capeandcowl application
[PLAYER INFO]
NAME: Ali
AGE: 23
JOURNAL: aliccolo
IM: aim- aliccolo
E-MAIL: aliccolo@gmail.com
RETURNING: no
[CHARACTER INFO]
CHARACTER NAME: Matthew "Matt" Michael Murdock // Daredevil
FANDOM: Marvel 616
CHRONOLOGY: Daredevil Volume 2 Issue 115
CLASS: Hero, portrayed by the media as a "dangerous vigilante".
SUPERHERO NAME: Daredevil
ALTER EGO: Matt Murdock, Attorney at Law.
BACKGROUND:
Matt Murdock was abandoned by his mother as an infant and raised by his father, boxer 'Battling' Jack Murdock amongst the crime and grime of Hell's Kitchen, Manhattan. Determined that his son would have a better life than he did, Jack strictly forbade Matt from playing sports or participating in physical activities, instead stressing the pursuit of academia. Matt's reluctance to join his schoolmates and neighbors in their games led to him being given the taunting nickname, "Daredevil", and though he secretly trained in his father's gym, he was constantly bullied.
Matt's life was forever altered when, at age twelve, he witnessed a blind man walking into oncoming traffic. He was able to push the man to safety, but in a strange ironic twist, the vehicle crashed, spilling it's radioactive cargo onto Matt's face, scarring and blinding him. It was from this accident that Matt lost his sight, but also gained his superhuman senses. Initially, he was terrified, unable to cope with the strange new world around him, until he met the blind ninja Stick. Stick became Matt's sensei, training him in martial arts and teaching him how to hone and master his new found radar sense.
He entered Columbia University to study law, meeting his best friend and future law partner Foggy Nelson, as well as the first love of his life, Elektra Natchios. He and Elektra parted ways following the death of her father and a drastic shift in her personality. The end of this relationship devastated Matt for some time to come, though he was able to put aside his depression to graduate and open a law firm with Foggy. Nelson and Murdock's first employee was a young woman named Karen Page, hired to be their secretary. Matt and Karen were drawn to each other, though Karen had reservations about becoming involved with a man with 'disabilities'.
It was also about this time that the darker side of Hell's Kitchen began to rear it's sinister head. Jack Murdock, still an active prizefighter, refused to throw a match, as ordered by a crooked promoter known as The Fixer, and was shot dead by The Fixer's men. Enraged and seeking revenge, Matt fashioned a costume out of his father's yellow and black boxing robes and hunted down the men who murdered his father, delivering brutal beatings, and scaring The Fixer to death. Deciding his work was not yet finished, Matt decided to continue fighting crime in his neighborhood, adopting the alias Daredevil and patrolling Hell's Kitchen at night.
Matt's romance with Karen continued to blossom until he encountered former Russian spy Natasha Romanova, the Black Widow. Matt left Karen in favor of Natasha, moving with her to San Francisco for a time. The two were lovers and partners, fighting crime on the west coast, but their relationship didn't last. Matt ultimately proved too controlling for Natasha, and they parted ways, with Matt returning to New York and rejoining Foggy and the law firm, and once again roaming the streets. Despite the end of their romance years ago, Matt and Natasha remain close friends and allies, and on occasion, lovers.
Elektra re-entered Matt's life at this time, cold and hardened after years of training by the mysterious ninja cult, The Hand. His former love was now a deadly assassin, hired by Daredevil's foe, Kingpin. Though the two were now enemies, they did briefly reconcile, just in time for Elektra to be stabbed by the assassin Bullseye and die tragically in Matt's arms. Though she would later be resurrected by agents of The Hand, Elektra's death continues to haunt Daredevil to this day, and that she would be a recurring opponent in his life also caused him additional strife. Bullseye would establish himself as Daredevil’s arch-rival, and the two would face off many times over the years.
Matt was briefly engaged to a woman named Heather, though their relationship was chaotic and unhealthy. Foggy and Natasha staged an intervention of sorts, and Matt and Heather broke off their relationship. She later committed suicide, causing him a great deal of grief and guilt. Things soon became much worse for him, however, Karen, now an adult film star and drug addict, sold his real name to Wilson Fisk in exchange for heroin money. Fisk, better known as the Kingpin of Crime, was a powerful mafia boss, and he was able to make Matt's life a living hell, destroying his finances, getting him disbarred, and burning down his house. Realizing that Kingpin was ultimately the cause of all the problems in his life, Matt swore to push the Kingpin out of Hell's Kitchen once and for all. He was slowly able to piece his life back together, and even reunited with Karen, helping her to get sober. He was eventually able to rebuild his life and regain his license to practice law. It was also during this tumultuous time that Matt encountered Sister Maggie, a Catholic nun at the local mission. Though she would deny it, Matt quickly realized that Maggie was his mother, and he would come to rely on her assistance from time to time.
Matt's relationship with Karen was not without it's troubles though, and while he loved her, he was admittedly unfaithful to her, having affairs with multiple women, including one of his greatest foes, the mentally disturbed Typhoid Mary, an agent of the Kingpin's who plagued him constantly. Matt suffered a severe mental breakdown, developing a second personality, known as Michael, which also served as a safeguard to defend his secret identity. He was forced to fake his own death when a tabloid threatened to reveal his name, and this caused him further identity problems.
The death of Karen Page at the hands of Bullseye threatened to shatter Matt's already fragile psyche, made doubly worse that she was impaled by Daredevil's billy club at the altar of a church. Matt feels guilt over this incident to this day, and many of his friends have hypothesized that Karen's death is what sparked his more recent emotional problems. Shortly after Karen's death, Matt reteamed with Natasha, forming a short lived group bent on capturing and defeating the Punisher. This team didn't last for very long, and within months Daredevil was back to being a solo act.
