Bendis' Daredevil Part 7: The Widow

[cyberghostface]

'The Widow' is the first part of a 'trilogy' of stand-alone stories that Bendis did on Daredevil before his tenth and final storyline. Whereas all of Bendis's prior arcs were puzzle-pieces that put together a larger tapestry (that is Silke's storyline lead directly into the outing of Daredevil, Lowlife had the return of Kingpin which set up the next story) these were all largely self-contained.

'The Widow' is, all things considered, a breather and a bit of a lighthearted story compared to the rest of Bendis's run at this point. Admittedly, as I'm not a huge expert on the larger Marvel universe, some of it left me cold. I.E. there's what I'm guessing is supposed to be a big reveal near the end that had me go "Huh?"

For the record, the arc follows two interweaving plots, one involving Matt, the other involving Natasha. When deciding what pages to show, my first priority was pages that focus on both of them, then the one involving Matt, and then the one involving Natasha. As such, there's not a whole lot of the latter plot here.

#61...

Taking up from where 'King of Hell's Kitchen' ended, Milla wants her marriage to Matt to be annulled. Matt is upset, but Foggy says to give it to  her, saying that if it was meant to be, she'll come back.

In Bulgaria, Madame Hydra is arrested by the Avengers for plotting a terrorist attack. As she is captured on Bulgarian soil, that causes some problems. 







When Nick Fury is given orders to take the Black Widow in, he instead tells her to abort her current mission and disappear.


Matt is dealing with the press accusing him of being the current kingpin, and finds Natasha waiting for him in his room. 













#62...



So we flashback to last night, where we see Daredevil and the Black Widow take down Jigsaw at the pier.






Inside the case is the annulment request from Milla.

The next day, Foggy wants to know if anything happened. Matt says no, because he's married. Foggy is a bit incredulous.

Later, Jigsaw pays a visit to the office of Nelson & Murdock.









Matt and Natasha are out at lunch in SoHo, where Matt tells her that he is currently married. Suddenly, Matt smells gunpowder from two blocks away. The issue ends with the two narrowly dodging gunfire.

#63...

The issue opens with the assassin apparently talking to himself, saying that he was told to kill the Widow and make it look a sloppy gangland slaying. Daredevil attacks him under the impression that Jigsaw sent him, but the man's heartbeat says otherwise. The assassin pulls out a radio device that scrambles Matt's brain.









He shoots at her, but she manages to dodge it and it only hits her shoulder. The two fight, but the assassin manages to get away.

Later, Matt is helping Natasha with her wound, and asks to know what is going on. She explains that she was called in by Nick Fury.









#64...

Nick Fury is on the helicarrier, and discovers that someone has hacked into Murdock's files. He demands to have it traced.

Matt realizes that legally, he could take out Jigsaw and his men, but he realizes doing so would expose him once and all as Daredevil. He's going to have to leave it up to the proper authorities...and Natasha.










Natasha later gets a message from Nick Fury that simply says 'Howard'. This refers to 'Howard the Duck', meaning he wants them to play 'sitting duck' for a little while. The next day, Quinn is once again targeting Matt and Natasha, only this time he gets hit in the neck with a dart from Nick Fury.



Long story short, the person who was planning this against the Black Widow is none other than Alexi Shostakov, the Red Guardian. The internets inform me that this is Black Widow's ex-husband and a supervillain, but when I first read it I went "Should I know who this guy is?" So he gets arrested by SHIELD. I thought of posting the pages with him, but in the end I decided that the final pages with Matt and Natasha were better suited.

Matt later sees Milla, and tells her he couldn't sign the annulment. He says he didn't marry her under false pretenses, and that he loves her.
. 





Next up is 'Golden Age', which is in my opinion one of Bendis's best stories on the title. If you haven't seen it before, you're in for a real treat.

Comments

[speedingtortoise]

The vast majority of these are showing up as red x's of death for me
: (

[cyberghostface]

Did you try opening them up in new windows?

[speedingtortoise]

Ah that did the trick! Thanks!

