Marvel’s Daredevil is a Christian. Born Again has a lot to live up to

Comic book movies/TV shows as a genre are essentially all the other genres at a dress up party. Of course you’ve got action, adventure and sci-fi. But you’ve also got teen comedy, political thrillers, and in the case of Daredevil, we have crime drama, arguably the grittiest one anyone has seen since The Wire. 

Who is Daredevil? 

Created by Stan Lee, Bill Everett and Jack Kirby in 1964, Daredevil, (aka Matt Murdock), is a superhero with a twist. Matt Murdock was blinded in an accident involving a chemical spill as a child. However, the same chemicals that robbed him of his sight also enhanced his remaining senses, to essentially give him a ‘radar awareness’. He is orphaned when his single father is killed by mobsters, and grows up to don a red devil costume, (complete with horns) and fight crime. What makes the choice of devil imagery even stranger is that Matt Murdock is a practising Catholic.

Daredevil has been a mainstay of the comics since his inception, and when the Marvel Cinematic Universe came into being, it really wasn’t long before there was a demand for him to be seen. A deal was struck with Netflix to produce a number of TV series based around more ‘street level’ superheroes, and Daredevil was the first of these.

That Netflix show was cancelled after only three seasons not because of a lack of interest, but because the advent of Disney Plus meant that Disney wanted all its Marvel properties under one roof. Which brings us to the newly-released Daredevil: Born Again.

The Devil in Confession 

At the time of writing, Daredevil is one of only two characters who are canonically Christian in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and certainly the only one whose faith has warranted any real screen time. One of the things that is unique about the character of Matt Murdock is that he is perhaps the only character that can be regularly found in the confessional booth.

There’s a scene, in the first series of Daredevil, where Matt Murdock sits down and talks to his priest about the nature of evil. Matt ends up asking the priest “what if you could stop it?” Which is really the central thesis of the entire show. How can you be a Christian, an explicitly nonviolent religion, and at the same time stop bad people by beating the snot out of them?

What is interesting about Matt is that he has a genuine faith which obviously has an impact on him. But there’s an element of utilitarianism in the way he operates. Utilitarianism is the belief that, according to philosopher Jeremy Bentham; “it is the greatest happiness of the greatest number that is the measure of right and wrong”.

Therefore, whatever brought pleasure or prevented pain for the greatest number of people was morally the right thing to do. This also means that an action is determined to be good or bad based on what the outcome is, a philosophy that most would agree is at odds with mainstream Christianity. It’s possible that the cognitive dissonance at play here is part of what leads Matt Murdock to his crisis of faith.

Crisis of faith 

At the start of the third season, Matt is at a point where he is seriously questioning his faith. In his defence, he has narrowly escaped having a building dropped on him and losing his beloved Elektra. At the time of the third season’s release, Charlie Cox, (the British actor who plays Daredevil) stated that Matt Murdock: “still believes in God, but he now believes in a punishing God. He’s that angry. He feels let down. If you’re someone who believes was given this gift to help and that was almost taken away but you’re still alive, it throws everything into question”.

Here Matt is having a crisis of faith sparked by emotional trauma; where a person is hurt so badly, that it’s not really about no longer believing in God, but no longer believing that God has your best interests at heart. The last thing you want to do is engage a person in this situation in a theological debate. If they are hurting, they may want to lash out at somebody, and it might as well be you. The best thing we can possibly do for someone in this situation is to just give them love, care and listen to them.

With all these themes to consider, it’s clear that Daredevil: Born Again has a lot to live up to. But if you are a Marvel sceptic, and are looking for a more mature way into the Marvel Cinematic Universe, this would be a great place to start.

Daredevil: Born Again is available to view on Disney+