Volume 17: Daredevil: Guardian Devil

Daredevil: Guardian Devil

Author: Kevin Smith | Illustrator: Joe Quesada

"I've been blind since I was a child, and as a result,
I've never actually seen the woman who cried herself to sleep in my bed last night."

Guardian Devil isn't a direct sequel to Frank Miller's Daredevil: Born Again story (Volume 08 of TUGNC), but Kevin Smith's version of DD, his treatment of one of the more tortured heroes of the Marvel Universe, was clearly influenced by Miller's work.

It opens with a handwritten letter, a heartfelt confession exposing someone's inner feelings. Ink on paper can be a powerful modifier of a reader's emotional state; comics are ink on paper, too.

The text speaks directly to Matt's inner demons, a part of him that's never far from the surface thanks to his catholic upbringing: the unique feeling of guilt that the Catholic Church creates and nurtures in an individual, requiring them to feed it for life lest they fall from God's grace. For many of the lambs, the tether of conditioning the Church attaches stretches but rarely breaks, strengthening each time the individual is forced to confront their own mortality.

When someone is feeling lonely, lost, or underappreciated, when there's no-one around but they need acknowledgement of their feelings, who else but God can give it to them? Furthermore, just because someone wears a mask, is a symbol of hope for others, it doesn't mean they themselves aren't ever lonely and lost.

A new element is introduced and presumed to be either a form of divine salvation or its opposite, damnation. It's something that either ought to be protected or destroyed. The uncertainty, the pressure on the hero to choose one side or the other, is laid on thick.

Credit where it's due, Smith has some excellent ideas (delving beneath not just the spandex but also the character's skin, into their psyche is a solid basis for storytelling) but his heavy-handedness often undervalues the good work. When the text is being wholly subjective, such as the aforementioned letter, it's not a problem. When it's required to be objective, however, it can feel forced and melodramatic. The finale, in particular, was that way for me. It left me unfulfilled and resolute that, while I feel it was a book worthy of the score given below, I've no desire to read it again.

The book collects together Daredevil (Vol 2) #1-8.

Verdict: