Elecktra Lives Again (Daredevil) [Paperback]

Frank Miller (Author, Illustrator)

Product Details

• Paperback
• Publisher: Marvel Entertainment Group (April 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0871357984
• ISBN-13: 978-0871357984
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,650,382 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Frank Miller is one of the seminal creative talents who sparked the current gigantic sub-industry of motion pictures featuring comic book- initiated product. A sub-industry which had become a super-industry. This most profitable aspect of this millennium's film production, now producing an annual flow of box office profits in the Billions of dollars, was launched when Frank Miller's graphic novel re-take on the classic comic book hero, Batman, resulted in an entertainment industry-wide reconsideration of the genre in the deeper and darker vision Miller brought to it.

Miller re-defined the presentation of comic book characters and heroic fiction with his grand-daddy of graphic novels, "The Dark Knight." This revolutionary work
not only kicked off the series of Batman films based on his redefinition, but a craze for such material that has thrown dozens of such heroes into multiple film franchise heaven. Certainly chief among these has been Miller's uniquely classical take on superheroic narrative, "300," and his "Sin City" books, each of which entered motion pictures with historic successes, and each now in Miller's creative phase of achieving its highly-anticipated sequel. Miller's co-direction of "Sin City" has made him one of the hottest
directors... as well as a guiding creative force...for the new genre. Or one might say "super genre."

Miller's latest graphic novel, Holy Terror, is his first original graphic novel in ten years. Join The Fixer, a brand new, hard-edged hero as he battles terror in the inaugural release from Legendary Comics.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

28 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Work of Primal Art, February 6, 2002

By 

Omni - See all my reviews

This review is from: Elektra Lives Again (Hardcover)

Elektra Lives Again

The story of Daredevil and Elektra is literally a stand-out Romeo and Juliet of the comic world. Frank Miller created the perfect fallen hero in Elektra, shaped her psychological complex to suit her name and tied her to Daredevil aka blind lawyer Matt Murdock, the epitome of the blind lover and moral code. There is now a current monthly comic book for Elektra, the point of her death muddied by Marvel's desire to capitalize and it falls flat.
One cannot remix Bach.

The Elektra back story is simple:

Part One: Elektra became a ninja assassin for the evil Hand after the death of her father. She betrayed the Hand after learning their skills/secrets then going solo. The Hand came after her and eventually the assassin Bullseye fatally wounded her and she died in Daredevil's arms.

Part Two: The Hand decided to resurrect Elektra and make her an undead slave/assassin. Daredevil interceded and through sheer force of will, purged her soul of the evil spell right before she came back to life. However she disappeared right after her heard a single heartbeat. He was left with the doubt of whether or not she lived.

Part Three: Elektra joins with a rogue gov't agent in Elektra Assassin to stop essentially a demon/anti-Christ from becoming the President of the USA. In print, she succeeded, some argue that in reality we need her even more than fantasy allows.

Elektra Lives Again.
The Hand---persistent to a fault are at the resurrection game again. Anyone. An assassin Kirigi, Bullseye, Elektra---the Hand have this fanatical need to have a Prime A Leader Assassin. Low self esteem in ninja cult, I suppose. This time they want to first kill Bullseye (who is in prison for killing scads of folk---he's kind of like Hannibal Lecter with the ability to turn anything into a weapon-anything, we're talking orange seeds here and use him to kill. To ... Elektra, ... Matt, ... anyone. Elektra alive and avoiding the love of her life Matt Murdock is hot on the Hand's trail to stop all of this madness.
Matt begins having psychic dreams about Elektra and what her soul is going through because of the link resurrecting her has created between them.
What makes this interesting is that though Matt uses his fighting skills, his heightened senses and amazing acrobatics, he never dons the Daredevil costume. That's the first mark of this work being superb.
The second mark is the silence of Elektra and her ability to move through the real world as a shadow, a dead woman, a ninja, a ruthless assassin committed to doing what's right no matter the fall-out.

Frank Miller's point in all of this carnage and Elektra dying one more time is that this is their destiny. Elektra must deal with these dark assassins and have Matt as a tugboat of light to keep her near the line of goodness. When Matt cradles Elektra, killed by a dead Bullseye he finally can accept her death---the fact that she's dressed all in white as a nun is wonderful imagery.

The art of Lynn Varney is tired. I mean that as a compliment. Everyone looks haggard, worn out, tired. And that's how they should look. These people are something slightly different from the normal superheroes/villains in the sense that it's all personal with them and they willingly ... and will die (sometimes several times) for the Good Fight. The battles are intensely personal and gory, violent to the degree of shocking but that's what a real fight should look like. And when you get right down to it, these are some mentally unbalanced folk. Even Matt. And they should be. That's what I mean by personal, this comes as close as possible to almost reality. Of all the superhero films out there, this should be made into a film. Not necessarily a trilogy but maybe one or two that really convey the horror and pity and sadness of this whole beautiful, bloody, twisted tale.

Five Stars.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Vigilante opus, Modern Greek tragedy and Irish Catholic morality play, January 1, 2007

By 

LR Vega - See all my reviews

This review is from: Elektra Lives Again (Hardcover)

Daredevil and his immortal love get the Frank Miller (and Lynn Varley)'s Dark Knight treatment. It larger than life, surreal and quite violent. But at the heart of it is Matt Murdoch's love for the fiery greek warrior that refuses to die or be tamed. Even if you only see the red devil outfit for a few small panels, you don't miss it. You know DD is all over these bleeding, tear filled and wonderfully suffering pages. As always, you have to feel for poor Matt Murdoch. Also, Bullseye is there, as no DD-Elektra tale can be complete without getting him into the action in a very meaningful way. A visceral, visual experiernce, somewhat disjointed (in a good kind of way, a la Blade Runner). Gives deep meaning to the term "graphic novel".

8 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A non-continuity exercise in self-indulgence., April 4, 2002

By 

Donald E. Strong "Desired FX" (Pittsburgh, PA USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Elektra Lives Again (Hardcover)

I don't know if Miller intended this as a story in which Elektra would actually be revived--if he did, he mucked with Marvel continuity way too much to make it work.

For me, the book gets 3 stars because of Miller's excellent draftsmanship and storytelling, and Varley's dynamic colors. Miller's work didn't look this good again until 300 was released.

But the story is just not there, for me. Miller indulges himself in a personal exploration of isolation and despair with Matt Murdock (Daredevil) spending an enormous amount of time watching and waiting for an outside force (Elektra) to show up and make him whole again.

Now while I've always liked Murdock's particular flavor of angst--more than anyone in the Marvel Universe, the blind guy in the too-loud world should be entitled to brood--he just comes off as thoroughly helpless in this story. Maybe that's what Miller wanted, that sort of flailing desperation, but it didn't play for me. I've read the story a number of times, hoping to "get it," but it always comes up short for me.

04/22/02 - I just reread this yesterday, and my opinion is unchanged. The last 20+ seem to lose track of what the first 40+ pages are about. The action is striking, but only the most obvious of story's questions are answered. Ths story yearns to be substantial but ends up superficial, and some of us prefer SOLID chocolate bunnies at Easter.

This one's good for Miller completists, but if you want a really ripping Frank Miller Elektra story, I recommend Elektra: Assassin, his brilliant, funny collaboration with Bill Sienkiewicz.