Originally Posted by
J. D. Guy
I love Blindspot! I haven't kept up with Daredevil post Soule's run, so I wonder if he still has a place there. No reason he shouldn't, other than typical writer shenanigans.
I would say, however, that Blindspot wasn't used or integrated as well as he could and even should have been. For starters, the "#0" issue that introduced Sam and the first issue proper was done such a way wherein most of the more "juicy" moments of early relationship growth and exploration between Blindspot and Daredevil were surreptitiously skipped over. And we never got much in the way of flashbacks of even references to what should be a very vivid and defining time between the two. This also meant that much of the active mentoring, including the relevant thoughts and feelings from both sides that they would inevitably have had and showed, are largely glossed over for most of their time together.
Another issue that could and should have been done better regarding Sam/Blindspot's integration would have been to have him present and accounted for much more than he was. It wasn't long into his run before I realized that Soule had a tendency to write Sam/Blindspot out of the story almost every time that Sam/Blindspot's character wasn't explicitly the focus of the story. That got kind of frustrating for me before too long. The early Daredevil/Punisher maxi series was an exception that wove and integrated Blindspot into its narrative, and was awesome for it. (I even recall how much I loved the artwork in that maxi!) That should have been done way more often. It should have been the norm rather than the exception. It was to a point where Sam/Blindspot spent just as much time away from the book than in it, and in truth more so. Sam being absent from both of Soule's Annuals was frustrating. Especially the first one that had the story where Daredevil paired up with another young hero I had never heard of and that we never saw again as far as I know.
As a bit of a corollary, Sam/Blindspot did a lot of cool stuff off-panel that really should have been on it. I felt that Daredevil/Matt should have been better integrated into Sam/Blindspot's stories than he was. Because of this, it took much longer to get a picture of who Sam was that was clear. (I distinctly recall how more than a couple of readers didn't have a hang on who Sam was and where he fell on the Hero's morality spectrum, to the degree they took a number of Soule's telegraphed fakeout beats seriously, and we're just sorta waiting for Sam/Blindspot to ultimately betray Daredevil for realsies)
This includes Sam's character progression and character development. I'm typically not one to tout "show, don't tell" as some kind of storytelling golden rule as is the trend to do, because assuming it must be followed at all times is actually narrow-minded and limiting to the kinds of stories and story-parts that can be told and considered "good" in the long-term. That said, Blindspot is a case where I'd argue it should have been followed. Too often did we learn Sam's insights and introspection regarding the things he's going through in hindsight via infodump after he had already went through them. This even extends towards Sam's younger sister Hannah. Sam's story should have been important enough that we got more of Hannah, who she was, how she felt about her brother on a more intricate level (and about their mother who focused on Sam's wellbeing as a motivation for everything she did), as well what the specifics were to her abrupt maturation (beyond the out-of-universe reason of Soule kinda remembering she was there, and that Sam was taking care of her before he and their mom left for China, and so as not to look like he forgot her completely, wrote Hannah as working at a fast-food joint as shorthand before moving on). Hannah's side of the story was worth telling. And I wished Sam/Blindspot's importance reflected that.
Now then, in my opinion, while I can see similarities between Sam and Duke, I feel they're fundamentally different enough that I wouldn't say Sam's beats were a more focused take of Duke's. For one, as I explained above, as much as I enjoyed it, Sam's focus could have been better and more consistent and more holistic than it was. But beyond that, as an example of their fundamental differences, while both are heroic and alturistic to their cores, I get the feeling that if Duke wasn't an only child and had a sibling, especially one as close in age to him as Hannah was to Sam, Duke would be closer to that sibling than Sam is to Hannah. In the least, I would see that Duke would definitely put in more explicit effort on his part, even if the hypothetical sibling was ornery or whatever. (Sam was a good brother obligatorily, including working to take care of Hannah financially, but generally wasn't shown to be close to Hannah as a sibling.)
So I say there's vast room for improvement for both of them. And in Sam's case, it doesn't help that he never appeared or branched out outside of Soule's Daredevil run and his Daredevil/Punisher maxi series. Which is bad. He had a lot of contemporary teen heroes he's never interacted with (including some really logical ones, like Joaquin Torres/The Falcon, who could relate to Sam's political and societal struggles, and Robbie Reyes/Ghost Rider, who feels like a spiritual brother to Sam with how much they parallel one another). And if Sam/Blindspot doesn't have a relevant role in the current ongoing Daredevil run, all the good things Soule did do in bringing Sam/Blindspot into existence is functionally as if it never happened, or never mattered that it did.