Daredevil was announced on San Diego Comic-Con and ever since rumor has it that it has been troublesome to get a day of shooting.
Daredevil was announced at SDCC 2022
Daredevil was announced with a lot of fanfare at the San Diego Comic-Con 2022. The show was supposed to have 18 episodes and would be the live-action version of the Daredevil classic graphic novel “Daredevil: Born Again”.
The comic is considered a classic and features Daredevil’s archnemesis Wilson Fisk out to slowly kill Daredevil’s alter ego, Matt Murdock. First by destroying his law practice and then blowing up his house and slowly breaking down his friendships isolating Matt Murdock and drawing him out.
The way Wilson Fisk gets Daredevil’s true identity is through longtime friend and associate Karen Page. Karen left New York to make it as an actress in Los Angeles. Instead, she got addicted to drugs and ends up doing xxx movies rather than actual movies. She sells the identity for $100 to buy smack.
Deborah Ann Woll talks about Karen Page
Deborah Ann Woll talked recently about reprising her role as Karen Page. In the comics, as mentioned before, Karen didn’t do so well after she left New York for Los Angeles.
Тhe TV version of Daredevil: Born Again will not have that version or any version of Karen sadly. Karen was one of the best things in the Netflix series and I especially loved the dynamic between Matt and Karen.
In an interview, Woll mentioned the following:
Look, playing Karen Page was one of the great roles of my career so far. I have such enormous love and respect for her, for myself, for the story that we created together. I think any iteration of Karen that comes back, if she comes back, if it’s me, if it’s not me, if it’s in comic books, if it’s in 50 years, whatever it is, I just hope that it continues to honor her. That you’re never just the sidekick.
But that was a month ago, rumor has it that both Woll and Elden Henson, who played Franklin “Foggy” Nelson in the Netflix Daredevil series are coming back.
The strike has affected Daredevil’s shooting schedule
Just as the planned shoot was about to start, Daredevil was hit by the SAG-AFTRA strike and it delayed everything.
And then the rumor popped up that the show was to be retooled after executives deemed it not watchable enough. So instead, they got more of the old crew back together and added some new faces.
The old crew includes Jon Bernthal and Vincent D’Onofrio reprising their roles as respectively Frank Castle and Wilson Fisk.
The new faces include Margarita Levieva, Michael Gandolfini, and Sandrine Holt. And as a special surprise, Wilson Bethel will reprise his role as the other arch-nemesis Bullseye.
But all in all the strike hit the Daredevil shoot hard as well as other Disneyplus shows. It took about a year to start shooting again.
The show has been retooled
The show has been retooled, the first incarnation of the show was more a legal drama with some light comedy and Daredevil would not suit up until the 4th episode.
The Marvel executives and Kevin Feige did not like it much and thus let go of the original showrunners and hired new ones. And a new stunt coordinator named Philip Silvera, who has been attached to Marvel for a long time.
With the new version of the show, it looks like Marvel is going back to the darker street thug-level part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. And I agree with that.
Most of the comics revolve around Hell’s Kitchen and other parts of New York and all of them are at street level. The same goes for The Punisher and Wilson Fisk. They are street-level, unlike a lot of others in both the Marvel Cinematic Universe and the Marvel Comics.
You have the part where the heroes go into space like Iron Man and Captain America and they are also considered the 2nd line of defense against threats. The street heroes are considered the 1st line of defense.
If the TV show Echo teased anything, it is that Wilson Fisk is going to run for mayor of New York City.
What I would like to see in the new Daredevil series
I am looking forward to the new Daredevil TV series. I was a huge fan of the comics and I have read most of them from the 1960s up until the late 2010s. Of course, I have read Frank Miller’s run but also Brian Michael Bendis’s and Ed Brubaker’s runs. They have that darker tone that you saw in the Netflix series and the show is largely based on their writings.
I would like to see more street-level opening scenes, just like in the comics. It usually starts with petty crimes and you see the hero trying to stop that.
There are more things. Take for instance Echo, who made her debut in Daredevil. She could have a cameo in the series. She has close ties with Wilson Fisk.
We all saw Frank Castle in the Netflix series before it was canceled. He was somewhere Midwest, the last we saw him. What draws him back to New York? Most of his enemies in New York are dead.
I can only hope that the relationships between Karen, Foggy, and Matt have withstood the test of time. The relationship between the 3 of them is what carried the Netflix show, it gave the show heart and soul.
And I would like to see Daredevil’s humor toned down a bit. In She-Hulk, he was the Daredevil who was jokey and funny and that’s how he was intended by Stan Lee. But, we have enough funny people in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and the character has been rewritten by Frank Miller that it has become a dark character.
Speaking of She-Hulk, since she and Matt are dating, here is hoping for at least a cameo of Jennifer Walters, She-Hulk’s alter ego. Can we have that? Please say yes!
The Born Again storyline is a classic and I hope that the new TV show pays proper homage to the comic book that made Daredevil even bigger.
