Netflix premieres its first Marvel series Friday with Daredevil. The 13-episode season follows attorney Matt Murdock (played by Charlie Cox), who was blinded as a boy and has enhanced senses, as he sets up a practice in Hell’s Kitchen, N.Y. The series is executive produced by Steven S. DeKnight and Drew Goddard. The following are reviews from TV critics around the web, compiled by B&C.
“Dark, brooding and violent, the slickly produced series casts the blind hero as Marvel’s version of Batman, a masked vigilante as apt to get roughed up himself as pummel the bad guys.”
—Brian Lowry, Variety
“Because this show's being made for Netflix, the home of a thousand niches, no one involved has to worry about making this anything other than the most kick-ass Daredevil adaptation possible. So far, they've succeeded at that, and made me even more eager to get a look at the other heroes who will eventually partner up with Matt Murdock.”
—Alan Sepinwall, HitFix
“The show’s creative team has translated the kineticism of superhero action to the screen in impressive ways, akin to lean Hong Kong cops-and-robbers pictures. What they haven’t done is make great television.”
—Noel Murray, A.V. Club
“Because it's on Netflix, it has the capacity to be something greater, untethered to ratings. But ultimately it's very purple in its prose, yearning to be film noir, but — lacking the writing or grit to achieve that — playing more like hokey blood porn.”
—Tim Goodman, The Hollywood Reporter
“With influences including features The Raid,District 13 and Taxi Driver, this very stylized Daredevil is hard to take your eyes off – which is a way of warning you that there might be some bingeing in your weekend.”
—Dominic Patten, Deadline
“This could be the Marvel production that finally wins over the most hardcore DC-only fanboys who otherwise tend not to favor the sensibilities found in most of the Marvel movies.”
—Mark Hughes, Forbes
