*Spoilers found within recap*
With Stick (Scott Glenn) rescued, Matt Murdock (Charlie Cox) thinks he can get some downtime, but not quite. Seems The Hand is on the move, collecting info about all the people Daredevil helped bring to safety. Among them is Karen (Deborah Ann Woll), so he understandably heads off to take care of things. Elektra (Elodie Yung) assists Matt in his mission, but they both know this is pretty much guaranteed suicide. The two of them have, in my opinion, a sincere conversation about the future if they survive, a possibility of a life away from New York City.
Sadly, this speech foreshadows someone is going to die.
Before long, Daredevil and Elektra encounter Nobu (Peter Shinkoda), who has gotten the bait he wanted, so therefore he lets the hostages go. The aforementioned three battle it out, but before long, poor Elektra is on the wrong end of a blade belonging to Nobu. Hate to say that I called it, but the theory came true. Matt rushes to Elektra’s side, and holds her until she passes. Unfortunately, he’s got to push his emotions aside and tackle Nobu and The Hand.
As Matt works his way through the ninjas, he is aided by far away bullets, courtesy of The Punisher (Jon Bernthal), complete with a skull on his chest! YES!!! Matt doesn’t flinch, as he finds the assistance helpful. However, Frank leaves Nobu to Daredevil, and quietly goes into the night. Why they felt they had to show Frank finding a crap ton of weapons in the previous episode is beyond me, as the payoff is not really demonstrated. Still, it’s nice to see Matt and Frank on the same page for once.
Matt and Nobu trade blows until Daredevil tosses Nobu off the building. A normal man probably wouldn’t get up from that, but The Hand is known to be of the immortal variety. Conveniently, Stick shows up and slices the head off Nobu, pretty much rendering him unable to come back to life.
As things quiet down, Karen and Foggy (Elden Henson), sans Matt (per the norm) have one last drink together at Josie’s. Foggy finally has his shot at being a big time lawyer, thanks to an offer from Jeri Hogarth (Carrie-Ann Moss) of Hogarth, Chao, and Benowitz, all appearing in Netflix’s other Marvel series, Jessica Jones.
Despite Josie laughing it off, Foggy actually offers to pay the long running tab that he, Matt, and Karen have accumulated for what would seem a least a couple of years. I did enjoy this element of closure, but I’m hoping that Foggy is not kept at a distance next season with his new “hot shot” job. He’s been a force to be reckoned with during the course of the recent 13 episodes, and I’d like to see even more of him in upcoming story lines.
Moving on, Matt and Stick have a quiet burial for Elektra, but she’s not out of the woods yet, apparently. As the episode closes out, we see the late assassin in an urn coffin of sorts, attempted to be resurrected by The Hand. Ruh-roh.
Speaking of Elektra, her role near the end of the season was far better and more interesting than the character at introduction. It’s sad we needed to start on bumpy footing with Matt’s former love interest, but hey, better late than never.
And speaking of Matt, he’s got a lot of ‘splaining to do to sort of former, sort of not love interest Karen. So, without resorting to an extensive lie, he just shows her his Daredevil mask, and I’m sure she’s going to have a lot more questions now since he’s fessing up. That’s a very interesting development/character choice but one I felt that was necessary.
Overall, Daredevil Season 2 had a really strong start, an ok middle, and a solid end. The finale open some new doors while closing others, and some are still ajar. In the end, it did what it needed to do and that’s good. There was some strong cliffhanger material, too!
I also need to state that The Punisher needs his own show, or he needs to have more to do next season. Honestly, Bernthal’s portrayal owned every time he showed up in this season, and I don’t want to see that go to waste. Hell, an appearance in Luke Cage is more than welcome.
In conclusion, Season 2 was far better than Season 1, but still far from perfect. Definitely a solid ride altogether.
Finale Rating: 8/10
Daredevil Season 2 Rating Overall: 7/10
Daredevil Season 2 is currently streaming on Netflix
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Logan J. Fowler is a senior writer and video game editor on Pop-Break.com. He contributes his thoughts every week for Trailer Tuesday and ABC’s The Goldbergs.” Logan’s “kid at heart” nature has led to his discussion about pop culture that many geeks love to talk about, including superheroes, Super Mario Bros., Pixar, and Muppets, among other things. In addition, one of his first pieces for the site, “Top Ten Comic Book Movies,” was picked as a “Freshly Pressed” piece by WordPress and remains one of the site’s most well-read articles. Many of Logan’s friends have said that he moonlights as Spider-Man but this is so not true. Wait, are those police sirens I’m hearing?! Gotta go! -thwipp-
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