Elektra Lives Again

Rating:
Summary: A Work of Primal Art
Review: Elektra Lives Again

The story of Daredevil and Elektra is literally a stand-out Romeo and Juliet of the comic world. Frank Miller created the perfect fallen hero in Elektra, shaped her psychological complex to suit her name and tied her to Daredevil aka blind lawyer Matt Murdock, the epitome of the blind lover and moral code. There is now a current monthly comic book for Elektra, the point of her death muddied by Marvel's desire to capitalize and it falls flat.
One cannot remix Bach.

The Elektra back story is simple:

Part One: Elektra became a ninja assassin for the evil Hand after the death of her father. She betrayed the Hand after learning their skills/secrets then going solo. The Hand came after her and eventually the assassin Bullseye fatally wounded her and she died in Daredevil's arms.

Part Two: The Hand decided to resurrect Elektra and make her an undead slave/assassin. Daredevil interceded and through sheer force of will, purged her soul of the evil spell right before she came back to life. However she disappeared right after her heard a single heartbeat. He was left with the doubt of whether or not she lived.

Part Three: Elektra joins with a rogue gov't agent in Elektra Assassin to stop essentially a demon/anti-Christ from becoming the President of the USA. In print, she succeeded, some argue that in reality we need her even more than fantasy allows.

Elektra Lives Again.
The Hand---persistent to a fault are at the resurrection game again. Anyone. An assassin Kirigi, Bullseye, Elektra---the Hand have this fanatical need to have a Prime A Leader Assassin. Low self esteem in ninja cult, I suppose. This time they want to first kill Bullseye (who is in prison for killing scads of folk---he's kind of like Hannibal Lecter with the ability to turn anything into a weapon-anything, we're talking orange seeds here and use him to kill. To ... Elektra, ... Matt, ... anyone. Elektra alive and avoiding the love of her life Matt Murdock is hot on the Hand's trail to stop all of this madness.
Matt begins having psychic dreams about Elektra and what her soul is going through because of the link resurrecting her has created between them.
What makes this interesting is that though Matt uses his fighting skills, his heightened senses and amazing acrobatics, he never dons the Daredevil costume. That's the first mark of this work being superb.
The second mark is the silence of Elektra and her ability to move through the real world as a shadow, a dead woman, a ninja, a ruthless assassin committed to doing what's right no matter the fall-out.

Frank Miller's point in all of this carnage and Elektra dying one more time is that this is their destiny. Elektra must deal with these dark assassins and have Matt as a tugboat of light to keep her near the line of goodness. When Matt cradles Elektra, killed by a dead Bullseye he finally can accept her death---the fact that she's dressed all in white as a nun is wonderful imagery.

The art of Lynn Varney is tired. I mean that as a compliment. Everyone looks haggard, worn out, tired. And that's how they should look. These people are something slightly different from the normal superheroes/villains in the sense that it's all personal with them and they willingly ... and will die (sometimes several times) for the Good Fight. The battles are intensely personal and gory, violent to the degree of shocking but that's what a real fight should look like. And when you get right down to it, these are some mentally unbalanced folk. Even Matt. And they should be. That's what I mean by personal, this comes as close as possible to almost reality. Of all the superhero films out there, this should be made into a film. Not necessarily a trilogy but maybe one or two that really convey the horror and pity and sadness of this whole beautiful, bloody, twisted tale.

Five Stars.

Rating:
Summary: A Work of Primal Art
Review: Elektra Lives Again

The story of Daredevil and Elektra is literally a stand-out Romeo and Juliet of the comic world. Frank Miller created the perfect fallen hero in Elektra, shaped her psychological complex to suit her name and tied her to Daredevil aka blind lawyer Matt Murdock, the epitome of the blind lover and moral code. There is now a current monthly comic book for Elektra, the point of her death muddied by Marvel's desire to capitalize and it falls flat.
One cannot remix Bach.

