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WITH SPIDER-MAN'S
SUCCESS,
MARVEL wanted Stan Lee to create another
superhero in the same style as everyone's favorite
wallcrawler. They got what they wanted at first, but
it's unlikely that anyone at that time expected him to
take on a life of his own and basically change the
course of comic-book history.
But that's what happens when you deal with the devil.
In the beginning, there were more than a few
similarities between Daredevil and Spider-Man. Daredevil
lived in New York City, swung from the rooftops and
fought criminals with both a quick fist and snappy
repartee. What set him apart, though, was that he was
also blind. Blind heroes had been done before -- DC's
Dr. Mid-Nite fought crime in the 1940s (though blind,
his unique power allowed him to see perfectly in the
dark) -- but Daredevil was the first major superhero
with a physical handicap.
He wasn't born blind, though. At an early age, young
Matt Murdock saw an old blind man walking in front of a
truck. He saved the man, but the truck's radioactive
cargo broke free of its restraints, and Matt's eyes were
scarred by the toxic waste. While he was recuperating,
he discovered that his other senses were heightened to a
superhuman level -- he could hear a person's heartbeat
from across the room, and he could read a newspaper just
by feeling the ink impressions on the page. He also
developed a "radar sense" that functioned
better than his own sight. Armed with his superhuman
senses and athletic training, Murdock later brought his
father's murderer to justice and embarked on a new
career as a costumed vigilante.
From the beginning, Daredevil personified better than
anyone else the divided nature of the costumed
superhero. By day, he was a lawyer, working hard to
ensure his client's right to a fair trial; by night, he
was a masked vigilante working outside the law to fight
for justice. Matt's father was a boxer who wanted his
son to rely on his brains, not his fists, and young Matt
was forbidden to learn how to fight. But the honors
student couldn't resist, and so he trained in secret
against his father's wishes. As the series unfolded,
readers learned that Matt was also a religious man, and
yet he chose the devil as his symbol while he fought on
the side of angels.
Daredevil has grown a lot since his first carefree
adventures, especially after writer/artist Frank
Miller burst onto the scene with his dark and moody
interpretation of the hero. But two things that has
never changed are his devotion to justice and his
courage to take what others would call a handicap and
turn it to his own advantage.
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