Matt's name was published by a tabloid, essentially ending his life of anonymity in Hell's Kitchen, casting him in the spotlight he'd avoided for years. Matt denied being Daredevil, both publicly and in private, though the citizens of the Kitchen and NYC as a whole seem to believe the papers over him. During the year following his name being published in the newspapers, Daredevil was infrequently seen. Matt adopted a different technique for dealing with the criminals of Hell’s Kitchen. He took it upon himself to drive the Kingpin out of his neighborhood once and for all. He beat the Kingpin severely, declaring to the witnesses and bystanders the he was the new Kingpin of Hell's Kitchen, and for a year the crime rates dropped, and life in the Kitchen drastically improved. Matt used the money he won in the lawsuit settlement to set up charitable organizations aimed at rejuvenating the neighborhood. A library was built, parks were constructed, and his reputation and public image received an enormous boost in popularity. During this time, he also secretly married his most recent girlfriend, a blind woman named Milla Donovan, whom he had only known for a few months. Despite his real feelings for Milla, Matt continued to be haunted by his past, in particular his failure to save Karen. Realizing that Matt was still in love with Karen, and that their marriage was the result of a decision made during an emotional breakdown, Milla left Matt and filed for an annulment.
As if things weren't bad enough, the F.B.I. had been building a case against him, and was able to arrest him on obstruction of justice charges, despite the best efforts of Natasha and others to get him released. He was sent to Ryker's Island to await trial, kept in the same cell block as the Kingpin, Bullseye, and dozens of other criminals he'd previously faced in combat. Despite being housed with the general population, Matt was able to keep a fair reign over the other prisoners, using his reputation (and occasionally violence) to secure a safe stay in the prison. Fate had other plans, however, and Matt was forced to listen in horror as his best friend Foggy was apparently stabbed to death while visiting the prison. Matt's mental state was rapidly deteriorating, and it wasn't until Frank Castle arrived at Ryker's as well that the two were able to escape in the middle of a riot.
Being locked up on Ryker's and caught up in his own cycle of lies and denial, Matt had been relatively spared by the events of the Superhuman Civil War, however while the real Daredevil had been in prison, a new Daredevil has been masquerading in his place, protecting and defending the Kitchen, and working along side the anti-registration heroes. This left Matt free to pursue Foggy's killer across the Atlantic and all over Europe. Having solved the mystery of his imprisonment and uncovered the trail of deception that led to his arrest, the charges against Matt were dropped, and he was free to return to America. His license to practice law was once again restored, he was reunited with his estranged wife, and Foggy was freed from the Witness Protection program. Matt's life is finally back on track. Unfortunately though, the cycle of hell was about to start all over again.
Like clockwork, one of Daredevil’s past villains returned to seek revenge. Larry Cranston, also known as Mister Fear, began distributing a drug that caused those who took it to become psychotic and lose all fear. Mister Fear was able to inflict his drug on Matt’s wife, Milla, and in a fit of anger she pushed a stranger in front of a subway train, killing the man. Milla was left in a deep state of psychosis, and Matt was left to pick up the pieces once more. Defeating Mister Fear and having him arrested was easy. Accepting the news that there was no antidote for the compound the villain had released on Milla was much more difficult. His wife was insane, and there would be no miracle cure for her.
Matt’s instability seemed to worsen, and he blamed himself for Milla’s permanent state of insanity. Milla was placed in a mental institution, and her parents filed suit against Matt in order to gain custody of their daughter. To complicate matters even worse, he had a one night stand with his friend, private detective Dakota North, an affair which was captured on film and presented to Milla’s parents for use in their suit against Matt. He was eventually forced into signing over custody of Milla to her parents, and despite his faith and belief that marriage is sacred, he allowed the annulment process to proceed. All the while he was being attacked by a new foe, the enigmatic Lady Bullseye, along with a new resurgence of the Hand. Bit by bit his life was being ripped apart all over again, though to what end, he had no idea.
Lady Bullseye was not the only mysterious newcomer into Matt’s life, however. The blind, alcoholic ninja, Master Izo slowly but forcefully weaseled his way into the center of Matt’s world, offering to him the opportunity and means to take out the Hand for good.
PERSONALITY:
On first impression, Matt Murdock comes across as a confident, dedicated practitioner of the law, in turn both compassionate and fearsome, and not one to be easily brushed aside. He's a first class lawyer with the gift of gab, when the mood strikes him. He's sharp, he knows all the right questions to ask, and he knows how to manipulate a witness and draw out a confession. Conversely, you won't meet anyone as genuinely empathetic as him. He understands hardship well, and he considers himself to be a benefactor and guardian for those who need him most; the disparate citizens of Hell's Kitchen.
His personality is both mirrored and amplified once he pulls his cowl on and becomes Daredevil. The same tenacity that he's known for demonstrating in the court room transforms into something darker. Instead of hammering away at his opponents with rhetoric and questioning, he handles them with a blend of Japanese martial arts and boxing that can best be described as very painful to whomever he is up against. Matt can be violent, on more than one occasion a little too violent. However, so far he has been able to maintain his control and refrain from allowing his vigilante activities warp into something deadly.
In his day to day life, Matt is generous, and has a soft spot for long shots and underdogs, often taking on pro bono legal cases and volunteering his time and money to those in need. He is a devout Catholic, although admittedly, a terrible Catholic, complete with the guilt, sure he is already damned to hell. Despite all of this, he comes across as rather charming, and has had a seemingly unending parade of women in his life. Matt has dated various major players in the Marvel universe, from heroines to villainesses ,and quite a few innocent civilians. His love life and relationships have tended to be somewhat self-destructive and marred by tragedy. Several of his former girlfriends died tragic deaths, all of which severely impacted his emotional well being. More recently, his wife was driven insane by one of his villains and was committed to a mental institution after she killed a man. He blames himself for this, and for all of the misfortunes that have crossed those he cares about. He is prone to mood swings, violent fits of rage, and deep depression. He has a history of suffering emotional breakdowns, and has a tendency to fixate and obsess over memories of past tragedies.
