It is indeed a fine companion piece to Bloodline or Marco Polo, which is not much of a distinction. Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt is great, but that was made for NBC.Īnd so maybe Daredevil is a real Netflix-y Netflix show in that it’s competently assembled but ultimately sort of hollow. Many people enjoyed season four of Arrested Development, though I am not one of them ( curse you, bad green-screens), but even so: AD is Fox’s more than it’s Netflix’s.
(Or … three or two.) Even if we chalk up its creative failures to non-Netflix entities, Netflix still decided to wring a fourth season out of it. The Killing! Boy, that show did not need a season four. Bloodline is a story drought, with no emotional relevance and very little to say. House of Cards has some high dramatic highs, but its feebly constructed lows are too ridiculous to ignore. Lilyhammer originated in Norway and is not very good. But the rest of its original programming isn’t all that striking. Netflix winds up being the vehicle for how many of us consume “quality” television, particularly shows we’ve waited for and heard about over the course of months or years - and that winds up contributing to the idea of “a Netflix show.” Netflix has two bona-fide gems in Orange Is the New Black and Bojack Horseman: smart and original, funny, and precise. It’s almost a relief not to have everything be guns, guns, guns, and these sometimes-brutal action sequences emphasize how much Daredevil cares about bodies: Where are we strong, where are we weak, what can be zeroed in on? The chemicals that blinded Matt as a child also gave him heightened abilities in his other senses - a premise the show handles well and delicately, making his powers of observation seem more like the setup for a USA spinoff of Psych than a moody superhero drama.īut is it a Netflix show? The idea of “a Netflix show” is one of prestige and binge-worthiness, of the kind of daring programming a network would be too chicken-shit to try and cable would be too slow to capitalize on. If you like hand-to-hand fight scenes, Daredevil has your number. The show is squarely violent, including the aforementioned punches and lots of severe beatings (a particularly disturbing one with a bowling ball), the severing of limbs, and plenty of cracking bones. The good guys are good, the bad guys are bad, and of course the women are there to be victims and helpers and occasionally both a victim and a helper. Daredevil is also a half-assed lawyer show, complete with a drawn-out organized crime case and a blonde assistant who herself is embroiled in said case. and Agent Carter and what feels like dozens of films. Is life one giant punch to all of us? Maybe so.ĭaredevil is Netflix’s latest original series, and it isn’t all that original: It’s another Marvel property, joining ABC’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. “It hurts, doesn’t it? Being in pain?” That’s what Daredevil says to a bad guy. Just let Matt/ Daredevil tell you more about punches. Don’t think about the instances in which punching is a crime. Maybe punch-taking is genetic? Perhaps it’s a nurture trait, not a nature trait, but either way: Daredevil thrives on your punches, you gnarly cretins! The thing he cannot take is injustice. My dad could take a punch, Matt tells us and anyone else who will listen, including a priest and an underdeveloped love interest. See, Matt Murdock - lawyer by day, superhero by night, blind guy by all the time - can take a licking, which he learned from his dad, who was a so-so amateur boxer. So many punches in Daredevil, and each frequently remarked upon.
Not the sherbet-and-ginger-ale kind you get after a piano recital, but the fist-on-flesh kind you get in a fight, or as a neighborhood vigilante. Matt Murdock - lawyer by day, superhero by night.