I will admit that I have not yet finished Daredevil on Netflix. As of this very moment I have watched the first six episodes. I am going to attempt to avoid major spoilers but I won’t make any promises so please read this at your own risk.

So many have spoken about the violence level in the new Marvel and Netflix show Daredevil. This violence is considerably higher than that in any other Marvel property as of the moment. The only films I can think of which may have matched Daredevil in the level of blood are perhaps Blade and the always awful Punisher: War Zone (a movie I had high hopes for, as I was a huge fan of Lexi Alexander’s Green Street Hooligan’s). Daredevil is the first time that we have ever been privy to the idea that real violence has real consequences

The brilliance of what Marvel and Disney have done in conjunction with Netflix is that they have taken the most adult content oriented material and placed it on a pay-for-view platform, allowing it to blossom. This is not the large blockbuster movie where the hero can be beaten up but at the end of the day goes home and shrugs it off. Here, in the land of streaming television, a punch leaves a bruise and a stabbing leaves a bleeding hole.

Time and time again, we have been treated to men and women of godlike powers and skills who never make mistakes in battle, who deal out one hundred hits for every single one they receive. Though these tales are fun, and I am happy to shell out my money every summer to watch the spectacle play out on-screen, this is not the real world. In the real world, a fight is a battle of attrition. A person only wins when his or her opponent is physically or mentally broken and can no longer continue forward.

Unlike Thor, Hulk, Iron-Man and the other Avengers, Matt Murdock is simply a man. He is not a highly trained government assassin or a super soldier. The only thing that makes Matt super is his will. Matt is not a world level savior, he patrols Hell’s Kitchen, a portion of New York which is not even one square mile in area.

So, why does the show have to be so violent? Quite simply, because this level of violence would be the truth of a real life street level vigilante. Murdock does not have the crazy gadgets of Batman, all he has is his fist, feet, and billy clubs. This means that the odds of him being able to restrain an assailant are slim, particularly if there is more than one assailant. He must beat them into submission. This is what has always made Daredevil one of the grittier Marvel heroes. Even his childhood before his fateful accident was steeped in violence. Matt was raised by a father who’s only true skill was fighting. His entire world has been built around fists. Violence is what put food on the table.

The key component in the brilliance of this series is how the violence is handled. As a third degree black belt, I have spent many years covered in the bruises of unblocked kicks and punches. Hell, sometimes even the blocked stuff leaves bruises. We watch Matt show up at Claire Temple’s place time and time again searching for true medical assistance. He winces and moves stiffly after his long nights of fighting crime. He takes a hit, and he stops to regain his bearings and asses if he can continue forward or must retreat to fight another day.

There has been much discussion of the now famous hallway fight in the second episode. The true greatness is not in the fight�� however, it is the broken moments between the punches; the stops in action where Matt leans against the wall or stays prone on the floor gathering his breath. To the martial arts student, these silent moments are life. This is what is referred to as recovery time. It is the second or two in which the brain can asses the situation and the breathing and heart rate can be brought down just enough for one more push. A martial artist will always know how to maximize the amount of recovery time he or she gets and we see that with Matt. His moves are precise and not wasteful, everything has its purpose. The use of recovery time and the minimalistic approach to fighting is the difference between winning and losing.

Then there is Wilson Fisk, a man who to the point I am in at the show has only used his physical prowess once. He too is a violent man who to some level is disgusted by violence. Fisk has no desire to get his hands bloody often leaving the dirty work to underlings. He would much rather focus on the finer things in life. Art, food, love; these are the true passions of The Kingpin. Yet when push comes to shove, Fisk will shove hardest. He, like Murdock understands that violence is a necessary evil. This is incredibly funny when we consider how truly identical these two characters are. Both want to control the city in which they live and both will go to any lengths necessary to mold their home in his own personal image.

It is interesting to think that Matt’s crusade against Kingpin would break the city into warring criminal factions. While if Fisk were in control, the level of violence within the city would likely drop to all time lows. We root for the vigilante who claims to love the law while spending his nights assaulting the citizenry, yet the man who is carefully orchestrating the violence in the city making sure that it will eventually hit record low due to his strangle hold over the criminal element is the most derided character in the whole show.