[Dr Kain]

Last night I finished reading the Frank Miller/Klaus Janson run of DareDevil. Even though I have read some DD comics as a kid, they were just a bunch of random issues from what was out at the time, so this was the first time I have ever read a consistent set of issues and I have to say they were fantastic. When Miller isn't a bat shit crazy psychopath, he is a fantastic writer and the artwork was just incredible. It was also interesting to read the first time DareDevil and Kingpin actually crossed paths and the relationship that was built from that. Two of my favorite moments in the run includes one story where Foggy was acting like a gangster and stood himself up to Kingpin and another where this one guy named Pike kept getting attacked by everyone looking for Stick until he opens up his door, sees two people just tells them where Stick is because he's tired of being attacked over it. It was such a hilarious scene.

Unfortunately, the run was not perfect as there was this subplot with some girl named Heather (no idea where Karen is in all of this, but she doesn't appear even once during this run), who is the daughter of a dead business owner and Matt's girlfriend who becomes his fiancee that came out of nowhere. The worst part was they just randomly break the two up with forged letters Foggy and Black Widow wrote, which made no sense at all. Not to mention it felt very rushed.

Beyond that, the continuous plots with Bullseye and then the one with The Hand, Stick, and Elektra were all fantastic, though the book ends without DD and Elektra meeting each other after her resurrection, so that was kind of lame. In fact, the last story is just a side story between DD and a bed ridden Bullseye rather than anything grandiose. I mean, I get the series wasn't ending there, but I was hoping for something that felt like a final issue for their run.

Nevertheless, I can really see why this run elevated DareDevil into a top favorite character going forward and how it impacted the story telling of these characters later. I do hope Marvel sooner rather than later releases all of the material that followed this book in Omnibus form because the only thing I have is an Epic Collection that covers material 60 issues later and I'd rather read them all in order going forward.

Lastly, poor Turk. Hasbro should do an alternate Turk head for the upcoming Legends Stiltman figure.