Matt grew up idolizing his father, Jack, essentially viewing him as a larger than life hero, as a god among men. His father's personal motto, 'never give up' has now become his own personal mantra, and Matt can be stubborn to a fault. He is fiercely protective of his name and reputation. His double life is not something he wants to have splashed about in the newspapers. Daredevil has one life, Matt Murdock has another. The two do not overlap, and when they do, he can become irrationally angry. He is not above suing people and newspapers for libel by day and then beating the living hell out of them by night.
He is often referred to as a human lie detector, which is rather ironic considering he seems to have few qualms with telling lies himself. Denial is often his weapon of choice, and it often comes back to bite him. Matt has a somewhat evasive personality, sidestepping direct questions as best he can, giving half-truths and hoping that suffices, and flat out lying if it will save his skin. It isn't that he is dishonest, he doesn't see himself as such, anyway. Rather, he's just arrogant enough to see himself as above the truth on certain issues. He has an elitist streak. Matt thinks very highly of himself and can come off as incredibly self-centered. His view of the world is often short-sighted and quite limited; unless it's happening to him or to someone in his neighborhood, he isn't apt to immediately care.
And for all the arrogance and selfishness, his self-esteem is quite shaky. He goes through somewhat manic stages followed by severe depressions, and he's contemplated suicide once or twice. The intensity of his enhanced senses has not especially helped his mental fragility. He's in an almost constant state of pain, both from his sense of touch and from his heightened hearing. Matt takes prescription painkillers to help dull the pain, and it can be speculated that he may have formed some sort of dependence on them.
Matt's personality changed dramatically following his break up with Black Widow and his subsequent return to Hell's Kitchen from San Francisco. Until that point, he was more apt to display his jovial streak. He was more lighthearted, he told jokes, and in general he was much less somber than what he is today. Whether his split from Black Widow was the catalyst for this change, or whether it was a sudden maturing of his nature cannot be fully determined, though the series of tragedies that would follow their break up most certainly played a role in his becoming a darker, moodier, more intense individual. The death of Elektra served as another stepping stone into a darker side of his psyche. Though he had been faced with other catastrophic events in his life, she was his first love, and her death in his arms sparked an emotional breakdown not matched until the death of Karen Page via similar circumstances years later.
POWER:
Enhanced Senses While Matt is legally blind, his other senses function at superhuman levels. For example, he can read by touch, sense changes in temperature and air pressure as they happen, remember any scent or taste he encounters, and hear a human heartbeat from 20 feet away. He can track individuals across great distances based on their scent, tell how long a body has been dead based on its temperature, etc. His hearing is his most accurate sense, so sensitive that he can tell whether or not a person is lying by listening to their pulse. However, his enhanced hearing is a duel-edged sword. Loud noises cause him great pain, and particularly busy locales can leave his senses feeling overwhelmed. He also has a lower threshold for pain than most people, due to his sense of touch being so developed.
Radar and Electromagnetic Awareness Matt has a specialized 'radar sense' which functions similarly to echolocation. He is able to pinpoint the location of objects by listening to the reverberations made by ambient sounds against objects and people. This sense also allows him to detect other forms of electromagnetic waves. He is capable of detecting and identifying radation across the entire electromagnetic spectrum, from gamma to radio and all types in between. He can tell immediately if something nearby is radioactive, and if something nearby is giving off a radio signal, he'll know it, though he won't be able to understand the message being transmitted.
Ninja Skills Matt is a member of the order of the Chaste, having received training in ninjutsu from his sensei, Stick. He has mastered the eighteen disciplines of the shinobi, and he is competent with katanas, spears, naginatas, kusarigama, knives, and projectiles, in addition to being an expert in wielding all types of stick weapons which range from staffs, batons, and nunchaku to paired eskrima sticks. He has combined his martial arts training with his gymnastics and boxing skills to form a hybrid fighting style, a true mix of East and West. Matt has learned basic pain control techniques, and meditation based self-healing techniques. He can also use a variety of pressure points to paralyzing an entire body or certain parts of the body and can disable eye sight, speech, excrutiating pain, or even death.
[CHARACTER SAMPLES]
COMMUNITY POST (FIRST PERSON) SAMPLE:
[Voice;Public]
[There is a pause, a brief flicker of static is transmitted, followed by the sound of traffic passing in the background and the general sounds of a busy city street. After a solid six or seven seconds, Matt speaks.]
This thing on yet? Hello? Piece of...
[He sounds almost exasperated, with good reason though. He's been messing with the communicator, trying to learn how to send a secure transmission and simply figure the damn thing out for going on an hour. These sorts of things are tough when you can't exactly see what it is you're doing.]
Alright, it's transmitting, let's see if anyone is listening.
[He clears his throat, and the transformation in his voice is almost instantaneous. Gone is all hesitation, no more muffled muttering. The voice heard next is clear, articulate and calculated. This is not the voice of a lost, confused little citizen; this is the voice of a lawyer who knows the deal and has slayed better men than you. But there's something much darker looming beneath the professional inflections, something foreboding and almost sinister. To those who know it, the voice is unmistakably Daredevil's.]
Listen up, and listen good, I'm only going to say this once. This might not be New York, and there might not be a Hell's Kitchen here to stomp around and look after, but this is still my city. Your sinning, your hooking and whoring, your drugs and your pushing, and your murder? That ends. That ends right now. From now on, you don't do that on my streets. You don't hook. You don't shoot up and you don't sell. And you don't put your hands on anyone. You punks had a nice long run of things, but the chaos is over. I might be new to this place, but I’m not new to this game. I know how to take care of a neighborhood, and that’s exactly what I’m gonna do.
[There is a pause to the declaration, and the sounds of the city can be heard again for the briefest of moments before he resumes.]
So here's the deal. What would be Hell's Kitchen? That's mine. That part of the city is under my protection, it’s under my watch. And I don’t tolerate drugs and violence on my watch. You wanna live your life in sin? You wanna go around destroying yourself and everyone around you? That's fine. But you don't do it there. You get out of that neighborhood and you stay out. And if you don't? Then Daredevil is coming for you.
