Issue(s): Daredevil annual #4 (Back-up stories only)
Cover Date: 1989
Title: "Role reversal / The rescue / The redeemed and the condemned"
Credits:
Gregory Wright - Writer
Jim Lee / John Romita Jr. / Whilce Portacio - Penciler
Kim DeMulder / Klaus Janson / Al Milgrom - Inker
Ralph Macchio - Editor

Review/plot:
Note that this entry covers the back-up stories for 1989's Daredevil annual #4 only. The Atlantis Attacks portion is covered in a separate entry.

This is a trio of pretty bad filler stories by Gregory Wright, who was the Managing Editor for Mark Gruenwald's books at the time this issue was published. All three do feature some headliner artists, so there's that.

The first is nearly incomprehensible, both because of the dialogue of the Wildboys...

...and the plot (and/or Jim Lee's storytelling). I'm also not sure where Spit got that tongue.

The story seems to be the Wildboys seeing some other criminals and going after their stash of contraband, but in the end the police show up and (i assume tongue-in-cheek) act like the Wildboys have helped them capture the criminals.

I don't really know why the Wildboys resort to choking each other at the end (since they didn't seem to have any disagreements prior to that) or really what the point of it all was.

During that story, we see Eightball of the Bratpack/Fatboys...

...and his unrelated story is expanded upon in the second back up, which has Darla getting kidnapped.

Here's the concurrent Eightball scene as done by Romita and Janson.

John Romita draws the Bratpack kids as super-deformed dwarves; they are pretty hilarious looking.

The Bratpack kids try to stage a rescue for Darla...

...but they get in trouble and Daredevil has to show up to bail them out and ask why they didn't do the obvious and call the police.

The third story features Ben Urich on a story about a drug lord that he's hoping to put in jail.

Matt Murdock warns him to be careful...

...but Urich presses on and eventually gets shot by Bushwacker.

Poor Urich gets hurt a lot by super-folk. But when Bushwacker looks into what Urich was investigating, he finds that the drug lord is someone that used to flood his neighborhood with drugs when he was a priest.

So he doesn't finish Urich off (and Urich is totally fine, you guys). And then when Urich's story comes out and the druglord doesn't go to jail, Bushwacker kills him.

Quality Rating: C-

Historical Significance Rating: 1

Chronological Placement Considerations: The first two stories here intertwine, and all three take place while Matt Murdock is still working at his legal clinic. Beyond that, it should take place after Bushwacker's first appearance in Daredevil #248-249 and the Wildboys' first appearance in Daredevil #253. I've placed this after Daredevil #253 but before Daredevil #254 when DD begins to be under the influence of Typhoid Mary, although the stories could go later if necessary. We'd definitely need the story to be placed before Inferno.

References:

• Eightball thinks to himself that he used to think the Wildboys were cool, a reference to Daredevil #253.

Crossover: N/A

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: N/A

Starting with this issue, the Fatboys appear exclusively in the Annuals, then after Annual 8, they disappear and only show up in Karen's funeral.
Matt's criticism of the Fat Boys for trying to rescue Darla themselves is hypocritical considering that he used them to spy on Typhoid in Daredevil 256.
The problem with Bushwacker's appearance is that his face isn't messed up in this story but it is in Daredevil 260. Of course, as we'll see in later issues, there's plenty of inconsistencies with Bushwacker's face.

I think the whole Wildboys strangling each other thing is a joke; "All that hard work we did just to help the police?!" Sort of the two-person version of beating your head on the wall.

Only Ann Nocenti should write the Wildboys. Which is my way of saying no one should write the Wildboys.