Daredevil: Born Again Season 2 Is Changing Marvel's Bullseye In A Big Way

Contains spoilers for "Daredevil: Born Again" Season 2, Episode 5 — "The Grand Design"

The merciless assassin Benjamin Poindexter (Wilson Bethel), aka Bullseye, has made quite the mess of things in the critically acclaimed second season of "Daredevil: Born Again." Not that we expected anything less from the sociopathic killer. However, one fascinating thread that Season 2 continues to unravel is his desire to pay penance for killing Foggy Nelson (Elden Henson) — penance that, in his view, may just be complete upon killing Vanessa Fisk (Ayelet Zurer) to even the score.

In Episode 5, "The Grand Design," Matt Murdock/Daredevil (Charlie Cox) helps Bullseye escape the Anti-Vigilante Task Force agents on his tail. As they evade capture, Dex recalls the night the Man Without Fear threw him off a rooftop in Season 1, noting that he should have died. Matt reflects that "maybe that's the grand design," to which the assassin agrees. In his mind, he was allowed to live to trade one evil deed for another — it's with this thought that "Born Again" strives to once again live up to its name.

This revelation marks a compelling change in Bullseye that we haven't seen in the character before. His past behavior had made him unredeemable in the eyes of many, and yet, his clear stance against Wilson Fisk's (Vincent D'Onofrio) reign of terror over New York has put him on the same side as the Devil of Hell's Kitchen. It's an uneasy alliance to be sure, but Dex's remorse seems to imply that there's something more going on with him beyond what the comics have ever offered.

There are plenty of ways that Marvel has lied to us about Daredevil, and now the Marvel Cinematic Universe is changing the way we've always viewed his longtime nemesis. Season 3 of the original "Daredevil" series set Bullseye up in a way that was somewhat comics-accurate, showing him getting his spine reinforced with the metal alloy Cogmium during surgery (it's Adamantium in the comics, but this change was likely due to the Netflix shows operating in a strange place in terms of what they could and couldn't use). However, "Born Again" Season 2 is venturing into uncharted waters with the character.

Ever since his first appearance in "Daredevil" #131, there's been no doubt that Bullseye is a stone-cold killer. In fact, his complete and utter disdain for human life is one of his main personality traits. People genuinely couldn't matter less to him. Indeed, the closest thing Bullseye has ever been to heroic was when he was recruited into the "Dark Avengers," where he pretended to be Hawkeye for a brief time. But that didn't last long, nor did it remotely change his nature.

His arc in the show may not be accurate to the comics, but "Born Again" has arguably made Bullseye a lot more interesting. His struggle with discerning how to do the right thing in the wake of his murderous activities could lead to a fascinating rebirth. In turning Bullseye into an almost anti-hero (or at least some form of a vigilante), "Born Again" has managed to surprise us far more than we thought possible.