And if what I’m saying doesn't mean anything to you, ask around. Spread the word and ask them if you don't think I mean business. Ask them what happened to Wilson Fisk if you don’t believe me. Consider this your only warning.
[Several seconds of nothingness before the traffic and cut in. Then, as suddenly as the transmission began, it ends.]
LOGS POST (THIRD PERSON) SAMPLE:
It was a decent knock-off of New York. To the outside observer, or someone who didn’t know all the ins and outs of the city, this place would be a fine imitation. But every city has a heartbeat, every street and filthy alley is part of her nervous system and pulse, and to every one of Matt Murdock’s functioning senses, this rendering was screamingly false. All the rhythm that made New York New York was missing, the little quirks and flaws that endeared the city to him were absent, replaced by this... this. Whatever or wherever it was.
It was disorienting, stepping out onto the sidewalk and having his surroundings be just so slightly off. There was sensory glimpses of the familiar bombarding him, but with enough change that this composite city left him feeling lost and more bewildered than he had in ages. This wasn’t his city, this place wasn’t his home, and there wasn’t much to stop the overwhelming influx of confusion and anger that was helpfully coursing though his veins. Except his self-control, of course.
Matt knew better than to fly off the handle right off the bat. There were too many questions to ask and have answered. Running blindly through the city, stirring up trouble without any understanding as to the players or their motives may have worked in Manhattan, but he wasn’t going to try that here, not now. He’d grown up since he’d last tried barging into Wilson Fisk’s office demanding vengeance and answers. He liked to think he was older and wiser, and less inclined to public displays of stupidity. Generally speaking, anyway.
He'd headed west first, of course, because west meant the West Side, and the West Side meant the Kitchen. The route was much the same, the city grid was as predictable as clockwork, but it still lacked that feel that the city was supposed to have. The air felt different, thinner, less heavy than the oppressive New York haze that seemed to weigh down the world, and everything smelled different, too. The Hudson (or whatever they called the river in this world) didn’t have the same sting to its stench, though Matt could smell it from across town. It was like the river was calling to him, bidding him home, even though it wasn’t his Hudson and this place wasn’t his home at all.
He couldn't help but stand there are gawk for a moment, letting the slight alterations settle in his mind, letting the changes and tweaks to the cityscape become fully rendered by his radar. It wasn't unrecognizable. It wasn't like he'd suddenly found himself in L.A. or Chicago, but the little things were wrong, and the glory of a place like Hell's Kitchen was in the details.
And the details were entirely off. Where was Josie’s? And Fogwell’s Gym? Where was the Clinton Mission? All these places of significance, all these buildings that held such importance... all replaced by piss-poor replicas. Knock-offs of the real thing. It wasn't just the locales either. The vibe of the neighborhood was gone. Not that he had any right to complain on that front. How many years had he fought to clean up the streets of Hell's Kitchen? How many times had he been beaten and bloodied in the name of those streets? How many times had his ankle been snapped? How many times had he been knocked out cold by some gang of lowlife losers bent on taking out a cape? All those hoodlums were gone now, sure, but there would be others to take their places. Ones less inept than his ol' pal Turk, in all likelihood. Ones who didn't have the history with him that someone like the Kingpin or Owlsley did. Ones that wouldn't hesitate to pull a gun, ones with no reason to heed his warnings to clean up their lives and get out of his streets. The whole scenario was wrong, and it was enough to make a guy want to punch something or someone very hard.
“Watch where you’re walking, idiot.”
The voice cut through his moment of self-pity, just in time for Matt to realize he had wandered to the block where his brownstone ought to have been, where a similar building now stood, one so similar it gave him deja vu just to smell it and listen to the noise of traffic and pedestrians bounce off the exterior walls. Matt stopped in his tracks, frozen on the sidewalk, hands stuffed in his pockets as he stared up at it, in a manner of speaking, eyes empty behind his glasses as he listened to the sounds and let them paint the picture. The steps were different, and the layout too. It wasn’t his brownstone, but it was damn close.
“Christ, pal, I said watch it. What are you, blind?”
The passerby was ignored, dismissed with a casual snort and nothing more. Matt wasn’t going to waste his time on the ignorant, he had much more important individuals to worry about. If he was here, maybe others were, too. Milla, maybe, or Foggy. People he loved, people he needed desperately. If they were here in this version of reality, then it wouldn’t be so bad, he could manage. If they weren’t, if he was alone... well, he could cope with that too. He’d been dealt much worse hands in his life than the loneliness card.
The thought of cards sparked another train of thought entirely. What if Bullseye was here? What if Milla and Foggy had been here alone with him, without anyone to protect them, with no one coming to their aid? Matt knew his enemy well, well enough to know what made his sick psyche tick. Bullseye would have killed both of them, if he’d had the chance. And without ol’ Hornhead around to keep him in line, there would be nothing standing in his way. Matt’s mind was taking off on its own, the imagined scent of his wife’s blood filling his senses, the sound of Foggy’s heart ceasing to beat, the memories of what it was like in prison, when he’d almost lost his best friend for good. Everything was so vivid, he could practically taste the pain, and though his exterior was collected and calm, his own body with pulsing with an adrenaline fueled panic.
He had to track them down, he had to seek them out. If there was any chance that his family was here, no matter how tiny or minute, he had to take it. He’d use all his senses and all of his skills, and he would search for Milla, for Foggy, for anyone else he cared about and loved and needed to have alive. This city was huge, and everything about it was haunting, but he wouldn’t give up, he couldn’t. With a deep, cleansing breath, and a new sense of resolve, he pulled his jacket tighter around his torso and set out, following the scent of the pseudo-Hudson and praying for the best.
FINAL NOTES ABOUT YOUR CHARACTER:
All the powers are based in canon, but if they need to be scaled back or adjusted, I am completely flexible.
