Daredevil

[Jonathan101]

The guy playing Agent Nadeem, I really like his performance. I'm not intimately familiar with the comics, so I don't know if he's a character from there, but he's giving me a lot to latch onto even though I have no idea where his arc is going.

He's an original character, although some of the stuff that happens to him is taken from what happened to Matt Murdock and another minor character in the Daredevil: Born Again story arc.

Also, as someone not intimately familiar with the comics (a passing familiarity with most marvel properties is all I'll boast), it was just Episode 5 when I finally realized who Agent Poindexter is.

Yes. DDs arch-enemy FINALLY makes an appearance.

Stilt Man -_-

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

I think I was pretty clear on knowing that Poindexter was the guy that cleared out the detail that was trying to kill Fisk.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

-/-- $poiler --/-

One thing about Nadeem's actions that I didn't really think about when I asked about his contemptibility is his part in investigating Murdock based on Fisk's claims. And it's not for nothing to consider. While Karen got a little in over her head trying to expose Manning, she certainly did a good job of making Nadeem seem like a doofus who was playing into Fisk's hands a little too excitingly. A tad more so than Foggy did imo. I mean especially if I was Matt at this point I'd be pretty perturbed, particularly at Nadeem considering Murdoc of all people knows the best what Fisk's doing.

But that still sorta comes back to Nadeem in particular not having the easiest of recourse in this whole debacle. It wasn't just a handful of agents that had Fisk's back, he actually did have an above board detail that he manifested that the FBI as an organization was complicit to. So on top of that, he had a circle of coyotes doing his evil bidding in which Nadeem was just the last one. And they play it off like it was all Nadeem's fault. Maybe driving Poindexter to the church was actually pretty bad though, but I think he says something like "I did the worst deed of all in driving Poindexter there".

[bronnt]

So, finally wrapped up this season.

Spoilers

I was actually a bit disappointed in that they killed off Nadeem in the end. I mean, it's probably inconsequential in that Netflix is ending its Marvel properties (since Disney is creating their own streaming service to compete with Netflix), but I think it's a shame to spend a ton of time on character development only for it to never again matter after the season is over. Even though there's probably no more episodes, so many people have been killed off that the world around Daredevil seems a bit empty.

Also, for that reason, all the way up until the end credits was I expecting Electra to somehow show back up. I mean, she was standing right next to Matt when the explosion happened, so if he survived, I don't know why she couldn't also. Once it got down to the last couple of episodes and I could see where things were going, I was utterly convinced she was going to show up at the last second to murder Fisk.

The last couple of episodes also had one of my least favorite hero tropes. Tvtropes calls it "What Measure is a Mook?" In this case, Daredevil threw a platter to prevent Fisk being hit with a microphone that Bullseye threw at him. But when Bullseye is throwing knives at the FBI agents who busted in, let them get skewered. Somehow that's okay, we don't care about them. Or how important it is for Daredevil to never kill anyone, but when he's escorting Agent Nadeem, he's quite fine with the bad guys being shot. If it's such a sin to kill Fisk, then it's probably just as bad to let the nameless mooks get mowed down.

Anyway, it's still a really good show. It's a shame all the Marvel shows are going away, though. I never really watched the others besides Jessica Jones, but it's good programming.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

So, finally wrapped up this season.

Spoilers

I was actually a bit disappointed in that they killed off Nadeem in the end. I mean, it's probably inconsequential in that Netflix is ending its Marvel properties (since Disney is creating their own streaming service to compete with Netflix), but I think it's a shame to spend a ton of time on character development only for it to never again matter after the season is over. Even though there's probably no more episodes, so many people have been killed off that the world around Daredevil seems a bit empty.

I see what you're saying, but I'm not quite sure what you expect. Everybody that's killed off must be inconsequential, or at least had a buildup from the previous season? I know that's not really what you're conveying, but I don't see it much in the way of a problem.

Also, for that reason, all the way up until the end credits was I expecting Electra to somehow show back up. I mean, she was standing right next to Matt when the explosion happened, so if he survived, I don't know why she couldn't also. Once it got down to the last couple of episodes and I could see where things were going, I was utterly convinced she was going to show up at the last second to murder Fisk.

I didn't think about her during the season, though between watches you gotta start to wonder what happened with him getting out and her disappearing, only to be mentioned once or twice.

The last couple of episodes also had one of my least favorite hero tropes. Tvtropes calls it "What Measure is a Mook?" In this case, Daredevil threw a platter to prevent Fisk being hit with a microphone that Bullseye threw at him. But when Bullseye is throwing knives at the FBI agents who busted in, let them get skewered. Somehow that's okay, we don't care about them. Or how important it is for Daredevil to never kill anyone, but when he's escorting Agent Nadeem, he's quite fine with the bad guys being shot. If it's such a sin to kill Fisk, then it's probably just as bad to let the nameless mooks get mowed down.

Matt can't really stop everything that happens, and I'm pretty sure that the microphone was aimed at Vanessa as vengeance for fridging Katy. And I'm not really sure the lengths he'll go when it comes to armed law enforcement in the line of duty. It starts to smell a bit funny maybe, but really there's only so much he can do. With Nadeem he probably could have handled that situation depending on how harry it really was, but that would obviously blow his cover in the public's eye probably. I don't think he's really of the mind to enforce the no-killing rule that happens with teamups in superhero encounters, especially given that Nadeem is literally in the line of duty as a human and there are a bunch of assault rifles gunning for them.

