She-Daredeviling Some Mind Control

It's 1974 again and Chris Claremont is asked to script an issue of Daredevil...

Picking up where regular writer Steve Gerber left off, Chris is faced with the second chapter of a two parter that ended with regular Daredevil baddie The Owl capturing both Daredevil and his lady love Natasha Romanova... better known as the Black Widow. Let's see how Chris chose to continue this particular classic...

But of course!

The only logical way for this particular story to continue is to have the Owl draining Daredevil's mind, leaving him a pliable husk to do with as he pleases.

Do you FEEL it working, MAN-WITHOUT-FEAR? Do you feel my MIND-MACHINE sucking away at your THOUGHTS? Your IDENTITY? YOUR VERY SOUL?

The Owl had planned to make the Black Widow watch in utter agony as Daredevil's mind got controlled... But heck, no way Natasha Romanoff's gonna lie idly by. She's the Black Widow after all...

With a decisive *ZRAPT!*, courtesy of her Widow's blasters, Natasha destroyed the Owl's mind transferal machinery, right befofre freeing herself. Yet, the evil mastermind still managed to press her into service, by pointing a gun at the helpless Daredevil. 

The Owl ordered her to take out a certain zoologist lady that had been a thorn in his side. Reluctantly agreeing to this hit-and-run deal, the Widow took off to find and deal with her reluctant target...But much to everyone's surprise and the rejoice of teen boys everywhere the promised final confrontation ended with sexy time.

Just who is that woman in the skimpy nightey that she can actually toss around KGB-trained special operative Black Widow? Well, take three guesses and the first two don't count...

Oddly enough, the Owl was unaware of zoologist Shanna O'Hara's dual identity. He merely wanted to capture the scientist so she could teach him all about the upcoming animal world order. However, he got the mad as heck Shanna the She-Devil, who paired up with the Black Widow to take him down.

During the final confrontation, the Owl tried to escape the combined Shanna, the Black Widow and Daredevil by using a blinding gas attack. However, it's rather hard to take the sight of a man who is blind to begin with. So, the Owl's escape was easily thwarted by Daredevil who could still 'see'...

"Funny, isn't it? The Owl tripped himself up this time"

And with that corker of an exit line, straight from a 1960s Batman episode, we end the slice of silver age goofiness that is Daredevil # 117... A real hoot!