Marvel Gold. Daredevil 4: A Woman Called… Black Widow

Last year we were reviewing Daredevil’s third Marvel Gold, where we talked about the Roy Thomas inheriting the title from the hands of Stan Lee in the transition from the late 60s to the early 70s. For this next volume, Panini compiles the entire stay of Gerry Conway with the character (#72-98), accompanied almost entirely by the legend Gene Colan. In short, this is a stage that you either love or hate. For many, it is considered one of the best moments of Daredevil pre-Frank Miller; for others, a collection of madness orchestrated by conway with some good loose moments.

conway I was a kid of barely 18 years old when Marvel gave him the opportunity to write for them being Daredevil his first job as a regular screenwriter. For Marvelit was clearly a strong bet since between 1971 and 1973, the writer would be in charge, in addition to the little horn series, of The Amazing Spiderman, Namor, Hombre de Hierro, Hulk either The Fantastic Four. Almost nothing.

But the beginnings were not easy. In fact, the first year of conwayboth in Daredevil like in Hombre de Hierro, resulted in disappointing sales figures that explain, in the case of the blind hero, an important change of direction for the series and which we will talk about shortly. After the taste for the melodrama of Thomas, conway would make a major tonal leap in his first story, in which Daredevil faced off against a race of leopard-men from another dimension. It’s not exactly the type of story that the average reader relates (or related to Daredevil) with. Immediately after we have a cross-over with Hombre de Hierro which begins as a spy story around the key to the Zodiac (and where Nick Fury would not be out of place) and which inexplicably ends with the heroes in another strange dimension, in this case in an imitation of heroic fantasy with wizards and dragons.

The first year of conway it’s hard. Very hard. The guy had ideas, that’s clear, but I doubt he was prepared to carry a regular series on his shoulders. And just because he had ideas doesn’t mean they were well executed or appropriate for a show like Daredevil. In it #74all the inhabitants of New York go blind, the #75-76 transmit vibes of the first years of Marvel with Matt Murdock and Foggy Nelson traveling to a Latin American country (with all its clichés) where Daredevil will fight El Condor. In it #77 start a cross-over with Namor with these two heroes also fighting with Spiderman in the typical fight/confusion without any logic. But the worst remained, “the saga of Mr. Kline”, an absolute disaster. Covering the #78-84in addition to several numbers of Hombre de Hierro and Namorwe may be talking about one of the worst stories (and certainly the worst cross-over) of the Marvel from the 70s. Mr. Kline is presented as a Kingpin-style mafia mastermind who overnight seems to be omnipresent in Matt Murdock’s life, whether sending villains against Daredevil (the Owl, Scorpion) or blackmailing Foggy. Halfway through the saga we discover that Mr. Kline is a robot, renamed The Assassin, who works under the orders of Baal, a survivor of the earth in 12,000 years and who sends Mr. Kline/The Assassin to the past to avoid a disaster that left the planet almost uninhabitable. In the end, other beings from Earth but from an even more distant future kill Baal, Mr. Kline, and return the heroes to their normal lives.

Apparently and taking into account that, at that time, Daredevil was published once every two months, this saga did a lot of damage to the reputation of the publication (also to that of Iron Man) and readers were abandoning the series. A change of course was necessary and the seeds of it had already been planted with the appearance of the black widow in the middle of the saga. After a couple of issues in which the series seems to return to normal with classic villains (#85 Gladiator, #86 Ox), conway He sends Daredevil and Black Widow, now as co-stars of the series, to San Francisco. That means breaking up with him. status quo and abandon the secondary ones like Foggy or Karen Page. The treatment you give conway The romantic part of the plot is a clear example of his lack of skill in those years. In one issue, Karen is dating her agent (remember that she is almost a Hollywood star here), in the next she is engaged (?) to Matt, and in the next they break up definitively with the hero marching to the other side of the country with other woman. You have to read it to believe it. Finally, a continuity detail that will blow your mind: Karen Page leaves the series for the next 14 years! For a character that today we have so associated with Daredevil, few realize how fundamental the recovery of the character was. Frank Miller in Born Again.

The best of the volume are the adventures of the already renowned Daredevil and the Black Widow in San Francisco, with a new group of secondary characters and with an increasing role of Natasha Romanoff. In these issues the heroes will fight against Electro, the Purple Man or Mr. Fear. Added to the general improvement is the draftsman, Gene Colanwhich shines much more, however contradictory it may seem if we know the strengths of his drawing style, in the environment of the city of Bahia. Colan, we should already know, has its strengths in the setting and in the most everyday scenes such as the wonderful full-page spread of Daredevil at the top of the Golden Gate Bridge. He suffers more when drawing action, with scenes that are sometimes confusing. Although if something I will not forgive Colan It is the redesign of Electro’s suit, a real horror. Another historical note: in the #76 begins inking the series, and collaborating with Colan, Tom Palmer. The duo Colan-Palmer would appear to be one of the most solid, artistically speaking, of the 70s in Marvel.

conway leaves in the #98 and from there at the end of the volume we have Steve Gerber and the first credit in Marvel as a writer of such Chris Claremont. He #100 It would happen, I have to admit, without much fanfare, except for having the opportunity to see a blind Daredevil piloting a plane, of course. Overall, a somewhat irregular volume, with elements that would go into the character’s history such as the duo with the Black Widow but that do not quite convince on a narrative level. Personally, I don’t think conway have a better job Marvel than his work with Spiderman (and I include what we are about to see reissued in Spain), but this Daredevil is somewhat disappointing except in its last issues. It’s the 70s and Daredevil still had a short trip through the desert until he reached the end of the decade and received the new lifeblood that would redefine the character.

The best

• the dynamic between Matt and Natasha

Worst

• the saga of Mr. Klein