NAME: Ali
AGE: 23
JOURNAL: aliccolo
IM: aim- aliccolo
E-MAIL: aliccolo@gmail.com
RETURNING: no
[CHARACTER INFO]
CHARACTER NAME: Matthew "Matt" Michael Murdock // Daredevil
FANDOM: Marvel 616
CHRONOLOGY: Daredevil Volume 2 Issue 115
CLASS: Hero, portrayed by the media as a "dangerous vigilante".
SUPERHERO NAME: Daredevil
ALTER EGO: Matt Murdock, Attorney at Law.
BACKGROUND:
Matt Murdock was abandoned by his mother as an infant and raised by his father, boxer 'Battling' Jack Murdock amongst the crime and grime of Hell's Kitchen, Manhattan. Determined that his son would have a better life than he did, Jack strictly forbade Matt from playing sports or participating in physical activities, instead stressing the pursuit of academia. Matt's reluctance to join his schoolmates and neighbors in their games led to him being given the taunting nickname, "Daredevil", and though he secretly trained in his father's gym, he was constantly bullied.
Matt's life was forever altered when, at age twelve, he witnessed a blind man walking into oncoming traffic. He was able to push the man to safety, but in a strange ironic twist, the vehicle crashed, spilling it's radioactive cargo onto Matt's face, scarring and blinding him. It was from this accident that Matt lost his sight, but also gained his superhuman senses. Initially, he was terrified, unable to cope with the strange new world around him, until he met the blind ninja Stick. Stick became Matt's sensei, training him in martial arts and teaching him how to hone and master his new found radar sense.
He entered Columbia University to study law, meeting his best friend and future law partner Foggy Nelson, as well as the first love of his life, Elektra Natchios. He and Elektra parted ways following the death of her father and a drastic shift in her personality. The end of this relationship devastated Matt for some time to come, though he was able to put aside his depression to graduate and open a law firm with Foggy. Nelson and Murdock's first employee was a young woman named Karen Page, hired to be their secretary. Matt and Karen were drawn to each other, though Karen had reservations about becoming involved with a man with 'disabilities'.
It was also about this time that the darker side of Hell's Kitchen began to rear it's sinister head. Jack Murdock, still an active prizefighter, refused to throw a match, as ordered by a crooked promoter known as The Fixer, and was shot dead by The Fixer's men. Enraged and seeking revenge, Matt fashioned a costume out of his father's yellow and black boxing robes and hunted down the men who murdered his father, delivering brutal beatings, and scaring The Fixer to death. Deciding his work was not yet finished, Matt decided to continue fighting crime in his neighborhood, adopting the alias Daredevil and patrolling Hell's Kitchen at night.
Matt's romance with Karen continued to blossom until he encountered former Russian spy Natasha Romanova, the Black Widow. Matt left Karen in favor of Natasha, moving with her to San Francisco for a time. The two were lovers and partners, fighting crime on the west coast, but their relationship didn't last. Matt ultimately proved too controlling for Natasha, and they parted ways, with Matt returning to New York and rejoining Foggy and the law firm, and once again roaming the streets. Despite the end of their romance years ago, Matt and Natasha remain close friends and allies, and on occasion, lovers.
Elektra re-entered Matt's life at this time, cold and hardened after years of training by the mysterious ninja cult, The Hand. His former love was now a deadly assassin, hired by Daredevil's foe, Kingpin. Though the two were now enemies, they did briefly reconcile, just in time for Elektra to be stabbed by the assassin Bullseye and die tragically in Matt's arms. Though she would later be resurrected by agents of The Hand, Elektra's death continues to haunt Daredevil to this day, and that she would be a recurring opponent in his life also caused him additional strife. Bullseye would establish himself as Daredevil’s arch-rival, and the two would face off many times over the years.
Matt was briefly engaged to a woman named Heather, though their relationship was chaotic and unhealthy. Foggy and Natasha staged an intervention of sorts, and Matt and Heather broke off their relationship. She later committed suicide, causing him a great deal of grief and guilt. Things soon became much worse for him, however, Karen, now an adult film star and drug addict, sold his real name to Wilson Fisk in exchange for heroin money. Fisk, better known as the Kingpin of Crime, was a powerful mafia boss, and he was able to make Matt's life a living hell, destroying his finances, getting him disbarred, and burning down his house. Realizing that Kingpin was ultimately the cause of all the problems in his life, Matt swore to push the Kingpin out of Hell's Kitchen once and for all. He was slowly able to piece his life back together, and even reunited with Karen, helping her to get sober. He was eventually able to rebuild his life and regain his license to practice law. It was also during this tumultuous time that Matt encountered Sister Maggie, a Catholic nun at the local mission. Though she would deny it, Matt quickly realized that Maggie was his mother, and he would come to rely on her assistance from time to time.
Matt's relationship with Karen was not without it's troubles though, and while he loved her, he was admittedly unfaithful to her, having affairs with multiple women, including one of his greatest foes, the mentally disturbed Typhoid Mary, an agent of the Kingpin's who plagued him constantly. Matt suffered a severe mental breakdown, developing a second personality, known as Michael, which also served as a safeguard to defend his secret identity. He was forced to fake his own death when a tabloid threatened to reveal his name, and this caused him further identity problems.
The death of Karen Page at the hands of Bullseye threatened to shatter Matt's already fragile psyche, made doubly worse that she was impaled by Daredevil's billy club at the altar of a church. Matt feels guilt over this incident to this day, and many of his friends have hypothesized that Karen's death is what sparked his more recent emotional problems. Shortly after Karen's death, Matt reteamed with Natasha, forming a short lived group bent on capturing and defeating the Punisher. This team didn't last for very long, and within months Daredevil was back to being a solo act.
