Daredevil: Born Again Season 2, Episode 6 Review – “Requiem”

Following Daredevil: Born Again‘s attempt to cosplay its old self in “The Grand Design”, the MCU and Born Again‘s overstuffed, undercooked world makes its way back to the forefront in “Requiem”, an episode clearly trying to quickly shove a bunch of pieces into place before heading into season two’s abruptly-arriving endgame. The result is an incredibly messy episode, one that feigns interiority with Fisk and Murdock (and random other characters, like Heather) while its allegiance clearly lies with the plot histrionics happening on top of that, an approach that not only robs “Requiem” of any moral or emotional profundity, but lays bare some of the major issues with plotting and motivation that time and time again have limited Born Again‘s ability to build a meaningful, impactful story.

It doesn’t help that “Requiem” opens with an incredibly silly scene, where Vanessa’s surgeon tries to console Fisk with some of the most ridiculous nonsense imaginable – to which Fisk responds by crushing the man’s insides without saying a single word, a rather fitting bit of imagery for an episode feigning towards big moments and emotions, but one too brutally one-dimensional in its delivery to find any logic or nuance. From there, as Fisk silently makes his way through Vanessa’s funeral and wake, “Requiem” begins to pile on the plot, pulling the audience out of the supposedly critical moment for a half-dozen different plot distractions, most of which ultimately don’t have much bearing on the overall narrative – or much about what this series was trying to say just a single episode ago, as Matt Murdock shrugs and awkwardly grins his way through scenes with Karen and Fisk both as they discuss morality, purpose, and how ineffective Matt’s plan to not kill his enemies has gone.

Perhaps the most frustrating of them is the hyped reintroduction of Jessica Jones back into the narrative, which is about as anticlimactic as it could possibly be – and barely even foregrounds her in her own appearance, her presence mostly illuminating what’s been going on around her (except that her powers suddenly only work randomly after having a baby, a plot point as laughably dumb and convenient as it sounds). How did Jessica go from an alcohol chugging vigilante to a suburban mom whining about her ex (?) presumably running off to be one of Charles and Valentina’s hired mercs? Daredevil: Born Again really doesn’t seem to give a shit, rushing through a three-minute sequence where her and Daredevil break into the facility where the AVTF have moved the weapons Fisk promised Charles, taking down AVTF officers with a rather lifeless, over-edited fight sequence, before blowing them up with some really poor CGI explosions, and wordlessly sending Jessica back off into the night.

It’s an incredibly strange, strained sequence, one that reeks of MCU narrative tendrils needlessly connecting current projects with unrealized ones (are we teasing a Jessica Jones revival? A Luke Cage/JJ spinoff? More abrupt, short cameos in Born Again season 3? And are we assuming none of this is mentioned in Spider-Man: Brand New Day or Avengers: Doomsday?), something the original Netflix series usually avoided by gracefully isolating themselves in the seemingly-parallel gritty world of Netflix’s Marvel’s New York. It’s more a pointless distraction, a lifeless way for the MCU to hint that it still cares about characters it summarily discarded nearly a decade ago; otherwise, why tease things like their daughter Danielle Cage or emotional strife between two characters who were last together in Jessica Jones‘s first season? It’s unnecessarily allusive, distracting – and ultimately, provides nothing to the story of “Requiem”, or Born Again, in general.

“Requiem” then moves its attention to its other lesser stories, like the impending fall of Heather Glenn – who is stealing Vanessa’s jewelry while her body is still warm, and hearing Muse whispers in her head all of a sudden? While I admit I don’t hate the idea of her and Buck entering into some sick, fetishistic relationship with each other, Buck encouraging Heather to choke him while she cries is a scene that feels completely out of place with the tone of the rest of the series, a moment that is, like Jessica’s scenes, clearly engineered to push character and audience along to the next big, buzzy plot point (which is obviously Lady Muse, it’s not like they’re being subtle) with only a nod towards actual character exploration or development. We don’t really know why Heather’s suddenly become sexually aroused by the violence that was enacted on her in season one – we certainly haven’t seen how this has changed/affected her work – what does she even do in the mayor’s office at this point? Born Again doesn’t care to explore that, rather using short, allusive sequences that lack depth and nuance, which turn scenes about character into guideposts for future plot points, which is far less engaging and interesting, unless you are treating Born Again as a glorified Reddit post to speculate about plot and direction, which seems to be about the most satisfying way to enjoy the random collection of images and choices that consist of “Requiem”.

