6 Saving Graces Of Ben Affleck's Daredevil

C'mon, it wasn't that bad. Seriously.

By Samuel Clements /

When Ben Affleck was announced as the latest actor to play Bruce Wayne on the big screen, the internet almost exploded with horrific memories of Daredevil; obscenely choreographed action sequences and an over-reliance on clichés made the film bland, forgettable and uninteresting. Yet despite these fair criticisms, there are some semblances of salvation within the movie. These salvations are incredibly diverse; ranging from unique character interpretations to alternative ways of viewing the film. Daredevil€™s costume showed the dilemma for modern filmmakers; should they stick to the source material, or should they try to modernise it? X-Men ditched the original costumes in favour of functionality, and while this was well received in the public eye, the community of comic fans showed some unease at the way in which characters were somewhat betrayed by the big screen. This was the first of a multitude of painful problems in the 2003 blockbuster. Ben Affleck will never truly recover from this astoundingly atrocious adaptation of what could be an amazing hero; Batman may offer him some semblance of respect from the comic community, but for the most part the damage has been done. The fault of the film is not restricted to Affleck; the plot was weak, the script was poor, the action sequences tried to appeal to younger audiences, while the darker tones of the films appealed to adults. There were a litany of cinematic offences at play in this film, and to dissect these weaknesses would take a lifetime. Although the film now stands out as the ultimate guide to how to not make a superhero film, the positive factors have now become almost impossible to acknowledge due to the film€™s negative reputation. While Daredevil does, for the most part deserve this reputation, it was released in between some of the greatest superhero films in a generation; Sam Raimi had released his first Spider-Man film in 2002, and Bryan Singer€™s second X-Men film was released in the same year as Daredevil. This astonishingly high competition meant that Daredevil faced difficult opposition from the outset, so in some ways the negativity that accompanies the film was not fully self-inflicted...