Matt's name was published by a tabloid, essentially ending his life of anonymity in Hell's Kitchen, casting him in the spotlight he'd avoided for years. Matt denied being Daredevil, both publicly and in private, though the citizens of the Kitchen and NYC as a whole seem to believe the papers over him. During the year following his name being published in the newspapers, Daredevil was infrequently seen. Matt adopted a different technique for dealing with the criminals of Hell’s Kitchen. He took it upon himself to drive the Kingpin out of his neighborhood once and for all. He beat the Kingpin severely, declaring to the witnesses and bystanders the he was the new Kingpin of Hell's Kitchen, and for a year the crime rates dropped, and life in the Kitchen drastically improved. Matt used the money he won in the lawsuit settlement to set up charitable organizations aimed at rejuvenating the neighborhood. A library was built, parks were constructed, and his reputation and public image received an enormous boost in popularity. During this time, he also secretly married his most recent girlfriend, a blind woman named Milla Donovan, whom he had only known for a few months. Despite his real feelings for Milla, Matt continued to be haunted by his past, in particular his failure to save Karen. Realizing that Matt was still in love with Karen, and that their marriage was the result of a decision made during an emotional breakdown, Milla left Matt and filed for an annulment.
As if things weren't bad enough, the F.B.I. had been building a case against him, and was able to arrest him on obstruction of justice charges, despite the best efforts of Natasha and others to get him released. He was sent to Ryker's Island to await trial, kept in the same cell block as the Kingpin, Bullseye, and dozens of other criminals he'd previously faced in combat. Despite being housed with the general population, Matt was able to keep a fair reign over the other prisoners, using his reputation (and occasionally violence) to secure a safe stay in the prison. Fate had other plans, however, and Matt was forced to listen in horror as his best friend Foggy was apparently stabbed to death while visiting the prison. Matt's mental state was rapidly deteriorating, and it wasn't until Frank Castle arrived at Ryker's as well that the two were able to escape in the middle of a riot.
Being locked up on Ryker's and caught up in his own cycle of lies and denial, Matt had been relatively spared by the events of the Superhuman Civil War, however while the real Daredevil had been in prison, a new Daredevil has been masquerading in his place, protecting and defending the Kitchen, and working along side the anti-registration heroes. This left Matt free to pursue Foggy's killer across the Atlantic and all over Europe. Having solved the mystery of his imprisonment and uncovered the trail of deception that led to his arrest, the charges against Matt were dropped, and he was free to return to America. His license to practice law was once again restored, he was reunited with his estranged wife, and Foggy was freed from the Witness Protection program. Matt's life is finally back on track. Unfortunately though, the cycle of hell was about to start all over again.
Like clockwork, one of Daredevil’s past villains returned to seek revenge. Larry Cranston, also known as Mister Fear, began distributing a drug that caused those who took it to become psychotic and lose all fear. Mister Fear was able to inflict his drug on Matt’s wife, Milla, and in a fit of anger she pushed a stranger in front of a subway train, killing the man. Milla was left in a deep state of psychosis, and Matt was left to pick up the pieces once more. Defeating Mister Fear and having him arrested was easy. Accepting the news that there was no antidote for the compound the villain had released on Milla was much more difficult. His wife was insane, and there would be no miracle cure for her.
Matt’s instability seemed to worsen, and he blamed himself for Milla’s permanent state of insanity. Milla was placed in a mental institution, and her parents filed suit against Matt in order to gain custody of their daughter. To complicate matters even worse, he had a one night stand with his friend, private detective Dakota North, an affair which was captured on film and presented to Milla’s parents for use in their suit against Matt. He was eventually forced into signing over custody of Milla to her parents, and despite his faith and belief that marriage is sacred, he allowed the annulment process to proceed. All the while he was being attacked by a new foe, the enigmatic Lady Bullseye, along with a new resurgence of the Hand. Bit by bit his life was being ripped apart all over again, though to what end, he had no idea.
Lady Bullseye was not the only mysterious newcomer into Matt’s life, however. The blind, alcoholic ninja, Master Izo slowly but forcefully weaseled his way into the center of Matt’s world, offering to him the opportunity and means to take out the Hand for good.
PERSONALITY:
On first impression, Matt Murdock comes across as a confident, dedicated practitioner of the law, in turn both compassionate and fearsome, and not one to be easily brushed aside. He's a first class lawyer with the gift of gab, when the mood strikes him. He's sharp, he knows all the right questions to ask, and he knows how to manipulate a witness and draw out a confession. Conversely, you won't meet anyone as genuinely empathetic as him. He understands hardship well, and he considers himself to be a benefactor and guardian for those who need him most; the disparate citizens of Hell's Kitchen.
His personality is both mirrored and amplified once he pulls his cowl on and becomes Daredevil. The same tenacity that he's known for demonstrating in the court room transforms into something darker. Instead of hammering away at his opponents with rhetoric and questioning, he handles them with a blend of Japanese martial arts and boxing that can best be described as very painful to whomever he is up against. Matt can be violent, on more than one occasion a little too violent. However, so far he has been able to maintain his control and refrain from allowing his vigilante activities warp into something deadly.
In his day to day life, Matt is generous, and has a soft spot for long shots and underdogs, often taking on pro bono legal cases and volunteering his time and money to those in need. He is a devout Catholic, although admittedly, a terrible Catholic, complete with the guilt, sure he is already damned to hell. Despite all of this, he comes across as rather charming, and has had a seemingly unending parade of women in his life. Matt has dated various major players in the Marvel universe, from heroines to villainesses ,and quite a few innocent civilians. His love life and relationships have tended to be somewhat self-destructive and marred by tragedy. Several of his former girlfriends died tragic deaths, all of which severely impacted his emotional well being. More recently, his wife was driven insane by one of his villains and was committed to a mental institution after she killed a man. He blames himself for this, and for all of the misfortunes that have crossed those he cares about. He is prone to mood swings, violent fits of rage, and deep depression. He has a history of suffering emotional breakdowns, and has a tendency to fixate and obsess over memories of past tragedies.
