Written by Andy Diggle
Illustrated by Billy TanWith the help of his former enemy-turned-champion, Daredevil has thwarted his former friends and finds himself prepared to claim all of New York for himself. The chaos of Shadowland has reached a boiling point, and Daredevil himself may not survive to see the result!
Follow the cut to see what the final verdict on the end of Marvel’s street-level spectacle is.
If you were hanging around here in the early summer, you know how excited we here at Multiversity (namely me and Matt) were for Shadowland. Maybe we set the bar too high, but with this final issue I have but one thought: wow was that disappointing.
Well, I suppose I have to write more than that. Let’s start with that which I have no reservations about saying: Billy Tan dropped the ball. Hard. His work on this series wasn’t that great to begin with, but this issue had so many panels that looked phoned-in. Argue all you want that Beast-possessed Daredevil wasn’t supposed to look natural; it still doesn’t change the fact that there was serious problems with anatomy all throughout this issue, including with those characters who had nothing odd about their stature. Normally I can tolerate Billy Tan, though I may not care for his story, but this issue? No dice.
But what about the writing? That’s what I’m wondering too. I keep saying the phrase “this should have been good” when talking to others about this event. Andy Diggle has proven his worth as a writer many times over, and his pre-Shadowland issues of Daredevil were great. There is no reason this should have been as mediocre as it was, but there’s just too much to forgive in this issue alone: a terrible instance of jobbing, a lame deus ex machina, atrocious pacing, and an incredibly unsatisfactory ending. I understand Diggle wants to pique our interest for Daredevil: Reborn, but that’s just no way to end the event that caps off the past decade or so of Daredevil stories.
There were a few things that I liked about this issue, and the event as a whole. Firstly, I may not be pleased with the ending, but I am interested in the little change in the status quo, particularly regarding the Kingpin. The page where Elektra hands Matt a sword and the page following it were really well-done, but that strength only shines through when you look at them separate from the comic as a whole.
Maybe my high expectations have made me judge this harsher than I should, but this just wasn’t very good. In the end, what could have been an amazing finish to the gradual breakdown of Matt Murdock’s character just became another possessed hero story… and not a very good one, at that. I’ve read worse comics (much worse), but when a writer I normally have a lot of respect for writes something like this, I lose a bit of that respect.
Final Verdict: 4.3 – Browse, at best.
