Written by Antony Johnston
Illustrated by Roberto De La Torre and Marco ChecchettoSHADOWLAND ENDS — BUT WHO IS THE VICTOR? After the senses-shattering conclusion of Shadowland, can the people of Hell’s Kitchen rebuild without a champion to guide them? The future of Marvel’s street heroes begins here!
Shadowland is over, and was met by extremely disappointed sighs from myself and fellow reviewer Walt. But with Johnston coming in to tie up all the ends for now, how does the epilogue pan out in comparison with the rest of the story? Find out after the cut.
For all intents and purposes, Shadowland should have been great. With a street level event focusing on Daredevil, I’m not entirely sure at what point the comic went wrong. However, it’s undeniable to note that it left a rather sour taste in my mouth towards all things Daredevil, which is unfortunate because Daredevil is one of my favorite characters. My hope was that After The Fall could somehow put things into a bit more perspective, but the comic instead took the same route as the last issue of Daredevil – mild reconciliation.
On a basic level, After the Fall focus more on the non-hero related characters despite what the solicit might make note of. For an issue claiming to reveal who “won” Shadowland (spoiler: no one) and then set up the street level heroes for the next story, it doesn’t really do that at all. Matt’s gone, having left Hell’s Kitchen at the end of Daredevil #512 for the story to be seen in Daredevil: Reborn, and Black Panther is running around. When the issue ends, however, we’re not given any better look as to why T’Challa relocated to Hell’s Kitchen, nor do we have any real indication as to what the other street level heroes are going to do other than leave. For a story that had so many tie-ins and characters involved, After The Fall does decidedly little to tell us what’s going on with these characters, specifically as to their new relationship with Matt other than that no one knows where he is.
What the issue does focus on is the normal people and their reactions to the Daredevil fiasco. It appears that the cops, despite taking a rather heavy hit due to all the violence caused by Murdock, are more resilient to forgive him due to the amount of good he had done previously. It offers up the question of how low do you have to fall before people truly start hating you above the good that you’ve done. It’s an entirely relevant question here, and one that does resonate through the whole issue as we focus on two long time friends of Matt – Foggy and Urich – as they come to grips with what happened. The end result to the story is an odd one, seeing as both have decided to continue their roles in Murdock’s life unchanged while others around him don’t forgive him whatsoever, including the Chief of Police.
I find myself ultimately confused as to how the story ended. While I understand the themes of the issue and how it questions how we should react to Matt’s insanity, it’s odd that no one in the story seems to want to take a definite stance. All things considered, this “event” shook the Daredevil universe to it’s very core, but now that things are settling the only difference here is that Murdock is not around. Kingpin is still the head of an empire, Foggy still trusts and believes in Matt, and Urich is still keeping secrets. Meanwhile, everyone else leaves him – especially the women in his life, which is about average – and all the heroes in the story have decided to somewhat leave him alone since they can’t find Matt and talk to him. In between Shadowland #4 and #5, Matt/the Beast literally mopped the floor with all of these heroes, and all of them were scene underneath piles of rubble and slumped in corners with Shadowland #5 – yet all the heroes still just want to talk? The big Avengers continue to ignore Matt’s behavior, and all his friends are resolute to the belief that none of this is his fault and they need to help him. The comraderie is admirable, but I can’t help but note that if this was any other character the reaction might not be so different. Heck, if this was a situation where the Hulk freaked out, they’d probably… oh, I don’t know… try and shoot him into the sun?
Continued belowAntony Johnston is a good writer who is put into a somewhat difficult position here. While he did co-write most of Daredevil before and through Shadowland with Andy Diggle, it’s his job to really pick up the pieces here and put them into some kind of sensible fashion. I can’t help but be reminded of Cry For Justice in this instance, when JT Krul had to do the exact same thing. The unfortunate truth of the matter is that for a character who has had such a fantastic run for the past decade, the end result is much less than desirable. Shadowland went out with not much of a bang, but rather a confused whimper, and the epilogue to the story doesn’t really give any proper or expected resolution. While the idea of vigilantes is always a questionable one (and the moral lines in a world full of superheroes is obviously blurred), the comic doesn’t effectively discuss the most important issue: where does everyone stand on the Daredevil situation? In a world where Steve Rogers shows up in almost every other comic, I’m feel like Johnston missed a huge opportunity by not bringing him to Shadowland and Hell’s Kitchen at the end of the story to offer up what’s going to be done by it. I mean, the Kingpin’s in there now, and the Beast drove the entire burrough into violence. Why has no one noticed or really reacted outside of Luke Cage and Iron Fist?
The issue should have been much better than it was, but it’s not the worst way to wrap up Shadowland. Like I said, Johnston is a good writer, and while he missed a lot of what could make this issue relevant, he did a good job with the few things he discussed. While the reactions of Foggy and Urich are somewhat unexciting, it was a well written issue. Checchetto and De La Torre also did a great job splitting art duties with alternate narratives in the issue, and once again showed that this is how Shadowland should have looked. Both captured the feel that Daredevil has had for quite some time – that dark, dirty, and rigid world full of shadows. This is the feeling all of Shadowland needed and that the main Daredevil title kept up throughout the series, but even as good as the issue looks, it still feels somewhat “too little too late” as Shadowland officially ends.
As I said earlier, Shadowland should have been good. It’s unfortunate that it wasn’t, but sometimes things don’t pan out as the fans would have liked. Johnston was given the unbelievably hard task of adding the final note to the story, and while he admittedly tried – and you can tell in the issue that he really did try to offer some final closure – it still falls short, and Shadowland ends up being a poor way to close off a decade of fantastic stories. After The Fall doesn’t make things any better.
Final Verdict: 6.4 – Browse
