Summary
“The Grand Design” is a really great episode that weaves together past and present, old and new, in a way that feels very distinctly Daredevil.
The good news — or bad news, I suppose, depending on where you’re sitting — is that, despite getting a shard of glass wedged in her temple, Vanessa is alive. For now. As it turns out, her merely flirting with death is quite enough to send Wilson Fisk into a dangerous, depressive spiral, so the same objective is achieved, but her limboing between life and death gives Daredevil: Born Again Season 2 the opportunity to be a bit more contemplative. And that means flashbacks. Episode 5 is rife with them, which means some cameos from the original series, including Elden Henson’s Foggy and, pleasingly, Toby Leonard Moore’s James Wesley.
The downside of this, or so it seems initially, is that the structure doesn’t emphasise the shifting timeline very well, and the past sequences, however nice it might be to see the familiar faces, aren’t as interesting as what’s going on in the present day. But “The Grand Design” reveals itself to be better and cleverer than it seems, reflecting its own title and themes in thoughtful ways that deftly knit together past and present, old and new, making Born Again feel intimately of a piece with the Netflix series that people keep illogically complaining it bears no resemblance to.
Loose Lips
While all the focus is on Vanessa’s recovery, Daniel’s brush with death risks passing by unnoticed, which would be a shame. Daniel’s burgeoning relationship with Buck Cashman is one of the more unexpected and compelling dynamics of the season, and it really comes to the fore here as Daniel starts to worry that his new mentor might be preparing to execute him.
And there’s grounds to do so. While Daniel is languishing at the hospital, BB turns up fishing for info, and while Daniel initially acknowledges that this isn’t really the time, all it takes is a bit of performative sympathy for him to spill the beans anyway. Just like that, the name of the hospital and the fact that Vanessa remains in critical condition are both headline news. It’s hard not to feel sorry for Daniel here. Sure, he hero-worships the most obvious villain who has ever existed, but on the upside, Michael Gandolfini plays him really wonderfully.
Because he knows he messed up, when Buck takes Daniel for “a hotdog” and ends up driving him into the middle of nowhere with a bunch of power tools, Daniel thinks his days are numbered. He refuses to give anything away, though, so when it turns out that Buck just wanted a hand disposing of a body, Daniel realises he has passed a test he didn’t even know he was taking. And bravo to whoever came up with Daniel nervously asking, “The mayonnaise?” when Buck mentions having served in Helmand.
Beg For Mercy
After saving Bullseye in the previous episode, Matt now has the unenviable task of trying to keep him alive, despite the AVTF turning the city upside-down and Bullseye himself believing that Matt should just let him die to balance the books. Bullseye thinks that he was supposed to die when Daredevil threw him off the roof in Season 1, and that Vanessa’s potential death will suffice as atonement for his having killed Foggy on her orders.
But Matt is determined to keep Dex alive because he tried to kill him. The penance is mutual. And yes, sure, this is a bit of a redo of the moral debate and growly monologuing that Season 2 of the Netflix series did so well, but Wilson Bethel’s really good in it, and it ties in with the Foggy-heavy flashbacks. Foggy was the heart of the series, in many ways, a source of mercy and understanding that kept Matt grounded even in his worst moments. So, it’s naturally his memory that Matt turns to when trying to weigh up his options.
Ultimately, despite flirting with the idea of leaving Bullseye behind, Matt returns to save him from the AVTF raiding the church. Karen isn’t thrilled to see Dex when they get back to the hideout, but she’s presumably used to Matt doing this kind of thing by now.
Past Is Prologue
The two-pronged flashbacks are absolutely crucial to Daredevil: Born Again Season 2, Episode 5, even if they don’t seem to be at first. In one strand, Matt and Foggy, still in the earliest days of their legal career, agree to represent an old acquaintance named Lionel (although he calls himself Ray), who still calls Foggy “Fembot”. Ray isn’t a nice guy and has been working for Fisk in some vague capacity, but thanks to their personal connection — Foggy was tight with his brother — and the fact that Ray will be killed in prison if he’s convicted, Matt and Foggy work to get him released. When he is, Foggy gives him cash from the company fund to run.
Lionel is played by Nathan Wallace, who turns out to be a needlessly good actor to say he’s playing such a minor role. He and Foggy share a great scene before he legs it, which really cuts right to the heart of the show’s thematic underpinnings. As a nice little detail, it’s also Buck Cashman who is enlisted by Fisk and Wesley to take Lionel out. He’s gone by the time Buck arrives, but it’s a nice way of showing how far back Buck’s loyalty to Fisk goes.
In the second flashback thread, Wesley pushes Fisk to diversify his portfolio by getting into the art world, which is, obviously, how he met Vanessa and acquired the Rabbit in a Snowstorm painting. Everything about how that happened — Vanessa’s prediction that the right man would pay three times the list price for it, her determination to display it, etc — feels like destiny, and is indeed later described by Vanessa as the titular “Grand Design”, which is also how Matt describes Bullseye’s survival.
The Grand Design
In a smart touch, once Vanessa gets through her surgery and wakes up thirsty for pineapple juice, which ordinarily she doesn’t even like, these flashbacks are revealed to be Wilson recounting the story of how he and Vanessa met at her request. We’re not supposed to feel sorry for Fisk, obviously, but we do in this scene because the depth of his feelings for Vanessa is obvious, and the fact that she’s going to die is equally clear. The subtle changes in her personality — the pineapple juice, her reprimanding Fisk for upsetting the nurse, her being frightened by Fisk’s demeanour — are an ill omen.
Vanessa dying after giving Fisk the hope that she wouldn’t is the cruelest turn of events imaginable for him. If he wasn’t mad with Daredevil and Bullseye before — which, you know, he definitely was — he’s going to be furious now. But more to the point, perhaps, this way of doing things does a lot more for Fisk’s character, not just his villainous temper. We already know he’s dangerous. But being reminded of how dangerous, in distinctly human terms, makes him all the more terrifying.
