Daredevil clearly has no plans of slowing down with only four episodes left. Ever since around the seventh episode, things have only been growing, and each hour continues to accomplish something new that I thought was finale worthy. Now, we pick up with Foggy finally discovering Matt’s secret. I had figured it was only a matter of time this season before either Foggy or Karen found out. I’m glad that Foggy was the one because he has made some strong comments against Daredevil throughout the season, and Matt has stayed quiet when they happen. Now we pick up at a point where I couldn’t stop and needed to know what happened.
This was another flashback-heavy episode, but it was great. Foggy is clearly not happy to discover Matt is Daredevil. He’s been lied to all this time by his best friend and discovers that he’s acting outside of the law, which doesn’t go well with being a lawyer. Foggy is angry and has every right to be; we discover that their friendship started during freshman year of college, when they were assigned to be roommates. The two bond throughout the years and are truly best friends at this point, the flashbacks were really well-crafted and felt believable.
I’m actually quite surprised that Matt never went into more depth about his “blindness” and super senses. Although it’s somewhat disappointing to find out Matt’s character never said more, he’s used to surviving on his own so it’s not all that surprising. I really love the relationship that Foggy and Matt share, especially with how well Cox and Henson operate on screen together. The flashbacks really added to their relationship and made me love them so much more as a dynamic duo. The flashbacks also created a fantastic discussion about “justice” and what it really means, which drove a relatively quiet hour of Daredevil, at least compared to the others in the season.
Although I haven’t been totally enthralled with the Karen and Ben: Investigative Journalists plot, I really loved how they opened it up in this episode. We see an extremely touching scene between Ben and his wife that quickly turns sad as we discover that she is suffering from Alzheimer’s disease, and it’s terminal at this point. The writers connected Ben and Karen really well in this episode, and I actually have come to appreciate the relationship they’ve built up.
Ben begins to, once again, have second thoughts about pursuing the Union Allied story that would expose Fisk when he discovers that his wife doesn’t have too much longer to live, and he needs money to get her the proper care. He presents Karen with the deck of cards they were using to map everything out, along with every single physical piece of information they have on Union Allied. Ben’s gesture of passing on the cards was nice, but the fact that he even put everything in a shoe box so she had something to open was heartwarming. That moment, as well as the way Karen reacts to discovering the news about Ben’s wife and her choice to drop all attempts to lure him back the case (for that short time), shows how far their relationship has come.
I was surprised that Karen tracked down Fisk’s mother. I thought it was a really cool thing for her character to do because it shows we aren’t dealing with the simple victim that she was in the first couple of episodes. Ben’s rising interest in why Karen brought him to this retirement home was also well organized with a great build up to the major reveal. This is easily their riskiest move yet, but I’m super excited to see where it goes.
Fisk feels like he is barely, if at all, in the episode. This is all because he has very quiet and calm scenes that are much less intense situations compared to some of the show’s more recent installments. I liked his discussion with Madame Gao and thought their talk was interesting because things are clearly falling apart; not even Nobu and Fisk could stop Daredevil.
Fisk also continues to get better in each episode. When Vanessa drops at the end of the hour and he runs over to catch her, I was genuinely hoping Vanessa would be okay. That’s what I love about the character: I’m interested in him and care about his relationship. I thought it was pretty clear that Leland set up the poison champagne and was trying to take out Fisk before they had him blatantly drop the champagne glass to look like he was suffering as well. We’ll see how that plays out…
Overall, another phenomenal episode of Daredevil. I think Marvel and Netflix have done an amazing job with this show and keep finding ways to raise the bar in terms of quality with each hour. “Nelson V. Murdock” had the least amount of action and was extremely quiet compared to some of the show’s recent installments, but the entire debate and discussion between Matt and Foggy was intense and carried the episode. I really loved how well-written those scenes were and I think they nailed all aspects perfectly. This clearly isn’t the end of Nelson & Murdock, but I wonder if they will reconcile by, or in, the season finale.
Top Moments:
– THE GREEK GIRL! Elektra! Great to get more fingers pointing towards her inclusion during Season 2 and setting up The Hand as the villain.
– Wesley’s smile while he’s clapping after Fisk’s speech is perfect. The bromance continues.
– Nelson & Murdock: Avocados At Law
[Photo via Netflix]
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