Ultimate Daredevil & Elektra Vol. 1

Title:
Ultimate Daredevil & Elektra Vol. 1

ISBN:
0785110763

Price:
$11.99

Publisher/Year:
Marvel, 2003

Artist: Salvador Larroca, Joe Quesada

Writer:
Greg Rucka, David Mack

Collects:
Ultimate Daredevil & Elektra #1-4,
Daredevil #9

Rating:
3/5

Elektra
Natchios is 17 and arriving at Colombia University for her freshman year of
college. Her father is a businessman who owns a small dry cleaning chain in
Queens; her mother died of breast cancer when she was young. Elektra's a normal
girl in all but one respect: she's been extensively trained in martial arts,
and she can defend herself quite well if need be--which is a good thing,
considering the events of the year to come.

There's
good and there's bad: good, she hits it off with Phoebe, her roommate, and a
fellow student, Melissa. Bad, Melissa has attracted the negative attention of
Calvin Langstrom the Third, known around campus as "Trey." Good,
Elektra's set her sights on Matt Murdock, an attractive pre-law student whose
physical abilities rival her own, and who also happens to be blind. Bad... Trey
rapes Melissa. Even more bad: the police won't take action, due to Trey's
family's status. Elektra might have to take matters into her own hands--except
that Matt, who has a secret or two of his own, might not let her get away with
it.

I
really like the conceit behind Ultimate Marvel--younger, more contemporary reimagining’s
of Marvel heroes and heroines. This is my first acquaintance with the line, and
I'm definitely curious now to try more--I like that the line reworks characters
and storylines from the originals and doesn't try to confuse new readers with
the complex history of the original imprint. I know just enough of the original
Daredevil and Elektra characters to make sense of what's been changed here:
Elektra's family is more middle-class, rather than rich; Elektra's mother's
death was pinned down to a specific cause rather than left negligible; Matt and
Elektra meet in college, instead of when they're older. I liked this idea of
Matt and Elektra as college students: reading about kids my age, in an
environment like the one I live in now, made this story easy to relate to,
current, and compelling.

The
art was really excellent; I think this is the most impressed I've been with any
of the Marvel comics I've read so far. Sometimes Marvel women--even women like
Aunt May!--look too much like supermodels for me to take them seriously, but
Elektra, Phoebe, and Mel looked like normal girls, the type of girls I would
see around my campus. Elektra's outfit was made into something more practical,
the type of thing that a teenage girl--yes, even a teenage girl taking up
secret vigilante work--would wear. Same with Matt's costume, although like many
reviewers, yes, I did find it hard to believe that all Matt needed was a strip
of cloth over his eyes and the top of his head to keep Elektra and others from
realizing it was him.

Matt
and Elektra's romance is intertwined with the vigilante subplot, and although
it moves a bit too fast, I blame that on the arc only being four issues. The
story skips ahead months at a time, at least in the beginning. It basically
ends up being love after a few dates, which I'm never too fond of in fiction.
But I liked their dynamic nonetheless. Matt tries desperately to keep Elektra
from heading down the dark path of revenge and even murder. Elektra gets the
feeling she doesn't know quite as much about him as she thought she did.
Despite all the deceit and desperation, Matt and Elektra are still, when it
comes down to it, a teenage couple--they get physical at some slightly
inappropriate times, Elektra dishes with Phoebe once the date ends, and so on.
The romance was fairly light compared to the darker themes of sexual crimes and
dirty politics, and provided a nice contrast. I do think that the story could
have been expanded and fleshed out--we don't get to see much of Matt outside
his scenes with Elektra, and his backstory is left out entirely--but
nonetheless, I enjoyed it. I'm looking forward to checking out the sequel,
Ultimate Elektra: Devil's Due.