It is natural, from time to time, to doubt the value of what we do. Each of us makes contributions in various areas of our lives, such as our jobs, our families or households, and our communities. Sometimes these doubts make us consider giving up a role, especially when it comes to our job. Many of us don’t only want a paycheck for doing our work—we want to feel we’ve made a difference in a positive way.
Of the many superheroes of comics, film, and TV, few have suffered these feelings more often than Daredevil, starting from his very earliest years as "The Man Without Fear" and continuing into his current adventures. In this first post of several drawn from my new book on Daredevil's early years, we’ll look at three specific reasons for doubt he has and see what we can learn from them (and in the next post we'll consider a possible source of all three).1
Daredevil saves many New Yorkers from injury or death every day he puts on his red tights, but he still obsesses over the risks he imposes on his loved ones, some of which are realized. Although he dreams of marrying his early love, Karen Page, he tells himself that “only by giving up my crime-fighting career—forever—could I marry Karen—without endangering her life!” (Daredevil #43, August 1968).
When he gets involved in the legal problems of a later girlfriend’s father, who nonetheless goes to prison and takes his own life, Matt thinks to himself that he “only wanted to help, but instead I........