I watched the third installment of DD within a week or so of it becoming available, and although it remains quality television even under its third showrunner, Erik Olesen, I didn't find it as compelling as its forebears. I think part of it was because it felt the least comic-y of the 4 previous ventures (including The Defenders).
The NMCU's refusal to return to the status quo has been the strong point of its best series, so having Matt Murdock (Charlie Cox) using the presumption of his death at the end of The Defenders to abandon his civilian identity is a great jumping off point for S3. Having him heal up in the basement of a church in Hell's Kitchen evokes some of the imagery from Frank Miller and David Mazzuchelli's Born Again series, a clear source of inspiration for this season. But a crisis of faith also sees him forsake his signature outfit - he eschews his comic look for the entirety of the season, choosing instead the Man In Black look from season 1 (and the updated comic origin story Man Without Fear, and maybe a little bit of the Dread Pirate Roberts for good measure).
But don't fret, you will still get see old Hornhead in action, as the newly introduced Bullseye wears the costume to discredit the hero with a series of ruthless and brutal attacks. Bullseye is one of DD's greatest foils in the comics, and his origin here is one of the high points of S3. Ably portrayed by Wilson Bethel, a short-lister for Captain America many years ago, he somehow manages to balance Bullseye's cruelty and lethality with a troubled childhood and a struggle with mental health issues. I won't say they make him truly sympathetic, but they make him understandable and relatable, and for someone who likes killing his targets with whatever he finds laying around, that feels like quite an accomplishment.
A hero is only as good as his villains, it is said, and pairing Bullseye with Vincent D'Onofrio's Kingpin proves to be almost too much for Murdock, and almost too much for me as a viewer. As a series, DD has never shied away from showing the brutal, murky and morally convoluted side of crime and vigilantism, but I found this season's level of darkness and cynicism almost unbearable. To be fair, this might have something to do with the even more depressing and divisive political situation we see in the news almost constantly, but watching Wilson Fisk's machinations play out, and the ease with which he is able to co-opt and corrupt decent people may be good storytelling, but it isn't necessarily a good time.
D'Onofrio's gravitas and semi-stilted vocal delivery take the Kingpin from being a caricature to something proto-Shakespearean, and his obviously sincere commitment to the love of his life Vanessa (Ayelet Zurer) may be the only vulnerability he allows himself.
The real lynchpin to the story this season though is FBI agent Ray Nadeem, played by Jay Ali. A family man and loyal FBI agent with some financial troubles from helping pay for his sister-in-law's medical treatments, Nadeem is the one on hand when a prison assassination attempt prompts Fisk to begin providing valuable intelligence about organized crime. Hoping to parlay this leverage into a promotion at the bureau, he is quickly drawn into a web of complicity and truly fiendish choices.
Looking back on it now, I wonder if I was perhaps too harsh in my initial assessment; after all, it is a golden age of nerdy television right now, appealing to all tastes, and S3 of Daredevil has a lot going for it: great characterizations, a non-cookie-cutter storyline, and some of the best action sequences and fight scenes on tv. I just hope that next season they dust off just a smidgen of the grittiness, and bring in some of the adventure and joy I remember from the comics. There are hints of this in the coda to this season, so for now I guess it is a question of whether or not the Devil of Hell's Kitchen gets the opportunity to return for a fourth series.
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