The Elektra back story is simple:

Part One: Elektra became a ninja assassin for the evil Hand after the death of her father. She betrayed the Hand after learning their skills/secrets then going solo. The Hand came after her and eventually the assassin Bullseye fatally wounded her and she died in Daredevil's arms.

Part Two: The Hand decided to resurrect Elektra and make her an undead slave/assassin. Daredevil interceded and through sheer force of will, purged her soul of the evil spell right before she came back to life. However she disappeared right after her heard a single heartbeat. He was left with the doubt of whether or not she lived.

Part Three: Elektra joins with a rogue gov't agent in Elektra Assassin to stop essentially a demon/anti-Christ from becoming the President of the USA. In print, she succeeded, some argue that in reality we need her even more than fantasy allows.

Elektra Lives Again.
The Hand---persistent to a fault are at the resurrection game again. Anyone. An assassin Kirigi, Bullseye, Elektra---the Hand have this fanatical need to have a Prime A Leader Assassin. Low self esteem in ninja cult, I suppose. This time they want to first kill Bullseye (who is in prison for killing scads of folk---he's kind of like Hannibal Lecter with the ability to turn anything into a weapon-anything, we're talking orange seeds here and use him to kill. To ... Elektra, ... Matt, ... anyone. Elektra alive and avoiding the love of her life Matt Murdock is hot on the Hand's trail to stop all of this madness.
Matt begins having psychic dreams about Elektra and what her soul is going through because of the link resurrecting her has created between them.
What makes this interesting is that though Matt uses his fighting skills, his heightened senses and amazing acrobatics, he never dons the Daredevil costume. That's the first mark of this work being superb.
The second mark is the silence of Elektra and her ability to move through the real world as a shadow, a dead woman, a ninja, a ruthless assassin committed to doing what's right no matter the fall-out.

Frank Miller's point in all of this carnage and Elektra dying one more time is that this is their destiny. Elektra must deal with these dark assassins and have Matt as a tugboat of light to keep her near the line of goodness. When Matt cradles Elektra, killed by a dead Bullseye he finally can accept her death---the fact that she's dressed all in white as a nun is wonderful imagery.

The art of Lynn Varney is tired. I mean that as a compliment. Everyone looks haggard, worn out, tired. And that's how they should look. These people are something slightly different from the normal superheroes/villains in the sense that it's all personal with them and they willingly ... and will die (sometimes several times) for the Good Fight. The battles are intensely personal and gory, violent to the degree of shocking but that's what a real fight should look like. And when you get right down to it, these are some mentally unbalanced folk. Even Matt. And they should be. That's what I mean by personal, this comes as close as possible to almost reality. Of all the superhero films out there, this should be made into a film. Not necessarily a trilogy but maybe one or two that really convey the horror and pity and sadness of this whole beautiful, bloody, twisted tale.

Five Stars.

Rating:
Summary: Lovely Work
Review: Frank Miller's work from 1990 reviving an old character from the Daredevil series Elektra, who was Matt Murdock's girfriend that died in the series sometime ago. The artwork is great, however the story could use a little more punch. Somewhat reminds me of McFarlanes work in the early part of his Spiderman series, although Miller certainly puts a more intellectual slant in his books. Reccomended for Daredevil, Elektra and Frank Miller lovers, however if you are reading the Daredevil series, I dont think this book is a neccesity, for its sort of a book unto itself.