Matt grew up idolizing his father, Jack, essentially viewing him as a larger than life hero, as a god among men. His father's personal motto, 'never give up' has now become his own personal mantra, and Matt can be stubborn to a fault. He is fiercely protective of his name and reputation. His double life is not something he wants to have splashed about in the newspapers. Daredevil has one life, Matt Murdock has another. The two do not overlap, and when they do, he can become irrationally angry. He is not above suing people and newspapers for libel by day and then beating the living hell out of them by night.
He is often referred to as a human lie detector, which is rather ironic considering he seems to have few qualms with telling lies himself. Denial is often his weapon of choice, and it often comes back to bite him. Matt has a somewhat evasive personality, sidestepping direct questions as best he can, giving half-truths and hoping that suffices, and flat out lying if it will save his skin. It isn't that he is dishonest, he doesn't see himself as such, anyway. Rather, he's just arrogant enough to see himself as above the truth on certain issues. He has an elitist streak. Matt thinks very highly of himself and can come off as incredibly self-centered. His view of the world is often short-sighted and quite limited; unless it's happening to him or to someone in his neighborhood, he isn't apt to immediately care.
And for all the arrogance and selfishness, his self-esteem is quite shaky. He goes through somewhat manic stages followed by severe depressions, and he's contemplated suicide once or twice. The intensity of his enhanced senses has not especially helped his mental fragility. He's in an almost constant state of pain, both from his sense of touch and from his heightened hearing. Matt takes prescription painkillers to help dull the pain, and it can be speculated that he may have formed some sort of dependence on them.
Matt's personality changed dramatically following his break up with Black Widow and his subsequent return to Hell's Kitchen from San Francisco. Until that point, he was more apt to display his jovial streak. He was more lighthearted, he told jokes, and in general he was much less somber than what he is today. Whether his split from Black Widow was the catalyst for this change, or whether it was a sudden maturing of his nature cannot be fully determined, though the series of tragedies that would follow their break up most certainly played a role in his becoming a darker, moodier, more intense individual. The death of Elektra served as another stepping stone into a darker side of his psyche. Though he had been faced with other catastrophic events in his life, she was his first love, and her death in his arms sparked an emotional breakdown not matched until the death of Karen Page via similar circumstances years later.
POWER:
Enhanced Senses While Matt is legally blind, his other senses function at superhuman levels. For example, he can read by touch, sense changes in temperature and air pressure as they happen, remember any scent or taste he encounters, and hear a human heartbeat from 20 feet away. He can track individuals across great distances based on their scent, tell how long a body has been dead based on its temperature, etc. His hearing is his most accurate sense, so sensitive that he can tell whether or not a person is lying by listening to their pulse. However, his enhanced hearing is a duel-edged sword. Loud noises cause him great pain, and particularly busy locales can leave his senses feeling overwhelmed. He also has a lower threshold for pain than most people, due to his sense of touch being so developed.
Radar and Electromagnetic Awareness Matt has a specialized 'radar sense' which functions similarly to echolocation. He is able to pinpoint the location of objects by listening to the reverberations made by ambient sounds against objects and people. This sense also allows him to detect other forms of electromagnetic waves. He is capable of detecting and identifying radation across the entire electromagnetic spectrum, from gamma to radio and all types in between. He can tell immediately if something nearby is radioactive, and if something nearby is giving off a radio signal, he'll know it, though he won't be able to understand the message being transmitted.
Ninja Skills Matt is a member of the order of the Chaste, having received training in ninjutsu from his sensei, Stick. He has mastered the eighteen disciplines of the shinobi, and he is competent with katanas, spears, naginatas, kusarigama, knives, and projectiles, in addition to being an expert in wielding all types of stick weapons which range from staffs, batons, and nunchaku to paired eskrima sticks. He has combined his martial arts training with his gymnastics and boxing skills to form a hybrid fighting style, a true mix of East and West. Matt has learned basic pain control techniques, and meditation based self-healing techniques. He can also use a variety of pressure points to paralyzing an entire body or certain parts of the body and can disable eye sight, speech, excrutiating pain, or even death.
[CHARACTER SAMPLES]
COMMUNITY POST (FIRST PERSON) SAMPLE:
[Voice;Public]
[There is a pause, a brief flicker of static is transmitted, followed by the sound of traffic passing in the background and the general sounds of a busy city street. After a solid six or seven seconds, Matt speaks.]
This thing on yet? Hello? Piece of...
[He sounds almost exasperated, with good reason though. He's been messing with the communicator, trying to learn how to send a secure transmission and simply figure the damn thing out for going on an hour. These sorts of things are tough when you can't exactly see what it is you're doing.]
Alright, it's transmitting, let's see if anyone is listening.
[He clears his throat, and the transformation in his voice is almost instantaneous. Gone is all hesitation, no more muffled muttering. The voice heard next is clear, articulate and calculated. This is not the voice of a lost, confused little citizen; this is the voice of a lawyer who knows the deal and has slayed better men than you. But there's something much darker looming beneath the professional inflections, something foreboding and almost sinister. To those who know it, the voice is unmistakably Daredevil's.]
Listen up, and listen good, I'm only going to say this once. This might not be New York, and there might not be a Hell's Kitchen here to stomp around and look after, but this is still my city. Your sinning, your hooking and whoring, your drugs and your pushing, and your murder? That ends. That ends right now. From now on, you don't do that on my streets. You don't hook. You don't shoot up and you don't sell. And you don't put your hands on anyone. You punks had a nice long run of things, but the chaos is over. I might be new to this place, but I’m not new to this game. I know how to take care of a neighborhood, and that’s exactly what I’m gonna do.
[There is a pause to the declaration, and the sounds of the city can be heard again for the briefest of moments before he resumes.]
So here's the deal. What would be Hell's Kitchen? That's mine. That part of the city is under my protection, it’s under my watch. And I don’t tolerate drugs and violence on my watch. You wanna live your life in sin? You wanna go around destroying yourself and everyone around you? That's fine. But you don't do it there. You get out of that neighborhood and you stay out. And if you don't? Then Daredevil is coming for you.
