Marvel Reveals Major Change To Daredevil

Daredevil has been put through the wringer lately, and as a result, he has lost a significant ability he once prided himself on, unraveling the defender of Hell's Kitchen in the process.

Spoilers incoming for Man Without Fear #3 and #4, so if you haven't read them yet you've been warned.

As we learned at the beginning of Man Without Fear, Matt Murdock is still fighting to come back from the truck accident that left him brittle and a shell of his former self. His body has been through hell over the years, but as we find out in the last two issues, that isn't the biggest hurdle he has to leap.

In Man Without Fear #3, we see him interacting with his Defender allies Iron Fist, Luke Cage, and Jessica Jones as he tries to make it through his physical therapy. It isn't going so well, to be honest, and Murdock is pretty agitated as a result. Despite the pep talks from his friends, Jones finds him not doing his physical therapy one day, as he seems to have given up.

He tells her as much, but she doesn't believe it, telling him "you're Matt! Murdock! Nothing has ever gone right for you! But you keep going! That's your super-power! No one in the-the-the game is as tough as you." Murdock tells her then he's just out of tough, but she recalls a time when they all confronted the Foolkiller when Murdock literally got in front of Ben Urich and dared Foolkiller to pull the trigger without a second thought.

After remembering that story Jones puts it together, saying "That's it. Holy--You've lost it. You're afraid. Matt Murdock is afraid." He tells her to get out, but she's right. We see that again in Man Without Fear #4, when the Kingpin visits Murdock in his hospital room. While Kingpin recalls one of their earlier meetings, Murdock feigns being asleep, at the encouragement of his inner spirit of fear who manifests around him.

The entity tells him "Stay silent. Feign sleep. Because if he knew...he would kill you. There would be nothing you could do." It surfaces again when Fisk fumbles and says "you were helpless" and then corrects himself, saying "Daredevil was helpless." When Murdock says "He can't know. It's impossible" Fear says "but if anyone could..."

Eventually, Murdock gets sick and tired of Fisk's babbling and confronts him, and we then discover that Fisk also holds fear.

Even if Murdock returns to being a hero, it would seem he is no longer the man without fear.

Man Without Fear #4 is in comic stores now.