Daredevil 1x13 Review: Good Samaritans

“Daredevil”
Written by Steven S. DeKnight
Directed by Steven S. DeKnight
 
The Story
Matt and Karen attend Ben’s funeral. Fisk learns that Leland was responsible for Vanessa’s brush with death, and not because he was trying to kill Fisk. He just wanted Vanessa gone so Fisk would revert to v1.0. He thinks he’s sufficiently blackmailed Fisk for his own protection, but Fisk’s temper doesn’t care about silly things like threats or tasers. He hurls him down an industrial elevator shaft, killing him. Fisk sends his men to find Detective Hoffman so that he can’t rat him out. Karen, Matt, and Foggy come back together and use Marci’s leads to find a hole in Fisk’s accounts. Also, Matt overhears some of Fisk’s cops talking about Hoffman, so he races to find him first, with Foggy’s reluctant blessing. He gets there just in time to save Hoffman from getting his head blown off, and Hoffman’s confession leads to the arrests of everyone on Fisk’s payroll, including a senator and the mole at the bulletin (who was not the editor). Fisk proposes to Vanessa even as FBI agents are coming to drag him away, but he has an escape plan involving lots of armored trucks and goons with machine guns. He almost makes it back to Vanessa, but Matt, now wearing the suit Potter designed for him, intercepts him. They fight, and this time Matt wins, just in time for Sergeant Mahoney (the good cop) to pull up in his cruiser. He lets Matt go and takes Fisk to jail. Nelson & Murdock finally put their sign on the outside of the building, and Matt suits up to continue protecting Hell’s Kitchen.
 
Fisk’s Good Samaritan monologue is perfection. The shot of the police while he’s talking about the Levite and the priest passing by the dying man. The shot of Matt, Foggy, and Karen over the part about the Samaritan. And then Fisk realizing who he really is in the story. He is the ill intent and oh boy did I get chills up my spine when he said that part. “Traveling on a road he should not have been on” over Fisk’s backup pulling up in huge trucks. Just amazing. And what makes it even better is that one of the first things Karen ever said to Matt and Foggy when they showed up out of the blue to help her was “What are you guys, some kind of Good Samaritans?” FULL CIRCLE. I freaking love this show.
 
Things I Liked

• The way you can tell from that shot in the funeral scene that Ben’s editor now regrets every time he shot down Ben’s crime stories, because here’s the grisliest possible proof that Ben was right
• “How’re you holding up?” “Like a good Catholic boy.” “That bad, huh?”
• “Ten million buys a lot of courage.”
• Leland still has his taser! Too bad it isn’t a magazine of bull tranquilizers.
• “Last time you went after Fisk, I found you half-dead! More than half! You go after him in the mask again, he might kill you. Or you might kill him, which would probably have the same effect on someone as Catholic as you!”
• Matt is much better lying on his own than he is tag-team lying with Foggy. It’s freaking hilarious.
• Matt’s little smile when Karen mentions her confidence in the man in the mask.
• Matt calmly explaining Hoffman’s options to him while he’s trembling with horror at almost getting killed by Fisk’s cops
• Legal takedown! With hilarious slow motion and opera music, that somehow doesn’t ruin the tone of the episode. The shots of Ellison at the paper and Marci smugly watching the rest of her firm get taken down are especially good. But that music.
• Fisk’s proposal to Vanessa. Yeah, I ship them. Shipping them is like shipping the Macbeths. Vanessa doesn’t quite push Fisk towards evil like Lady Macbeth does to Macbeth, but she’s certainly validating it.
• Costume time! We have our origin story, ladies and gentlemen. (But I’ve got to admit, I kind of preferred the low-rent mask and black sweater ensemble.)
• Ironic dialogue reversal! “I’m going to kill you.” “Take your best shot.” Totally forgot about that. This time, it’s Fisk who has a wildfire of rage and Matt who has the controlled spark of anger. Rage gives Fisk a lot of power, but not enough to win in the end.
• The way the final fight is basically a boxing match. Some might say it’s not the most epic way to go out, but this show isn’t about being epic, it’s about parallelism, themes, and motifs. Boxing is absolutely the most fitting form for the final fight to take.

 
Things I Didn’t

• The surprising number of bloody shots when Fisk’s cops get to Hoffman’s hideout. I wasn’t grossed out, but it did seem kind of silly.
• As much as I like the boxing match style final fight, Matt’s final punch had kind of a goofy wind-up.

 
The Characters
Matt is starting to get his conviction back, or starting to have it for the first time, or something. He now knows exactly where he can fit into the way the law works. As long as he can get the right evidence, he can make sure the case goes through. It just so happens that he needs to use his abilities to get that evidence. I love how much Matt loves Nelson & Murdock (but he should know better than to start celebrating too soon). However, if he wants Karen to open up to him about the weird thing in her voice, maybe he should lead by telling her his own secret.
 
Mrs. Urich is right: Karen didn’t push Ben into following that story. He kept going even when he was telling her he was done. I’m not sure he would’ve found the trail leading to Mama Fisk without her help, but he probably would’ve found something that drew Fisk’s ire eventually. I love how much Karen loves Nelson & Murdock too.
 
Foggy is definitely Matt’s rock. He’s the one who can convince Matt that the law is worth trying. It’s funny that the guy who graduated lower than Matt has more faith that the law can work. I stand by the D&D alignments I gave the three of them at the beginning. Matt is Chaotic Good, Karen is Neutral Good, and Foggy is Lawful Good.
 
How could Leland possibly think that admitting to Fisk’s face that he tried to have Vanessa killed was something he could walk away from still breathing? I mean, yeah, it was a good plan to keep Hoffman hidden away as leverage, but he forgot to take Fisk’s rage into account. It surpasses his reason, particularly when his mother or Vanessa are involved.
 
Like Matt, Fisk has finally overcome his internal conflict and figured out what his role is. He’s the villain! And he’s done pretending otherwise. Yeah, I’m liking the Macbeth comparison, because Macbeth also took a long time to come to terms with his own villainy. It drove Macbeth insane, and it drove Fisk to murdering most of his allies.
 
Overall Rating
5,000,000,000/5