And if what I’m saying doesn't mean anything to you, ask around. Spread the word and ask them if you don't think I mean business. Ask them what happened to Wilson Fisk if you don’t believe me. Consider this your only warning.
[Several seconds of nothingness before the traffic and cut in. Then, as suddenly as the transmission began, it ends.]
LOGS POST (THIRD PERSON) SAMPLE:
It was a decent knock-off of New York. To the outside observer, or someone who didn’t know all the ins and outs of the city, this place would be a fine imitation. But every city has a heartbeat, every street and filthy alley is part of her nervous system and pulse, and to every one of Matt Murdock’s functioning senses, this rendering was screamingly false. All the rhythm that made New York New York was missing, the little quirks and flaws that endeared the city to him were absent, replaced by this... this. Whatever or wherever it was.
It was disorienting, stepping out onto the sidewalk and having his surroundings be just so slightly off. There was sensory glimpses of the familiar bombarding him, but with enough change that this composite city left him feeling lost and more bewildered than he had in ages. This wasn’t his city, this place wasn’t his home, and there wasn’t much to stop the overwhelming influx of confusion and anger that was helpfully coursing though his veins. Except his self-control, of course.
Matt knew better than to fly off the handle right off the bat. There were too many questions to ask and have answered. Running blindly through the city, stirring up trouble without any understanding as to the players or their motives may have worked in Manhattan, but he wasn’t going to try that here, not now. He’d grown up since he’d last tried barging into Wilson Fisk’s office demanding vengeance and answers. He liked to think he was older and wiser, and less inclined to public displays of stupidity. Generally speaking, anyway.
He'd headed west first, of course, because west meant the West Side, and the West Side meant the Kitchen. The route was much the same, the city grid was as predictable as clockwork, but it still lacked that feel that the city was supposed to have. The air felt different, thinner, less heavy than the oppressive New York haze that seemed to weigh down the world, and everything smelled different, too. The Hudson (or whatever they called the river in this world) didn’t have the same sting to its stench, though Matt could smell it from across town. It was like the river was calling to him, bidding him home, even though it wasn’t his Hudson and this place wasn’t his home at all.
He couldn't help but stand there are gawk for a moment, letting the slight alterations settle in his mind, letting the changes and tweaks to the cityscape become fully rendered by his radar. It wasn't unrecognizable. It wasn't like he'd suddenly found himself in L.A. or Chicago, but the little things were wrong, and the glory of a place like Hell's Kitchen was in the details.
And the details were entirely off. Where was Josie’s? And Fogwell’s Gym? Where was the Clinton Mission? All these places of significance, all these buildings that held such importance... all replaced by piss-poor replicas. Knock-offs of the real thing. It wasn't just the locales either. The vibe of the neighborhood was gone. Not that he had any right to complain on that front. How many years had he fought to clean up the streets of Hell's Kitchen? How many times had he been beaten and bloodied in the name of those streets? How many times had his ankle been snapped? How many times had he been knocked out cold by some gang of lowlife losers bent on taking out a cape? All those hoodlums were gone now, sure, but there would be others to take their places. Ones less inept than his ol' pal Turk, in all likelihood. Ones who didn't have the history with him that someone like the Kingpin or Owlsley did. Ones that wouldn't hesitate to pull a gun, ones with no reason to heed his warnings to clean up their lives and get out of his streets. The whole scenario was wrong, and it was enough to make a guy want to punch something or someone very hard.
“Watch where you’re walking, idiot.”
The voice cut through his moment of self-pity, just in time for Matt to realize he had wandered to the block where his brownstone ought to have been, where a similar building now stood, one so similar it gave him deja vu just to smell it and listen to the noise of traffic and pedestrians bounce off the exterior walls. Matt stopped in his tracks, frozen on the sidewalk, hands stuffed in his pockets as he stared up at it, in a manner of speaking, eyes empty behind his glasses as he listened to the sounds and let them paint the picture. The steps were different, and the layout too. It wasn’t his brownstone, but it was damn close.
“Christ, pal, I said watch it. What are you, blind?”
The passerby was ignored, dismissed with a casual snort and nothing more. Matt wasn’t going to waste his time on the ignorant, he had much more important individuals to worry about. If he was here, maybe others were, too. Milla, maybe, or Foggy. People he loved, people he needed desperately. If they were here in this version of reality, then it wouldn’t be so bad, he could manage. If they weren’t, if he was alone... well, he could cope with that too. He’d been dealt much worse hands in his life than the loneliness card.
The thought of cards sparked another train of thought entirely. What if Bullseye was here? What if Milla and Foggy had been here alone with him, without anyone to protect them, with no one coming to their aid? Matt knew his enemy well, well enough to know what made his sick psyche tick. Bullseye would have killed both of them, if he’d had the chance. And without ol’ Hornhead around to keep him in line, there would be nothing standing in his way. Matt’s mind was taking off on its own, the imagined scent of his wife’s blood filling his senses, the sound of Foggy’s heart ceasing to beat, the memories of what it was like in prison, when he’d almost lost his best friend for good. Everything was so vivid, he could practically taste the pain, and though his exterior was collected and calm, his own body with pulsing with an adrenaline fueled panic.
He had to track them down, he had to seek them out. If there was any chance that his family was here, no matter how tiny or minute, he had to take it. He’d use all his senses and all of his skills, and he would search for Milla, for Foggy, for anyone else he cared about and loved and needed to have alive. This city was huge, and everything about it was haunting, but he wouldn’t give up, he couldn’t. With a deep, cleansing breath, and a new sense of resolve, he pulled his jacket tighter around his torso and set out, following the scent of the pseudo-Hudson and praying for the best.
FINAL NOTES ABOUT YOUR CHARACTER:
All the powers are based in canon, but if they need to be scaled back or adjusted, I am completely flexible.