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Daredevil S01E11 – “The Path of the Righteous”

Fight or Flight

Wilson Fisk barges into the hospital with Vanessa, who has been poisoned by something in the drinks that were offered at the benefit they were attending. Immediately, he tries to get his way and get Vanessa immediate care. “Don’t you know who I am?” asks Fisk to a young woman working in the hospital when she refuses him entrance to the room that they take her into - “doesn’t matter,” she says, “fill out the paperwork.”

What will happen if Fisk loses his newfound love? Wilson Fisk without Vanessa at this point – especially if she was taken from him in this way – would likely send him into a chaotic freefall, even more out-of-control than he currently is.

“There was a time when I believed that I was complete – that I needed no one to understand who I am”. “If she dies..” Fisk suggests that Vanessa be sent away if she recovers so that she doesn’t have to be in danger any longer by staying at his side.

Battered and Bruised

Karen finds Matt still visibly hurt and thinks he may not be telling the truth about being in a car accident. It’s pretty amazing that for all of this time she doesn’t seem to have caught on to Matt’s after-hours escapades but, of course, she is dealing with a number of her own issues at the moment.

TV Soup Podcast: Daredevil, "The Path of the Righteous" & "The Ones We Leave Behind" Review 

Both Claire and Karen are telling Matt to be more careful – his injuries are showing more and more and it’s becoming more difficult to hide his nightly exploits from the people that he associates with during the day. He doesn’t have to hide them any longer from Foggy, but Foggy doesn’t want anything to do with him for the time being. I suppose Karen will eventually find out if she continues to spend a great deal of time with Matt, but I don’t think it will be anytime soon.

A Turning Point

“Fisk killed his father, people need to know that”. Karen tries to get Ben to write up the story – Ben is still upset that Karen was lying to him when she brought him to the home on false pretenses. Ben says that Fisk can simply spin this like anything else. Good point.

Karen appeals to Ben’s morals and he lets her know that someone may have poisoned the drinks at the benefit – and that perhaps there are already people that are going after Fisk and his people (the news of this is currently being covered up).

Karen really does appreciate the people in her life that care about her and are worried/concerned with her well-being. She’s starting to develop a good relationship with Ben. She is abducted at the end of the evening by Wesley.

Wesley spends a long time talking to Karen about Fisk’s mother and her visit. “If you’re going to kill me, just do it,“ Karen says. “I’m not here to kill you, Ms. Page, I’m here to offer you a job.”

Wesley wants Karen to convince Ben that Fisk is a good man and that he should no longer be trying to find faults in him and his character. He suggests that if she doesn’t comply, he will slowly kill everyone that she cares about before coming after her.

Karen is able to take a moment of distraction (Fisk calling) to grab the gun from the table and shoot Wesley. He had unloaded the first chamber of the gun, but the rest of the bullets were just where they needed to be. Bye, Wesley.

Wesley knows that Ben was there as well, which doesn’t bode well for him in the short term.

It’s Personal

Karen is still trying to get the word out about Fisk’s mother, but Foggy is of the same opinion as Ben was –  “it won’t be enough”.

Foggy wants to talk to Karen about what he found out about Matt but he is still keeping his mouth shut out of the remaining respect he has left for his old friend. “It’s personal,” is all he’ll say.

Angels & Demons

On one of his many visits to talk to the priest, Matt has an intense conversation about good and evil. Maybe devils were created as a warning to us all – to tread the path of the righteous. The priest basically admits to knowing that Matt is the masked man – I’m not sure that Matt can trust the priest, but then we don’t know very much information about him and his history.

One would think that someone as careful as Matt would have thought all of these things through, but then again he often just bursts onto a scene without giving the situation enough thought beforehand. The priest has basically given Matt his name and purpose here.

Becoming Daredevil

Matt finds out more about Fisk’s body armor – he’ll need to figure out a way past it if he is to finally be rid of Fisk. Turns out the source of this armor was a man named Melvin Potter, who is not very intelligent but is possessing of a huge amount of strength and endurance.

Melvin is being made to work for Fisk – he is afraid that if he doesn’t do what Fisk says, ‘Betsy’ will be hurt. Betsy is someone that Melvin cares about. Matt talks Melvin into making him something.. “a symbol” out of the armor that he works with. Looks like we’re talking about a new, upgraded costume! Thank goodness for that, because Matt likely would not have lasted much longer getting his ass kicked at least once per episode.

Daredevil S01E12 – “The Ones We Leave Behind”

Reconsideration

Fisk shows up at Karen’s house - he has quite an imposing presence. He says, “It gets easier” (referring to Wesley’s death by her hand), “the more you do it”. Thankfully, she wakes up – it was just a nightmare. All of this is weighing on Karen quite heavily.

