‘Daredevil’ Reboot Gets Writer, Will Adapt ‘Born Again’ Storyline

Let’s be honest: the 2003 Ben Affleck-starring Daredevil film isn’t very good.  It might have been considered “pretty good” when it came out, but so many better superhero films have been released since that even though we were willing to take Ben Affleck seriously as a superhero back then, we really can’t now.  Still, Daredevil — blind lawyer Matt Murdock by day, defender of Hell’s Kitchen by night — is one of Marvel’s more popular superheroes, and it has already been reported that David Slade (30 Days of Night, Twilight: Eclipse) has been tapped to direct a quasi-reboot of Daredevil — more of a Incredible Hulk / Punisher: War Zone “soft reboot” than a brand new series.

Now The Hollywood Reporter tells us the new Daredevil film has a writer, and, not only that, but a specific storyline that the film will adapt.  Brad Caleb Kane, a writer of the comic-friendly TV show Fringe and who did some uncredited work on the sublime Brooklyn’s Finest, has been tapped to adapt Daredevil: Born Again into the next Daredevil film.  In case you haven’t heard of it, Born Again is the most acclaimed Daredevil stories — in fact, one of the most acclaimed superhero stories in all of comics — which was written by comics megastar Frank Miller and drawn by David Mazzucchelli (one of my personal all-time favorite artists).  For those unaware, it tells the story of Daredevil’s arch-rival Kingpin learning The Man Without Fear’s secret identity and, as a result, decides to destroy Matt Murdock’s whole life, plunging him into insanity.  It’s perhaps one of the greatest superhero stories ever written — so much so that many subsequent writers of Daredevil have been accused of trying to simply re-write Born Again.  It’ll take some re-tooling because this is a Fox release, which does not own the rights to Captain America and the Avengers (who appear in the story), but if it’s a straight adaptation, it’ll work wonders on screen.

Also of interest is a rights issue: Fox has to keep moving on its Daredevil, Fantastic Four, and X-Men properties or the rights to the projects revert back to Marvel Studios (and Disney, who now owns Marvel).  This is the same reason why Sony is intent on churning out more Spider-Man films.  That probably means we can look forward to an announcement of another Fantastic Four film soon.  God help us all.

Any interest in another Daredevil film?  Do you want to see Born Again on film?  Give us your thoughts in the comments below!