There’s also Daniel, whose birthday becomes the backdrop for him to introduce BB to his mother (who flies a Fisk flag outside her house in this week’s wink-wink towards the real world), and for him to discover her very-obvious subterfuge with the information he’s constantly fed her, as Born Again tries to create this dynamic drama between the professional and personal with Daniel and BB. Unfortunately, it is another story that completely lacks interior: with how casually cool he is with Fisk’s fascistic tendencies, BB’s sudden attraction to him makes absolutely no sense. She is actively working against his administration, trying to take down the man who killed her uncle – and yet, she’s ready to fuck around with the deputy mayor, because he’s kind of a nice guy who is totally cool with the AVTF murdering citizens in cold blood (and their own, as Powell brutally murders Saunders during the episode’s closing scene – more on that in a minute)? BB’s behavior around Daniel is completely absent of logic, just another plot point where Daredevil: Born Again pretends it is offering coherent character arcs, but is simply just doing random shit in order to put its little narrative pieces and characters in place for whatever lies ahead in the final two episodes (and into season three).

There’s just a sense that “Requiem” doesn’t have a lot to say about its characters; this filters through to Matt, whose predicament with killing once again becomes a focal point in his conversations with Karen and Fisk. Karen is ready to put a bullet in Bullseye, screaming at Matt that he’s letting the people he loves die because he’s unwilling to kill criminals (she reminds him that she thinks about Wesley every day, and still has “fucking nightmares” about it, even though she’s literally never thought about or brought it up before) – and Matt has no answer for her except “this isn’t you”, puffing his chest out at her, and later Fisk, when they both try to chide him about his moralistic approach to fighting crime and maintaining moral authority over a broken world. Does Matt reach into his heart to pull out a religious quote or parallel? Nope. Does he tie this experience into any part of his journey? Nope. Does he even try to explain his thought process as everyone questions the logic and results of his decisions? Not even a bit! Instead, “Requiem” posits that Matt’s willpower is definition enough, that there’s nothing that can truly challenge his ability to fight Fisk and let him walk away nearly every single time, even when defeating him (which he barely does here, in what is one of the weirder, more imbalanced fight scenes between the two).

How does this collide with an impugnant Charles (who is now talking shit to the mayor, and sending teams after other vigilantes who won’t work with him), and an AVTF who is straight murdering people in the street? “Requiem” isn’t the episode to provide that answer, passing the buck to “The Hateful Darkness” to unwind the cascade of plot developments described, shown, and alluded to across the incredibly busy, yet remarkably thin “Requiem”. After an episode where it finally felt like Daredevil: Born Again might be recovering some of the former identity it’s spent most of two seasons chasing and imitating, “Requiem” throws Born Again right back into the shallowest end of the pool, where character and inner conflict constantly give way to histrionics and melodrama, reducing any observations about empathy, sadness, and vengeance into the most tinny, cardboard versions of themselves, rendering “Requiem” a lot of movement and noise that ultimately, doesn’t really have a whole lot to say.

Other thoughts/observations:

• We cut from Fisk killing the surgeon right to Vanessa’s funeral. Honestly, this episode should’ve taken entirely in that time period; it would’ve given Fisk’s silence more emotional weight, and provided an opportunity to see the city go through a complicated grieving process that’s mostly described by other characters (I really hate how this series constantly describes how New York is, but only shows it for a few seconds every episode).
  
• Why is Matt still talking about “hearts and minds”? When did he do PR training?
  
• Fisk giving away the government’s guns to the AVTF seems like a really bad, short-sighted idea. Will we see the threat realized?
  
• The governor’s office notes to Sheila about her running for office, which she says she’s not interested in. Assuming this is a plot line for season three – though after being sidelined all season, does anyone still care about her character?
  
• “Where you’re from, spotted dick is a dessert.” Burn, I guess?
  
• What is the difference in Daniel’s situation pre and post-burying a body with Buck? Incredibly unclear, except that it was the “cost of admission”.
  
• Jessica notes her powers “just drop out sometimes, and then it comes back.” How compelling!
  
• Ellison from the NY Bulletin lives!
  
• Powell calls Saunders a “Fredo fuck” before putting a bullet through the bottom of his chin. It’s this kind of writing that drives me nuts on this show.
  
• Murdock’s plan is for Fisk and him to…. leave New York? And what, go on vacation together?

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