Part crime procedural, part superhero drama, part action series, part The Dark Knight, Marvel’s Daredevil marks the biggest departure from the MCU to date and it’s utterly fantastic.  Gritty and dark, it has nothing to do with the Marvel movies we’ve seen to this point which are upbeat and bright, not just in their look but in their tone.  Daredevil is dark from the start and relishes in the seedy characters and back alleys of Hell’s Kitchen.  Confession: I used to read comic books as a kid and my two favorites were The Punisher and Daredevil.  I loved the darkly drawn pages and the sense of vengeance and revenge of both characters yet both have failed to ever make it to the screen in a convincing fashion.

I think we all remember the disaster that was the original Daredevil film starring Ben Affleck.  Everything that that movie does wrong, the Netflix series does right.  There is no mistaking the tone of Marvel’s Daredevil and it is consistent throughout: Dark, punishing, relentless and violent.  The most surprising thing is that to date, this such a huge departure from the MCU that we’ve come to know, but that isn’t the world that Daredevil lives in.  Daredevil and the world he inhabits are the grimy and dark back alleys of Hell’s Kitchen and the show does such a great job of portraying those areas and those people.  Matt Murdock’s backstory is easily explained here and shown quickly because it’s not as important as what happens to him as what happens next and aside from a few early flashbacks we see how Murdock is presently dealing with those affects and his abilities.  Murdock loves his city and vows to protect it at all costs from those that mean to destroy it, not only as Daredevil but also with his law partner Foggy Nelson.

As much as I loved the series there are a couple problems.  The acting is sometimes uneven and Vincent D’Onofrio’s villain, The Kingpin/Wilson Fisk, at times is so overacted that it can become grating but overall he’s very good and Charlie Cox as Daredevil is excellent.  Rosario Dawson is underused and in a few scenes the action is shot inconsistently but as a first season and an origin story it’s really impressive the risk that Marvel took here with such a payoff.  I look forward to season 2 and to the future of Netflix/Marvel projects such as Jessica Jones, Iron Fist and Luke Cage.

Recommend? Hell yes and not just to comic book fans.