Issue(s): Daredevil #56, Daredevil #57
Cover Date: Sep-Oct 69
Title: "...And death came riding!" / "In the midst of life...!"
Credits:
Roy Thomas - Writer
Gene Colan - Penciler
Syd Shores - Inker

Review/plot:
At the start of this arc, we learn Daredevil's brilliant plan for dealing with the fact that he killed off his Matt Murdock identity. "I'll conjure up a new legal name, and [Karen and I will] be altar bound--!". Well, sure, that settles it. I guess i'll accept the idea that legal expert Matt Murdock can figure out how to create a new identity from scratch and even somehow get all the necessary paperwork, but even beyond that, he was a fairly well known guy. What is he going to say to people that pass him in the street? Oh no, i'm not this young lady's former employer. I'm a different guy that looks just like him." What are he and Karen going to say to Foggy? Maybe Matt intends to invent yet another twin brother?

Anyway, he's finally worked up the nerve to reveal all of this to Karen, and seems unconcerned about how she might take it...

...but it turns out Thomas wants to drag it out a little further, so he's sent Karen up to her home in Vermont to deal with an issue regarding her father, who we learn invented the cobalt bomb but wouldn't divulge the secrets to the US government.

Daredevil follows Karen up and finds himself fighting a Death's Head (i bought these issues from mycomicshop.com, and they had the balls to advertise issue #55 as "First appearance of Death's Head." if you can believe that. This guy of course has nothing to do with the Simon Furman character, yes?).

He's pretty cool looking. His face is kind of like an Aztec Tuskan Raider.

But this is his only appearance. He turns out to be Karen's father, driven nuts by accusations of treason and exposure to radioactive cobalt. Including molten cobalt, which, and i'm no scientist, seems particularly unsafe, even if you don't fall in it.

Karen's father dies saving Karen after accidentally putting her in danger.

Roy Thomas had a friend in the Vermont named Tom Fagan, who later will appear in Marvel's sporadic Halloween stories that take place in Rutland. In this issue the train station that Karen and Daredevil stop at is called Fagan Corners.

Thomas has Karen Page drop an H.P. Lovecraft reference which seems a little out of character.

Daredevil's super-senses are super-extraordinary in issue #56. First, after encountering Death's Head, he thinks to himself "That's two skull-faced baddies I've encountered in a row! DD, ol' boy, you're in a rut...!". Self-depricating meta-commentary aside, it seems a bit much that DD can even perceive the Death's Head face. But on the next page, he's feeling the features of Karen Page's father in a framed photo, presumably through a layer of glass, so i guess he's just really on the ball today.

Foggy calls Karen during all of this asking her to please get back to work, because Willie Lincoln has info on someone calling himself Crime Wave.

After it's all over and Karen's father is buried, Daredevil approaches her and tells her to take off his mask. Because after being terrorized by a man in a glow-in-the-dark skeleton outfit that turned out to be her father, who then died, Karen could use another shock right about now.

Quality Rating: C-

Historical Significance Rating: 3 - Karen Page learns Daredevil's secret ID.

Chronological Placement Considerations: Next issue skips ahead a bit in time before flashing back to show Karen's reaction to the revelation here.

References:

• A flashback shows Karen held hostage by Starr Saxon in Daredevil #52.

Crossover: N/A

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: N/A

Roy Thomas loved to have his characters quote the books he read or music he listened to. It's one of the things that instantly makes his work recognizable.

Death's Head's mask was indeed based on an Aztec death mask.

Roy probably didn't know this, but there actually was a rock band from Chicago called H.P. Lovecraft during 1967-69.

Awww, I think "Karen, take off my mask" is beautiful. At last, Matt does something to redeem himself from being such an asshole to her over the years.

Yes, it's a shock, but he's spent so long waiting for "the right time", that it's great that he realizes the sooner he stops lying to her, the better. (And also, that giving Matt back to her is ultimately the first step to healing Karen after all she's been through.) And I'd like to think that seeing her grieving over her dad is the reason that Matt (finally!) decides to stop being a selfish dick and playing all the identity games. (I still can't really forgive that "Mike Murdock" crap.)

It's a pity that Roy doesn't really have a follow-up and that Conway decides to ditch the pairing (not that the whole DD/Black Widow/San Francisco angle is bad, I just mean in terms of the unfulfilled promise here), but it's very nice to see at least ONE of Marvel's Manly Men FINALLY stop the fucking lies. Peter? Tony? Ball's in your court, fellows.

(And, Tony? You might wanna get moving on telling janice. I'm just saying.)

All the cool 60s chicks read H.P. Lovecraft, man.