Karen and Foggy have a conversation at the office and Foggy reassures Karen that “everything is going to be alright” The mood turns decidedly more sour when Foggy turns to leave and finds Matt at the door.

Everyone is slowly leaving Matt’s side – Karen says “You know, I’m starting to feel like I made a mistake” [about coming to work at Nelson v. Murdock]. She is not leaving yet, however.

Later on.. “Matt.. is this what we are now? 3 People that don’t even talk to each other?” asks Karen.. this starts a conversation where Matt breaks down to Karen – he needs the support of his friends, he can’t go on alone as he has been and keeps burning bridges and keeping secrets from everyone. Although he doesn’t reveal his identity to Karen, this is a step in that direction.

Complications

Vanessa wakes up in her hospital bed - “why am I here,” she asks. Fisk explains that he has made arrangements for her to be taken out of the country, but she does not want to go along with those plans. “I knew being with you would be.. complicated.” She says. “Find whoever did this to us and make them understand.” “I’ll make them suffer for what they’ve done,” retorts Fisk. “I expect nothing less,” says Vanessa. These two are just made for each other.

Fisk finds out that Wesley was shot after his people located the body in the warehouse where he had brought Karen. In a fit of rage he beats one of his own men, just for following Wesley’s orders.

Fisk’s people are all beginning to blame the Japanese for the problems that they are coming up against recently (poisoned drinks, Wesley’s death). Fisk finds Wesley’s cellphone and realizes that the last call he made (the one that made him leave suddenly and resulted in his death) was to Fisk’s mother. Karen and Ben are still not safe.

Bach's Violin concerto No. 1 in A minor

Matt and Ben want to slow down Fisk’s takeover of the city so they’d like to cut off the main supply of money. Ben knows that a blind Chinese man is usually carrying the drugs around in a pack, so (using Ben’s information) Matt tracks the man into a car (playing classical music) as they drive through the city. It’s quite an impressive jaunt across the rooftops, really.

Now inside the building where the blind man was headed to, Matt witnesses the drug packing enterprise here firsthand. All of the workers have been blinded.

“All those people – you took their eyes,” accuses Matt of Madame Gao when they finally meet. “No, they blinded themselves,” she says. Madame Gao engages in a confrontation with Matt, knocking him out for a short time with what seems like very little physical force and managing to get away. Trying to get away himself, Matt gets in an altercation with a police officer where he attempts to explain that he is not deserving of the bad rap he is currently getting. Good luck with that, Matt.

Old Flames

Foggy allows Marci to see all of the information that they have gathered so far on Fisk (including the material handed over by the masked man (who Foggy now knows is Matt). Marci’s firm represents Fisk, but she seems genuinely interested in what Foggy has to show her.

Will she help or hurt them in the long run? It seems like Foggy and Marci had a trusting relationship and are starting it back up. Hopefully Marci won’t be stabbing Foggy in the back literally or figuratively – he’s such a genuinely nice guy.

The Long Farewell

Ben is desperately trying to get the editor of the paper to publish his latest story about Fisk killing his own father, etc but is not having any luck at all. He pushes so much that he gets suspended, and then eventually fired after accusing his boss of being on Fisk’s payroll.

Regardless of Ben’s situation with the newspaper, his wife will always be behind him 100% and suggests that he just try other news outlets in order to get the story out. The internet, etc. It looks like this story has legs and he is not going to give up on it anytime soon.

“I’m going to write about all of it. Tonight. Get it out there,” Ben says.

As Ben sits down to begin work on his new project, Fisk begins talking to him from the shadows. He explains that he had taken precautions after the Union Allied article was released and he also had found out that Ben went to talk to his mother. “I’m not here to threaten you,” he says at one point – “I’m here to kill you.” It’s unfortunate that we’ve grown to like Ben so much as a character of principle with a good heart, but those are the best characters to kill off  in a series like this – it makes the most emotional impact and reinforces just how dark the heart of our villain, Wilson Fisk, can be.

Although viewers are certainly looking around on-screen for Matt, or anyone else to come to his aid at the last moment – Ben is killed in cold blood by Wilson Fisk, and his words will die with him.

Who is Madame Gao?

Looks like Gao and Owlsley have been working together the whole time, and are trying to get Vanessa away from Fisk. They were behind the whole poisoned drink thing. They’re having serious trouble getting rid of Fisk’s girlfriend. “Yeah, she’s a real mule,” says Owlsley.

When Owlsley asks where Gao is going, she says that “I will visit my homeland and reflect upon the future.” Pressed as to where that exactly is.. China, maybe? She retorts, “It is a considerable distance farther.” Is she an alien? Referring to another world outside of the Earth? I’m just loving this supernatural intrigue – we know what types of things exist in the Marvel Cinematic Universe but haven’t seen much of that yet in season 1 of Daredevil.

