Man, it feels good to be back in Hell’s Kitchen.
Since we last saw Matt Murdock, we have had four seasons of Netflix/Marvel shows to hold us over, but none of them having the lasting effect that Daredevil consistently delivers. After seeing the character interact with his fellow street level heroes in the incredibly lackluster first (and only) season of The Defenders, it’s nice to see Matt (Charlie Cox), Karen (Deborah Ann Woll), Foggy (Elden Henson), and Wilson (Vincent D’onofrio) back in their own show with the focus strictly on them.
The premiere picks up with a short recap of what happened to Matt after he and Electra (Elodie Yung) had a building dropped on them. Matt is somehow washed out into the river and carries himself to dry land only to collapse and be found the next morning. He tells him to bring him to his church. He is then cared for by Father Lantom (Peter McRobbie) and Sister Maggie (Joanne Whalley). Matt is both physically and spiritually broken after losing Elektra and being unable to get his other senses working like normal. It’s only after a speech from Sister Maggie (who is totally Matt’s mom) that Matt is able to get up and start getting back into fighting shape.
Although he’s able to start training and fighting again, he’s not at 100% and even goes out to the street to try and help stop a father and daughter from being kidnapped only to be beaten to a pulp. This is where things get really interesting. As the two men are deciding if they should kill him, Matt throws them their led pipe, almost begging to be killed. He has lost his faith and his purpose and is now truly without hope.
This is an interesting premise as it seemed like marketing for this season would led you to believe that Matt would just try and stay hidden to fight crime without risk of getting anyone else hurt, which would essentially be like going back to the roots of Season 1. But it seems that Matt is also going to be dealing with a little bit of an identity crisis, which works well with Bullseye appearing later on in the season disguised as Daredevil, hell bent on ruining his reputation.
While Matt is dealing with the fallout of Midland Circle, Karen and Foggy are still trying to get their lives back to normal. Karen still believes Matt is alive and has been floating Matt’s rent. Foggy doesn’t want to believe it, but he faces the facts that they never found Matt because a building was dropped on him. We also get to see the return of Wilson Fisk as he is living a shell of a life in prison. While his lawyers are working on a plea deal, his wife, Vanessa (Ayelet Zurer ), is struggling to escape the fallout of his imprisonment. We only got to see brief shimmering/amazing moments with him in Season 2, but it looks like he will be much more of a focus this season.
Towards the end of the episode we are also introduced Ray Nadeem (Jay Ali), a family man who is not doing well financially. We later find out that he is a FBI agent and is assigned to do the monthly visit to try and get Wilson Fisk to cooperate. Ray doesn’t even attempt to make Fisk talk, and is stunned when Fisk actually makes him an offer.
Like most premieres, “Resurrection” was riddled with lots of exposition and little action. But just to get back into this world makes it all worth it, and with the recent cancellations of both Luke Cage and Iron Fist, we don’t know how much time we have left in it.
Overall rating: 8 out of 10
Daredevil Season 3 is now streaming on Netflix.
