6. Daredevil Isn't Blind To The Dangers Of Petrol Fumes
Matt Murdock has had a lot of interesting adversaries during his superhero career. There was Typhoid Mary, the martial arts expert with multi-personality disorder. There was Stilt-Man who had...stilts. Perhaps most nefarious of all, though, was the dreaded Vapora, the ghostly personification of dangerous gasoline fumes that Daredevil faced in a comic published in cooperation with the Consumer Product Safety Commission. To be quite honest, most of the people in Daredevil Vs Vapora sort of deserve the fate that the villain nudges them in the direction of. Especially the mother who decides to light a cigarette whilst leaning on an open gas canister. Vapora would have gotten away with it, too, if it weren't for that meddling superhero. She's invisible to the naked eye - just like petrol fumes in real life! - but Daredevil's heightened senses allow him to "see" her and scare her off. The scenes of people being menaced by fumes are pretty silly and on the nose, but it gets even more blatant when Matt Murdock goes to court. In his lawyer alter ago, Daredevil defends a landlord from arson charges after a house burst into flames after he used a gas canister to remove some kitchen tiles (seriously, what is wrong with these people?!). Murdock explains that the misuse of petrol can lead to accidents like this, but a lot of people are ignorant as to these dangers, just about managing to restrain himself from looking up out of the pages and saying "LIKE YOU ARE!"
Tom Baker is the Comics Editor at WhatCulture! He's heard all the Doctor Who jokes, but not many about Randall and Hopkirk. He also blogs at http://communibearsilostate.wordpress.com/
