Charlie Cox’s Matt Murdock may be renewing hostilities with Vincent D’Onofrio’s Wilson Fisk – and Jon Bernthal’s Frank Castle is coming along for the ride – but the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s Daredevil: Born Again has nothing to do with its three-season Netflix predecessor.
For a while, D’Onofrio in particular seemed adamant that he was playing the exact same character he brought to such unforgettable life in its previous iteration – to the extent he’s easily one of the finest live-action big bads Marvel has ever seen – but he ultimately changed his tune not too long after making his mainline MCU debut in Hawkeye.
Plenty of fans have been left disappointed by the confirmation Born Again is a completely clean slate, but stunt performer and Cox’s double Chris Brewster was even more scathing when sharing his thoughts on the revival during a recent appearance on the Unscripted podcast.
“They really, truly don’t want it to be anything like the Marvel Netflix Daredevil. So, nobody that worked on the original series, other than the cast that they’re bringing back, is coming back. And I mean, there were just some truly, truly wonderful that worked on that show and I think they really added to the magic of that show. And I think Marvel’s making a big mistake, but what you gonna do?”
You can see his point, when one of the major selling points of Netflix’s Daredevil throughout its existence were the signature extended fight sequences, so it would have at least made sense for Marvel Studios to recruit some of the same stunt performers. Sadly, other than the returning cast members it’s a brand new project built in Kevin Feige’s image from the ground up, so let’s just hope it ends up living up to its illustrious forebear.