Daredevil S03E13 Review: The Man Without Fear

Marvel's Daredevil, Season 3, Episode 13: A New Napkin

Yeah, this is an episode where it does some things amazingly well, and some things pretty poorly. So let's get through what I disliked about this episode first. Both Wilson Fisk and Matt Murdock's characterizations... don't really work. I really don't quite understand what Matt's going through in this episode. When the previous episode ended, he was ready to go back into "must kill Fisk" mode, understandably enraged at how their in-the-system plan failed miserably and ended up with Ray Nadeem dead. Hell, he was torturing Felix Manning for information at the beginning of the episode, Batman Begins style, by hanging the poor man off the ledge! And we get a protracted scene of Matt basically setting Bullseye loose to get his vengeance on Kingpin based on the newfound knowledge that Kingpin ordered the hit on Bullseye's "girlfriend" Julie.

But then Matt... seems to have a change of heart off-screen, going back in after Bullseye and engaging in a three-way fight while protecting Vanessa and stopping Bullseye from killing Kingpin? Kind of? It's honestly pretty bizarre, and I'm not sure when, why and what caused Matt's sudden change of heart. Did it happen before he went into the building? Did it happen during the fight, and that series of angry screaming just Matt working with his internal demons? If it's the former, then we're missing a crucial scene where Matt either struggles with himself or gets told off by someone that killing isn't the right way. If it's the latter, then the show just isn't doing a good job at communicating it at all. For a show that has spent the last 12 episodes building up this struggle on where Daredevil should or should not kill Kingpin, there is nearly nothing in this episode that explains why Daredevil ultimately chooses the "not" option, beyond the vague monologue by Foggy about how Matt's Catholic and therefore has to believe that everyone can change.

Which, again, fair enough if Matt is inspired by Nadeem standing up last episode or some shit, but the fact the sequence of episode is extremely uneven ends up hurting this a lot. Somehow, after all this, Matt ends up back to his season one bubbly happy buddy mode at the end of the episode, which is yet another character change that feels unnaturally earned, as happy as it is to see our three main characters hanging out together.

Anyway... the episode sort of centers around Kingpin and Vanessa's marriage, and the speech between the two are definitely well written, about how they're "all broken", and that they have to find someone whose broken pieces fit with yours. Meanwhile, everyone else is trying to bring Fisk down, with Daredevil torturing Felix Manning, while Foggy tries to warn officer Mahoney that someone's (Matt) trying to murder Wilson Fisk. While Mahoney does relent and commit the "C-team", he just wants to eat popcorn while Fisk gets killed, which... again, considering what Fisk has done, it's hard not to blame Mahoney for having that sentiment. For a show that really wants to push the idea that "killing the bad guys is bad", it really does a poor job at making Foggy's side of the story actually feel like the correct answer.

(Meanwhile, as part of Kingpin's plan, Nadeem is framed for the murder of that one agent at his house, while Daredevil is credited as the ultimate mastermind).

Karen does definitely bring up a good point -- considering the insane reach Fisk has, what if killing Fisk is the only way? And honestly, I don't think the show or Foggy do actually deliver any sort of satisfactory answer to this question beyond a vague "if he crosses that line, he'll never be able to forgive himself". Foggy ends up being dragged into the FBI by a summons, and they get him to... talk and represent Nadeem's widow, who claims to want to cooperate, but just wants to hand over NRay Nadeem's last video to Foggy.... which is basically another recording of his witness speech. Because they didn't think of making one last episode, even as a backup plan? Karen and Ellison basically make this one last testimony viral, coincidentally and dramatically going into everyone's phones just as Fisk and Vanessa are doing their wedding dance. Not sure why this particular mass media trick is counted as credible when nothing they tried have been admissible, but eh, okay, whatever.

While all this is going on, Dex goes off to check a certain freezer room where Julie Barnes' body is being kept, as instructed by Daredevil... and... I'm not sure why Kingpin's men didn't dispose of her body more securely, to be honest. Dex breaks down, and basically dons the cool Daredevil outfit to go and murder Wilson Fisk himself, with the added creepiness of showing up to the wedding while driving a van with Julie's frozen corpse on the other seat.

And then, of course, just as Kingpin himself gets discredited by Nadeem's completely-believable-final-will-and-testimony, Bullseye shows up and attacks, with Daredevil also showing up to stop Kingpin and Vanessa from being killed because of vaguely-implied reasonings that I have to think hard to headcanon. Oh, and because Daredevil only protects named characters, he doesn't stop Bullseye from killing any of the corrupt FBI agents in the room that get karmic deaths... even though they're mostly about as much to blame as Ray Nadeem was, doing bad things in the name of protecting their families. This show's morality about who to spare is very weird. Also, very convenient that Bullseye kills all the ones we know are corrupt, but doesn't kill any of the other guests.

Still, as much as I have a problem with the motivations and lack of explanation on anything that's going on in our characters' minds, the actual melee-a-trois between Bullseye, Daredevil and Kingpin is actually pretty fun, even if it's something that feels like it's somewhat out of place in Netflix's more grounded style. I don't mind it, though. We get a bit of a scream standoff between Kingpin and Daredevil as they wreck the set of Kingpin's fancy hotel room, and we get a bit of a back-and-forth as Bullseye tries to murder Vanessa several times, while Daredevil and Kingpin's priority is to protect Vanessa. And the constant back-and-forth of all three characters fighting each other is pretty great!

