is up to his old tricks again but when Daredevil last saw him he had been working on making a better life for himself and Betsy. What’s up with that – why would he throw all his hard work away and turn back to crime?

Warriors by Frank Miller, Denny O’Neil, David Mazzuchelli, and Dennis Janke. Published by Marvel Comics, 2014.

Eventually we learn that Melvin ‘the Gladiator’ Potter has turned back to crime since a gang has kidnapped Betsy and demanded a ton of money or they’d kill her.

But this issue is about more than crime, it’s dives into the personal lives of Matt and Foggy. Apparently things are not good at the law firm and Foggy and Matt are kinda on the outs. Further, Matt is in the middle of a sort of mental breakdown as he feels like he’s got the weight of the world on his shoulders. He’s feeling overwhelmed as everything in the city seems to be reliant on him to solve and because of this he’s starting to make some poor decisions.

One of those seems to be that his girl, Glori, was expecting him to propose to her but he just left her hanging. And now he’s not taking calls from anyone.

On the whole, while we see the Gladiator doing everything he can to save Betsy, Matt seems to be spiraling into self destruction, focusing on himself instead of the people he cares about. The bottom line being that this can’t go on for long without it significantly impacting his life.

This issue is full of really good fight scenes and they’ve made me excited to read more Daredevil from this era. Between them and the touching way Daredevil helps the Gladiator get his revenge, I really found this a emotional issue that expands on the rough and tumble superhero issues I’ve been reading lately.

I’m not sure how issue this fits into the Born Again story arc since it kinda seems like a stand-alone story. Regardless, I am glad to get some background to Daredevil and Matt Murdock’s life at this point in time since my only experience with the character has been from the the first few issues in 1964. Needless to say, things have evolved since then.

With the first issue completed I rate this story a B+ and I look forward to seeing where the story arc goes.

This comic can be found on Marvel Unlimited, Comixology, or at your local comic book shop.

Comic Corner | First Look Review of Daredevil #226