This episode seemed to be a departure from most of the season, but not necessarily in a bad way. Obviously, a few characters have plot armor, but a few things still felt a little over the top - mainly Fisk's assault on the bridge. I digress, so let's start back at the beginning.

Ben/Karen

The Ben Urich chapter of this show has ended, and the characters are saying goodbye, in the most coincidental gathering of people in New York City - hey, it's most of the cast! Ok, ok, that's going to happen in these kind of shows, I'll let it go. It was a nice funeral for Ben, with Foggy noticeably absent. Karen is terrified that Fisk will find out that she visited his mother with Ben, though he did do an ok job of covering for her, I just hope Fisk's mother doesn't say anything else about it.

Fisk/Owlsley

Wilson has been able to take Vanessa home from the hospital and he's a little worried there's some funky stuff going on in his business. Without Wesley around, he has no one to rely on for these things. He goes to visit Owlsley and doesn't get the answer he was looking for and it doesn't take much for him to figure out that Owlsley has been stealing from him.

TV Soup Podcast: Daredevil, "Daredevil" Review

Owlsley makes a really big mistake, telling Fisk that their real target was Vanessa. That's what we call a sensitive issue in Fisk's world. Even with the bargaining chip of Detective Hoffman in his pocket, he's unable to keep his mouth shut and Fisk shows him to the bottom of an elevator shaft.

Matt/Foggy

Matt and Foggy are finally talking again. Matt's rage is definitely getting the better of him. He wants to lash out at Fisk and everyone he works with, but really the whole thing is a bit quixotic. Matt is just one guy, and Foggy can only shout the truth back to him - you can only defeat him with the law.

They decide to move forward, and go see Sgt. Mahoney and pick his brain about Ben's death and what's going on with Fisk. They're really just in the right place-right time, as Matt is able to easily eavesdrop and finds out that Hoffman is still around.

Matt/Foggy/Karen

The band is back together, and Foggy is daydreaming about being a butcher again. Seems like this might be the kind of gig he'll retire to. Or maybe it's really corny foreshadowing for his nickname when he turns evil (now that would be a twist). Digging through Owlsley's records, they manage to find out where Hoffman likely is (and through a smooth move, Karen might be a little suspicious about the man in the mask's identity).

Man in the Mask

Matt manages to locate Hoffman just in time, of course. After a rather interesting conversation, Matt is his usual persuasive self. Hoffman (blood still covering his face) turns himself into Mahoney. They're finally able to get in a room with the right people who aren't bought by Fisk. Hoffman elaborates on the extent of the criminal enterprise and Matt and Karen are taking a mental victory lap. Cue the montage of bad guy after bad guy getting busted by the FBI (not Fisk's guys), and this is clearly the best work that the Mask has done.

Fisk goes down

All the missed connections in this show (who shot Wesley? who was the rat at the newspaper? etc) remind me of an unreliable narrator in books. It rewards someone who can watch everything in depth, because only the viewer (or reader) is able to put the entire correct story together. In a very dramatic arrest, complete with perp walk, Fisk is taken away. This leads to a fun little victory party for the crew at Nelson & Murdock.

You didn't think it would be that easy, did you? Fisk takes a moment to tell his captors a story from the bible. This is yet another way that the show has used religion to impress not faith upon people, but just examples of how to live their lives. It makes religion feel like a real part of the show, rather than some one-sided part of some aspects of the story. Fisk, like Jules in Pulp Fiction, mostly uses his bible story to deliver a badass line before the shit goes down. "I am the ill intent, who set upon the traveler on a road that she should not have been on."

Fisk gets away in a rather over the top fashion, of course. Why not just run away in the first place, if that's what you were going to do anyways? It's all over the news right away, so it's not like this is stealthy or anything,

Matt, knowing he needs a big upgrade, goes to Potter and gets his new threads. He's now got a proper superhero costume and some actual protection so he doesn't get the crap beat out of him all the time. Like any boy with a new toy, he's eager to try it out and goes Fisk hunting.

The final battle between Fisk and Matt is another in a long line of wonderfully choreographed fight sequences in this show, Matt had to finish off the fight with some sticks, a nice call back to his old buddy. Mahoney is the guy who shows up on the scene and he's able to take Fisk in and even gives Matt his nickname - Daredevil.

Parting Notes

- Foggy getting back with Marci? Go after Karen, dude!

- Does Karen, at the very end, know Matt's secret, or at least strongly suspect?

- Fisk gets to stare at a white wall again, this will definitely end well.

- The horns are too much, I agree with Foggy.