Not sure why Vanessa is sort of just standing there, though, even though she has been insisting on the whole "be smart, run now" bit prior to the fight starting. There's also a bizarre editing bit where Kingpin audibly tells Vanessa that he'll meet her "downstairs"... and she runs up a set of stairs, and quite literally stops halfway dumbstruck for a while. Considering how well-done Netflix fights have been, these feel like particularly weird choreography.

Ultimately, Bullseye gets smashed by Kingpin onto a brick wall, seemingly breaking his back and leaving him convulsing on the floor, and it's not until like ten minutes later when I realized that, huh, that is it for Bullseye. I was genuinely waiting for when he was going to jump back in and attack one of the other characters, but we just have a punch-fest between Kingpin and Daredevil, and was definitely ready to snap Kingpin's neck when... Vanessa crying no stops him? Or something? And then we get Kingpin telling Daredevil to... kill him, because he'll never stop hunting Karen and Foggy? Again, considering how Kingpin's priority has been to be with Vanessa, this particular line of thought just feels particularly bizarre. It's just there, of course, to be a temptation for Matt to declare that he won't kill Kingpin, and screaming that "THE CITY BEAT YOU! I BEAT YOU!". And I won't lie, it's a powerful moment because both Charlie Cox and Vincent D'Onofrio sell the hell out of their performances. In the heat of the episode, I was certainly sucked into it. A couple of days later, though, I just really feel like this character moment was unearned for both Daredevil and Kingpin.

Of course, Daredevil ends up giving Kingpin an incentive to stay in prison -- if he ever goes after Foggy and Karen, Daredevil will go after Vanessa, by revealing evidence that she was the one that ordered the hit on Nadeem. Again, this feels absolutely flimsy, and, again, considering how far-reaching Kingpin's reach has been, it feels kind of weird that this genuinely vague threat (not even a recording?) was what made Kingpin stop and agree to accept his defeat. I don't personally mind the fact that Daredevil uses Vanessa as leverage, since I can buy that it's the one thing Fisk isn't willing to risk losing, but the execution feels slipshod.

We get a fun, cathartic bit where officer Mahoney arrests Kingpin, and forces him to get into the car without even getting a chance to say goodbye to his wife, with the pretty badass one-liner: "did you give one to Agent Nadeem?" That's Kingpin out for the count, I guess. It's... it's a pretty hot-blooded climax, if nothing else, even if I've made my complaints about the finale pretty clear. It's at least satisfying from a confrontation standpoint.

And we get a couple of final epilogue bits. We get Matt talking with Sister Maggie about Father Lantom, and a fun little speech about how God's plan is like a beautiful tapestry, but men can only see the tragedy on the back side of said tapestry, basically forgiving Maggie for abandoning him, noting that all of the tragedy in Matt's life has led him into becoming a hero. We get Father Lantom's funeral and a pretty great speech about the man, and the whole "Man Without Fear" moniker.

There are some other fun fluff scenes afterwards. Matt thanking Karen for sticking by him and helping him see the truth about himself; Foggy and Tower's little interaction; Foggy and Marci's little speech; Foggy telling his brother that they're free from Kingpin's blackmail because of lawyer stuff... and, of course, the titular napkin. Daredevil admits that being Matt Murdock isn't bad, and the trio decide to set up "Nelson, Murdock and Page". As noted, this is individually a pretty d'awww scene, even if the transition of Matt back into happy smiley Matt feels abrupt.

The final scene, which likely isn't going to be followed upon following Marvel-Netflix's unfortunate cancellation, is Bullseye being outfitted with some Adamantium Cognium skeleton by Dr. Oyama (so the metal isn't okay, but the character is?), while his eye has apparently been transformed into concentric rings.

Still, other than that Bullseye teaser, the episode actually does manage to tie up the Daredevil storyline pretty neatly. Matt's regained his humanity and returned back to his buddies, while Wilson Fisk is brought down. I have made my problems with this episode particularly clear, though, and this is where I draw the line at spending so long at Karen and Dex's flashbacks, both of which take up nearly entire episodes of their own. As much as it's interesting, those could easily be pared down (as is Nadeem's earlier episodes) to make room for more scenes that would actually put Fisk and Matt's respective character arcs at a far more natural development. Also, considering how much Dex was built up over the season, Bullseye didn't really have that much of a dignified end, huh? He just goes full on psycho, and is just a crazy angry supervillain dude. Kind of a disappointment. Ultimately, though, Daredevil's third season is... it's better than the second one, that's for sure, and a good bit better than a whole lot of Marvel-Netflix's more recent efforts (better than the second seasons of Jessica Jones, Luke Cage and Iron Fist for sure) but at the same time, it is admittedly pretty over-hyped. Granted, it does maintain a pretty solid run throughout the season, and only really feels like it dropped the ball in this episode. Ultimately, though, for all its faults, Daredevil's third season does close Marvel's little Netflix series with a huge bang.