Friday, February 6, 2009

The Devil and The Details: Daredevil: Born Again

Fourteen years old and I learn that the devil is in the details.

The paper is somewhat coarse beneath my fingertips. My brain tries to race forward so as to empower my fingers to do what they have done for nearly a decade:

Turn the damned page.


The art is pretty, like the kind of pretty you see in the posters in the drycleaners' window. The art is polished. Considered. The man talks to the woman. The woman... remembers, not in flashback but in something, realistic. She remembers with regret.

The woman answers, raises a slip of paper and makes a declaration. It will speak of deconstruction.

“Look, this is worth something.”

These people speak to each other. This is... conversation?

It is changing everything I know.

Turn the page.


The man in red has yet to arrive. He is a good man. He is a good and noble man who has done many great things. He has not impressed me in the least.

How could he? He has always existed on the fringe of my four color existence. He'd no weight with me.

He'd never avenged.

On the page, the fat man with the diamond in his ascot from the Spider-Man albums I had six years back, holds up an envelope, considering its contents.

“Await the kill order... I shall test the information.”


Six months pass and the hero awakens to the sun's warmth on his face.

I am fourteen and I notice the color of the sun's warmth on a man's face. I am four pages in.

I am learning comics as art.

The noble hero awakens to his quiet destruction.

And I turn the page.

3 comments:

BIG MIKE said...

Born Again?

lou said...

Glad to see someone posting here again.

Anonymous said...

Wow.

That was awesome man. my neck hurts from nodding my head in agreement.

It's honestly the best thing Miller's ever done.

..also it's the reason why I consider Mazzucchelli to be the 'be all end all' when it comes to artists. the guy is fantastic, and can convey so much with his line work.

It's insane.

God, there are so many great moments in that book. It's the perfect synergy of artist and writer.