Rating:
Summary: Miller Just Misses
Review: Frank Miller, often considered one of the great modern comic storytellers, is best known for his Batman epic "The Dark Knight Returns" However, Miller returns to his roots by doing some work on Elektra and Daredevil, where he first got started in the comic industry.
Everyone knows that Elektra is dead. She was murdered by the deadly Bullseye, impaled upon her own sai (You can see the awesome battle in Miller's 'Daredevil Visionaries: Volume 2'). When Matt Murdock, Elektra's college boyfriend and the blind superhero known as Daredevil, begins to have eerie dreams of her rising from her grave, he becomes unnerved. Is Elektra back? And why? He discovers that one of his old enemies may be revived, deadlier than ever...
I enjoyed this book mostly because it was written out of the comics continuity, so you don't have to get bogged down in the chronology to understand it. The story is told from Matt Murdock/Daredevil's point of view, which is good to see, because I don't remember many of Miller's older Daredevil works being told from this perspective. This book only gets 4 stars because I was hoping for a lot more (The book is oversized and is just 75 pages long). It seems as though Miller could have written a lot more, but chose instead to make this book more 'choppy' for a more psychological effect. It didn't really work too well.
In summation, 'Elektra Lives Again' is a good book, and Frank Miller is still one of the best in the industry, but it isn't as good as his early run on Daredevil. The art is impressive and the plot interesting, but Miller fails to capitalize on what could have been an immaculate triumph of a story. Instead, he leaves many blank spots and tries to let you fill in the rest. If you're a big Daredevil or Elektra fan, you'll want to read this, but be forewarned - you may be let down.

Rating:
Summary: A non-continuity exercise in self-indulgence.
Review: I don't know if Miller intended this as a story in which Elektra would actually be revived--if he did, he mucked with Marvel continuity way too much to make it work.

For me, the book gets 3 stars because of Miller's excellent draftsmanship and storytelling, and Varley's dynamic colors. Miller's work didn't look this good again until 300 was released.

But the story is just not there, for me. Miller indulges himself in a personal exploration of isolation and despair with Matt Murdock (Daredevil) spending an enormous amount of time watching and waiting for an outside force (Elektra) to show up and make him whole again.

Now while I've always liked Murdock's particular flavor of angst--more than anyone in the Marvel Universe, the blind guy in the too-loud world should be entitled to brood--he just comes off as thoroughly helpless in this story. Maybe that's what Miller wanted, that sort of flailing desperation, but it didn't play for me. I've read the story a number of times, hoping to "get it," but it always comes up short for me.

04/22/02 - I just reread this yesterday, and my opinion is unchanged. The last 20+ seem to lose track of what the first 40+ pages are about. The action is striking, but only the most obvious of story's questions are answered. Ths story yearns to be substantial but ends up superficial, and some of us prefer SOLID chocolate bunnies at Easter.

This one's good for Miller completists, but if you want a really ripping Frank Miller Elektra story, I recommend Elektra: Assassin, his brilliant, funny collaboration with Bill Sienkiewicz.

Rating:
Summary: Pretty good finale
Review: I was fine with Elektra's original death and really didn't see the need for this story, but it was impressive nonetheless. Matt Murdock spends the whole story as himself, not Daredevil, adding to the serious tone. The purpose behind the story is a bit weak, but it works. Actually, the better parts involve the psychological elements, plus getting to follow M.M. through his daily routine. The fight sequences, while beautifully executed, didn't seem as interesting as the rest.

I feel that this is Miller's artistic high point - the artwork is very clean, and Lynn Varley's colors add tremendous depth to the pages. I wish that Miller's current projects had this look, as I can't stand Sin City's chiaroscuro, and 300 looked too sketchy.

Rating:
Summary: Pretty good finale
Review: I was fine with Elektra's original death and really didn't see the need for this story, but it was impressive nonetheless. Matt Murdock spends the whole story as himself, not Daredevil, adding to the serious tone. The purpose behind the story is a bit weak, but it works. Actually, the better parts involve the psychological elements, plus getting to follow M.M. through his daily routine. The fight sequences, while beautifully executed, didn't seem as interesting as the rest.

I feel that this is Miller's artistic high point - the artwork is very clean, and Lynn Varley's colors add tremendous depth to the pages. I wish that Miller's current projects had this look, as I can't stand Sin City's chiaroscuro, and 300 looked too sketchy.

Rating:
Summary: A thrilling adventure
Review: This Elektra TPB is well written and drawn.

The story seems like it is out of continuty and also the art seems really dream like and surreal.

I recommend this to any Elektra enthusiast. And read this so you can be informed for the Elektra movie.