Marvel Makes Fun Of Their Own Cliffhanger Endings With A Perfect Twist
Marvel loves their cliffhanger endings at the end of stories, but they’re often quickly and unceremoniously resolved – and the company knows it.
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Warning: contains spoilers for Devil’s Reign #1!
Marvel Comics is no stranger to inserting copious amounts of cliffhangers within their comics, and the company is well aware of their own tendencies – especially in Daredevil comics as of late. Thus, Marvel has created an entire cliffhanger ending that is in and of itself a critique of cliffhanger endings. Such an ending is in both Daredevil #36 and Devil’s Reign #1, showing readers that Marvel is mindful of their many mistakes.
In current Marvel continuity, Daredevil’s identity is a closely guarded secret…but that wasn’t always the case. Matt Murdock once used the children of the Purple Man (Zebediah Killgrave) to conceal his identity after it was publicly revealed, but their work was imperfect. Anyone’s memory could be jogged if they saw evidence linking Matt Murdock to Daredevil, such as his name on a piece of paper. As it so happens, this is exactly what the Kingpin has in his possession…but there’s a twist.
In Daredevil #36, the Kingpin, mayor of New York and now newly married, stares at a folder on his desk. It’s marked “Daredevil Identity” and has various papers within. Wilson Fisk stares intently at the contents of the folder, and it’s clear to the reader that the blank pages hold serious significance to the Kingpin. But it isn’t until Devil’s Reign #1 that the reader learns the true meaning of the folder’s contents: nothing.
“It’s nothing. But it should be something.” Fisk admits to Daredevil while the two confront each other on the streets of New York. The Kingpin is furious – he knows that he was the one who put the folder together, yet it contains absolutely no useful information to him, and he somehow knows that Daredevil plucked the information from his very mind. Daredevil taunts him with the fact that a secret identity is a secret, and swings away. The very next day, Mayor Fisk effectively bans all superheroes from New York City (and plans to run for President in the wake of the new legislation). As shocking as the confrontation is, one realizes that the file was meant to jog Wilson’s memory at the end of Daredevil #36…but because the pages are blank, it doesn’t. Thus is a standard comic book cliffhanger created: hooking the reader with a potential shocking development at the end of one issue, and unceremoniously doing away with it at the beginning of the subsequent book.
Cliffhangers in comics are an art form unto themselves. In the days of new characters frequently appearing, a good cliffhanger meant the difference between a reader buying a second issue and putting the series down for good. Thankfully, even though Marvel’s long-running Daredevil series pokes fun at their own cliffhangers, they’re effective enough.
Link Source : https://screenrant.com/marvel-comic-cliffhanger-ending-joke-twist-daredevil/