Marvel were never shy about hyping up their books, a trait derived from the carny hucksterism of Stan Lee himself. The first issue reprinted in this collection announces a newcomer who will ‘explode upon the Marvel scene like a bombshell’. It’s fair to say that, if anything, that undersells Miller’s eventual impact.

Miller’s most significant works lie a long way off at this point, and this run has him almost exclusively on artistic duties – he gets one just credit as co-writer across the nine issues collected here. That’s not to say that this isn’t a pointer to the future though – main writer Roger McKenzie is very much in tune with the darker fare Miller’s more at home with and Miller, in conjunction with inker Klaus Janson, enhances the darker mood. Miller’s use of shadow to enhance scenes is exceptional as are the visual tricks he uses to represent Daredevil’s hypersense. It’s of a piece with the likes of The Dark Knight Returns and Sin City.

It’s clearly Miller’s presence that lends these issues their significance. McKenzie’s a decent but not exceptional writer and most of the tales here are standard superheroics. Only David Micheline’s single issue really breaks that pattern, caustically commenting on big business, corruption and the onset of the computer era. Overall though it’s hard to shake the suspicion that the artwork provides both style and substance to this collection. ( )