Writer: Saladin Ahmed
Pencillers: José Luis Soares Pinto / Carlos Nieto
Inkers: Oren Junior / Carlos Nieto
Colorist: Jesus Abertov / Erick Arciniega
Letterer: Clayton Cowles
Cover Artist: John Romita Jr. & Scott Hanna (Cover A)
Cover Price: $4.99
Release Date: May 14, 2025
Recap
Matt Murdock wakes up in a dark basement filled with people infected with the strange fungal disease seen in the previous issue. Who put him there and can he find the source of this mushroom madness?
LEGACY issue #683 Rites of Reconciliation, Part Two
Plot Summary
The issue opens with Matt having a nightmare that he’s a young boy again. He’s wearing Bullseye’s costume and being chased by a demon, one of the seven deadly sins from the opening story arc. The narration reminds us that Daredevil allowed Bullseye to die a couple of issues ago. Given an impossible choice, he chose his best friend Foggy over the villain.
Matt wakes up from this nightmare to discover he’s part of a living nightmare. He is in the basement of Nyla’s building and there’s fungus growing all over his arms. Thankfully, Matt appears to be strong enough to fight the infection thanks to his enhanced senses. Matt tears off his civvies revealing the new armour-padded Daredevil costume. Does he pull a spare mask out from under the shoulder armour? It’s not clear, but pretty handy, eh?
He carries Nyla & her neighbor’s missing daughter Sayeeda out of the basement and calls the emergency services. The police don’t seem interested that there are a group of infected people knocked out in the basement of the building. Instead, they reply with the official story that “the residents ignored posted warnings and entered the building’s maintenance area” without permission. There they were exposed to industrial chemicals causing them to pass out. It sounds to Matt like there is someone higher up pulling the strings and keeping it quiet.
As Daredevil, he sneaks back into the building and searches for the source of the fungal infection. Here, we get a pretty complicated mushroom narration by Matt about “the mycorrhizal network.” Who knew he was something of a fungus specialist?! His enhanced senses lead him back outside onto the rooftops where he picks up the trail. It leads him to “an extremely expensive penthouse on the upper east side.”
Daredevil feels the power and influence of the fungal spread throughout this building. It’s messing with his senses and he fails to notice someone sneaking up behind him. Suddenly he is attacked by a couple of infected heavies and I’m reminded of the (in)famous video game & Max drama The Last of Us. He recognizes the mutated mushroomy thugs and tries not to damage them too much as he fights. Worryingly, Matt is still being affected by the infection and so the fight is harder than it should be.
After knocking them both out, Matt continues on through the penthouse building until he reaches the source of the mushroom madness. A creepy voice tells Matt that it is looking forward to watching its babies growing out of his corpse. Yikes! And that’s where the issue ends. I don’t know who this final fungal boss is, but I’m sure all will be revealed next issue.
Sharp Points!
The art and colors look great throughout. Is this why they needed two pencillers, two inkers and even two colorists working on the issue? I got a surprise when I was filling out the credits–how many artists?! The story is interesting enough, but some of the narration comes over a bit weird when Matt turns into Dr. Mushroom. It is good to see Daredevil using his enhanced radar senses so much as he tracks down the source of the infection.
Dull Points!
Not much to say here as it’s a good issue overall. The change of artists towards the end is not particularly noticeable and doesn’t take anything away from the story.
Final Thoughts
Daredevil #21 is a great-looking comic book. The creative team makes impressive and inventive use of Matt Murdock’s enhanced senses as he fights his weird fungus infection and tracks down the source of the mushroom madness. We still don’t know who is behind it all or what their endgame is, but I’m enjoying the mystery.
8/10
About the reviewer: Wakizashi Gray has a YouTube channel where he reviews comics. It has the rather bizarre name of Wakizashi’s Teahouse. He also keeps a WordPress blog called Wakizashi Teahouse Blog.
Here’s my expanded video review if you’d like to see more of the art and story:
Weird Science Marvel Comics 