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One of the deadliest assassins and all he needs is whatever is lying around to end your life. He doesn’t have any confirmed background, he’s a mystery. He hates Daredevil as much as he loves the thrill of the kill, so that’s saying something. Who is Bullseye? Is it possible to ever really know? Let’s find out!

Benjamin Poindexter. Lester Jangles. Leonard McClain. All names the man who would be Bullseye has claimed are his real name. Each with different backstories. None have been verified. He may just be making them up. No one knows for sure, maybe not even Bullseye. Sometimes he the child from an abusive home. Others, he was raised as best as a foster family could. In some, he was a baseball player who got tired of pitching no-hitters but loved the sensation he felt when he struck the batter with his ball, killing him. Perhaps this was the closest Bullseye ever got to feeling love, murder was fun and felt good.

No matter where he came from, Bullseye had found his calling with his first kill. He would enter the world of professional killers for hire and make a name fore himself as someone who never missed their target. He loved finding whatever was around to and just throw it with deadly force and aim to get his targets, whether it was a playing card or paperclip, the weirder the better. He was on a hot streak until he came across the masked hero, Daredevil. Suddenly this guy was able to stop Bullseye from finishing his work, that wasn’t fun at all. Now he had to prove himself all over again, if this weirdo in a red suit could stop him, he would lose credibility, Bullseye thought. Mind you, no one else seemed to think the otherwise perfect record he had was too marred by a superhero, this was all in Bullseye’s head.

Working for the Kingpin kept Bullseye happy because the Kingpin always had people he needed dead. Daredevil would complicate this by apprehending Bullseye in his attempts of murder and get him locked up in prison. By the time he was freed, Bullseye had learned that Kingpin had replaced him with Elektra Natchios as his top assassin. Infuriated, Bullseye would prove he was the better killer by killing Elektra with nothing but a playing card and her own sai. Turns out, Daredevil cared deeply for Elektra and would fight with Bullseye and during the fight, Bullseye would take a fall that would leave him with a shattered spine. If it weren’t for the intervention of a Japanese crime boss seeking a new assassin, Bullseye would remain incapable of moving, by the crime boss paid for Bullseye to undergo experimental surgery to get his spine laced with Adamantium, the same unbreakable metal that laces Wolverine’s bones.

Back on his feet, Bullseye had scores to settle, he had to first get his job back as Kingpin’s prime assassin. When it was time to face off against Daredevil, he had found he was missing. Bullseye decided he would become the new Daredevil, in a more Robin Hood style, stealing from the rich and giving to the poor. This started to mess with his head until he thought he actually was the real Daredevil and it would take the original, dressed in Bullseye’s own costume, to fight and take him down to snap him out of it.

When the hero Civil War happened, Bullseye was recruited into the Thunderbolts, the team comprised of imprisoned villains who would be forced to do good to pay off their debts to society. Usually, that’s how it works for the Thunderbolts but during the Civil War he was promised a chance at Daredevil’s life for his cooperation. He would be kept under heavy surveillance and that still wasn’t enough because he would end up killing his guards and become crippled again by a teammate he tried to kill. While in surgery to help him walk once more his team would be attack by psychics and it was due to his surgery that they didn’t bother to try and kill him, this was their mistake as Bullseye found great delight in testing his post-surgery skills out by murdering the psychics who were about to kill his team, entirely unaware how close they all were to death.

As Norman Osborn rose to power in what was once S.H.I.E.L.D. and now H.A.M.M.E.R. he would offer Bullseye a position in the Dark Avengers as their Hawkeye. Bullseye found the life of a regular, well publicized hero to be very difficult. He was not getting praised for all the kills he was responsible for, even if they were civilians. He would even get his chance to be on what was considered the “good” guys’ side as he fought Daredevil, who now lead the Hand ninja clan. This was the beginning of Bullseye facing off against Daredevil and his hordes of undead ninja warriors. The two would face off with Bullseye escaping until finally Daredevil, possessed by the darkness that rules the Hand, killed Bullseye as brutally as possible.

Revived by Lady Bullseye but the damage to his body was done, he lost all his senses but sight. Forced to live in an iron lung, he would be able to communicate through it and begin plotting his revenge against Daredevil. He would orchestrate Daredevil’s enemies attacking him to whittle away at him over a short time. He would recreate the accident that gave Daredevil his heightened senses and make the villain, Ikari as his right hand man. Eventually Daredevil would come face to face with Bullseye and in the ensuing battle between Daredevil, Ikari, and Lady Bullseye, Bullseye would be dropped into the chemicals that he had used to make Ikari, the same chemicals that blinded Daredevil, now blinded Bullseye. All his senses were lost now, with no way to enact his revenge or interact with the world.

There you have it! Bullseye is one of the deadliest people in all the Marvel Universe. He’s been a constant thorn in Daredevil’s side for decades. He’s been on the big and small screen now as a deadly counterpoint to Daredevil’s adventures on both screens. What will happen to him next? Who knows? See you next time!

Suggested Reading
Daredevil #131
Bullseye
Thunderbolts
Dark Avengers

Dr. Bustos
drbustos@comicattack.net