I will give you credit though that leaving Bullseye to corner Fisk is a bit of cherry picking. He might have also gone up to stop fisk instead of bait him for Bullseye, but the sensible thing would probably be to stop Bullseye in his track. Then again, it's tricky with the FBI all around as an audience who are of the mind to arrest or shoot Murdock on site as the man in the black mask.

[bronnt]

I will give you credit though that leaving Bullseye to corner Fisk is a bit of cherry picking. He might have also gone up to stop fisk instead of bait him for Bullseye, but the sensible thing would probably be to stop Bullseye in his track. Then again, it's tricky with the FBI all around as an audience who are of the mind to arrest or shoot Murdock on site as the man in the black mask.

It did lead to that three-way fight at the end, which I thought was great. It felt like a worthy climax for the season, even though I thought the season as a whole had some pacing issues. It was a lot of fun, and yet was chaotic enough that it didn't look choreographed. That's been the appeal, in general, of the Netflix Marvel shows-it feels like a street brawl instead of the somewhat-campy choreographed action in the Avengers movies.

Not that I have a problem with the latter, they're fun, but sometimes you want less sugar and more steak.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

I will give you credit though that leaving Bullseye to corner Fisk is a bit of cherry picking. He might have also gone up to stop fisk instead of bait him for Bullseye, but the sensible thing would probably be to stop Bullseye in his track. Then again, it's tricky with the FBI all around as an audience who are of the mind to arrest or shoot Murdock on site as the man in the black mask.

It did lead to that three-way fight at the end, which I thought was great. It felt like a worthy climax for the season, even though I thought the season as a whole had some pacing issues. It was a lot of fun, and yet was chaotic enough that it didn't look choreographed. That's been the appeal, in general, of the Netflix Marvel shows-it feels like a street brawl instead of the somewhat-campy choreographed action in the Avengers movies.

Not that I have a problem with the latter, they're fun, but sometimes you want less sugar and more steak.

Yes that is definitely an agreed upon appeal to these shows. Though it perfectly describes the extended fight sequences which you say you're a bit tired of by the third one, so I'm not sure what's going wrong there with it in general as recurring signature sequence in the show. As someone who likes not only the first season, but season 2 better than the first, I had a good deal of appreciation for each of them. The third one though added more to it in the form of tactical tricks by Murdock, to two different types of adversaries, and checkpoint conversation nearing the end of it, with some prisoners cheering him on and some nagging at him to let them out. I know it kinda turns into a detail list as I go on, but it was just very dynamic while keeping the raw tension of the first two.

[bronnt]

Though it perfectly describes the extended fight sequences which you say you're a bit tired of by the third one, so I'm not sure what's going wrong there with it in general as recurring signature sequence in the show. As someone who likes not only the first season, but season 2 better than the first, I had a good deal of appreciation for each of them. The third one though added more to it in the form of tactical tricks by Murdock, to two different types of adversaries, and checkpoint conversation nearing the end of it, with some prisoners cheering him on and some nagging at him to let them out. I know it kinda turns into a detail list as I go on, but it was just very dynamic while keeping the raw tension of the first two.

My problem with it is that, in this case, it got very showy. I don't mind extended sequences, but they made it one very long continuous shot. The gritty nature of the fights serves to ground them and draw you in, and then I got hit with a reminder that this is all just a show.

When you have the camera going for one long shot like that, when it's going through several different rooms and hallways and panning around to show what's happening, it feels less like a story and more like a theme park ride. After long enough, it feels cheesy (IMO). It's the opposite of what they did with the camera in season 1 with their long take fight scene, where it was just sitting, pointing down one hall way, and it kind of slowly pushed forward, getting the audience just a bit closer to the action without really being aware of the camera moving.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

Though it perfectly describes the extended fight sequences which you say you're a bit tired of by the third one, so I'm not sure what's going wrong there with it in general as recurring signature sequence in the show. As someone who likes not only the first season, but season 2 better than the first, I had a good deal of appreciation for each of them. The third one though added more to it in the form of tactical tricks by Murdock, to two different types of adversaries, and checkpoint conversation nearing the end of it, with some prisoners cheering him on and some nagging at him to let them out. I know it kinda turns into a detail list as I go on, but it was just very dynamic while keeping the raw tension of the first two.

My problem with it is that, in this case, it got very showy. I don't mind extended sequences, but they made it one very long continuous shot. The gritty nature of the fights serves to ground them and draw you in, and then I got hit with a reminder that this is all just a show.

When you have the camera going for one long shot like that, when it's going through several different rooms and hallways and panning around to show what's happening, it feels less like a story and more like a theme park ride. After long enough, it feels cheesy (IMO). It's the opposite of what they did with the camera in season 1 with their long take fight scene, where it was just sitting, pointing down one hall way, and it kind of slowly pushed forward, getting the audience just a bit closer to the action without really being aware of the camera moving.

I guess I see what you're getting at, though I just always see it as a show. I surely admire it more than what I'd consider more standard TV formats as it seems more realistic in interaction, but it's never a moment of being drawn in or taken out. To me it's like how people describe an Imax scene where you notice the screen get bigger then it just kinda goes back to normal.