Coc Week: Echo

[cyberghostface]

Echo AKA Maya Lopez is one of the more underrated Daredevil characters in my opinion. She's a deaf Native-American/Latina who had a romance with Matt Murdock while believing Daredevil killed her father. After David Mack introduced her she effectively went into limbo (you'd figure with Marvel's commitment to diversity that a character who is both disabled and a person of color would be more prominent but...) although Bendis made an effort to use her a few times. There are rumors that she is being cast for a Disney+ show (people are guessing Hawkeye due to Clint Barton's deafness in the comics) right now so maybe that will change.

Daredevil #9...







#10...















#11...














#13... (Long story short there were delays so #12 was an intermission issue.)



She doesn't really appear for the rest of the issue which is Kingpin-centered (I may post his material at a later date.)

#14...

Echo attacks both Daredevil and Black Widow. Matt lures her into a darkened building which renders her blind in addition to deaf.









#15...







It goes without saying that Kingpin survived this attack but he was left blinded as a result. This became a major plot point in Bendis's run in which Fisk's blindness made him weak and lead to an assassination attempt that put him in a coma. When he later returned he had reconstructive surgery and has been able to see ever since.



The final page is the reveal that Fisk is now blind.

Echo didn't return for years until Mack did a follow-up arc about her but to be honest it was pretty boring without much of a plot. Bendis later had her show up in New Avengers as the mysterious 'Ronin' an identity that Hawkeye later took from her.  She had a role in Bendis's Moon Knight run and died at the end but she subsequently returned in a later Daredevil story and has generally been on the sidelines ever since.

Comments

[lego_joker]

Ah! I read this a couple months back - probably the first Marvel comic I touched in a long while...

Mack's layouts are among the most stunning I've ever seen (and the fill-in in the middle of the story isn't half-bad either), but I find the actual story a bit hit-or-miss. Echo in particular is a bag of interesting traits that never seem to gel into a compelling whole, and I'm not sure if I buy Fisk trying to mold a Daredevil-killer from childhood instead of just hiring the best on the market. Bit of a lopsided investment, in terms of time and money...

[cyberghostface]

I don’t think it was his intent from the start to mold her, he was fulfilling his promise to her father. He didn’t even know Daredevil at the time.