Another day, another Marvel story. But hidden in the ho-hum news from Variety that another Nicolas Cage-starring Ghost Rider is certainly on the way, is the rather more tantalising news that a re-start for Daredevil is in the works.
Let's get Ghost Rider out of the way first: David Goyer has yet to sign anything, but word is he'll be getting story credit on the second film and overseeing the writing, which is slightly odd because it seems to be based on one of his own scripts that's been gathering dust for several years. Maybe it needs re-tooling but he's not quite up for doing that job himself. It's once again a Columbia project, to be produced by Avi Arad, Michael DeLuca and Steven Paul. And it's widely expected, given what he's said before, that it'll be Nicolas Cage riding through your town with his head on fire for the second time.
But here's the line that made us go hmmmm (in a positive way). Marvel are "quietly developing a new version of Daredevil". No other details of writers or producers or potential directors or stars (although we know it won't be Ben Affleck, who's been vocal about how he felt stung by the reaction to the original). But it's the first proper confirmation we've had that Daredevil v.2.0 is anywhere near happening.
We'd like to stress that the first Daredevil, especially in Director's Cut form, isn't at all bad: kind of on the borderline between noble failure and moderate success. So it always felt unfortunate that it didn't get to develop and improve as a franchise. Mark Steven Johnson's (he made Ghost Rider too) film concerned itself mostly with Frank Miller's Elektra arc (to the extent that she got her own spinoff) although there were elements from more recent runs.
But there are certainly more Hornhead stories to tell. Kevin Smith's Guardian Devil is well-regarded and popular, and had narrative repercussions several years down the line, even if it goes off the rails a bit at the end with the big reveal of an incongruous superbaddie (we won't tell you who). And then there's Brian Michael Bendis' recent sagas, in which Matt Murdock is publicly outed as Daredevil by the Kingpin, and Daredevil declares himself as kingpin of Hell's Kitchen.
He's a superhero whose defining characteristic is a disability (he's blind), which was always an interesting twist on the genre. And the noirish crime environment he stayed in since Miller put him there, more or less differentiates him from the rest of Marvel's pantheon (with the possible exception of the rather different Punisher).
So we say, more please. Do you agree?