And I'm really loving these posts. I need to look into buying this series if I can.

[amancalledblaze]

Thank you for posting these, THIS is why I like Scans Daily, reading bits of something that really is interesting and makes me want to track the issues down and really get into the thick of it.
*thumbs up*

[cyberghostface]

NP!

[twospirit.blogspot.com]

Exactly! I bought the 2nd and 3rd Daredevil Bendis collections because of this...and will probably buy more because it keeps being so good! Thanks for getting me hooked on it (I think!lol)

[stolisomancer]

Rough translation of Widow's French:

"You're really very ugly, aren't you? The worst part is that you smell worse than you look. And even more surprising, you're dumber than you are ugly. I've never met anyone uglier than you, and I'm Russian."

Heh. Somehow I missed this arc.

[darkknightjrk]

Heheh--thanks for the translation. I was wondering about that--especially since there seemed to be "laid" at the end of one of the balloons. :D

[salinea]

OK, this is decent French. I notice.

[toby_wan_kenobi]

Tu es francophone?

[salinea]

oui.

[toby_wan_kenobi]

Chouette. Moi, je ne suis qu'un prof de français... mais je viens de passer un an à Paris en faisant mes études superieures.

[mistervader]

I apologize for my ignorance, but if you're blind, you sign just with an "x" in e presence of witnesses, right? Is that how it works?

[freezer]

Hate to be Debbie Downer here, but the overarching plot left me cold. The whoevers at the Pentagon are going to sell out Natasha, an operative who's proved both her worth and loyalty for years and years, just to get a show trial out of Madame Hydra? Bugger that!

It just felt like they were trying for a dig at The War On Terror, swung wide, and hit Logic instead.

[jlroberson]

I really like the face that Maleev gave her, and I usually do not like Maleev's art because it seems to photoey. But that face, that nose, those expressions--they're really great. You almost don't need to read the words, just follow her face.

[mrstatham]

I like it because Natasha actually looks like she could be Russian or from one of the Eastern European countries, thanks to the kind of features he gives her. It's miles better than the generi-faces of someone like Frank Cho, whose Natasha looked the same as every other woman on the Mighty Avengers.

But I like this. The smile, the expressions, they kind-of remind me of one of my favourite Bond villainesses, Xenia Onatopp, and that, in my book, is definitely a good thing.

[pyynk]

From what I've been told, Maleev is starting to pull back from the heavy photo referencing. Seeing art like this makes me understand why as it's flat out fantastic.

[fredneil.livejournal.com]

I like this take on Natasha. Something's going to go wrong. Something always goes wrong.

[tzipwich]

The story in this arc wasn't the most exciting, but I really liked the characterizations here.

[filthysize]

Yeah, it's especially cold coming off of the explosive previous arc, but the banter made it a fun read nonetheless. I like seeing the consequence of Matt declaring himself Kingpin in that Jigsaw scene.

[mola_ram]

Dear Mister Director.

When Nick Fury blows you off...

YOU CONSIDER YOURSELF DAMN FORTUNATE!

[blackruzsa]

I love how it looks like Milla's gonna say something in the last page, but doesn't. I haven't seen Maleev's other art but because of his arc I've fallen in love with it.

[pyynk]

Love the art callback to Gene Colan with Natasha coming out of the shower.

[darkknightjrk]

Huh. Was that possibly posted on here?

[jlroberson]

Something's been nagging at me about that wonderful nose. It seemed familiar, and not just because I've known a lot of Eastern European women(I used to live in Chicago). Because it reminded me of someone, someone Russian. Someone I used as a model myself for a major character of mine, so I've studied how she looks.

If this model is not someone he knows personally, I'd bet money she's the rather startling Russian model Petra Verkaik. (google the name yourself; much of it is not safe for work I warn you)

As said, I've used her as a model myself, so that is in no way a criticism; in fact that is an EXCELLENT choice for the Black Widow, who after all is meant to be sexy AND dangerous. This is more a "that's neat" observation.