Daredevil: Born Again star Charlie Cox reveals Marvel’s original idea for the series was to feature multiverse variants of the characters, but that didn’t work out due to people’s familiarity with the Netflix show. During an appearance on the Deadline podcast Crew Call, Cox recalled the development of Born Again. Initially, Marvel was wary about alienating viewers who didn’t watch Netflix’s Daredevil and envisioned the Disney+ revival as a fresh start for Matt Murdock in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. However, people found it hard to buy Cox’s performance as authentic whenever his Murdock said or did something that differed from the Netflix series. The actor believes the variant idea was a good concept in theory, it just didn’t work in execution.
“One of the things the original team wanted to do was they wanted to keep Vincent [D’Onofrio] and I. They wanted to keep us, [but] they didn’t want to alienate the audience who hadn’t watched the [Netflix] show,” Cox said. “They wanted it to kind of be a reset. So there was a conversation about it being almost like a variant. You know, in the Loki show, we talk about these variants. It was almost like it was a variant – and we never said that – but it was almost like a variant. So it was another version of these characters existing in this world.”
Cox continued, “That’s a valid choice, it’s a fun idea. The problem became that whenever I said something that was in contrast to what we’d shot in the past, people thought I was lying. They didn’t think I was a variant, they thought I was being disingenuous.”
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Daredevil: Born Again Season 1 was significantly retooled after production was stopped due to the dual Hollywood strikes that took place in 2023. When previously discussing how the series was reworked, Cox shared that Marvel realized what they had shot “wasn’t quite working,” which led to the studio making substantial changes. Daredevil: Born Again Season 1 is a continuation of the earlier Netflix show, essentially making it Daredevil Season 4.
Though Daredevil: Born Again was a ratings misfire for the MCU, the show earned positive reviews and is set to continue. The second season is currently in production, with set photos periodically revealing new details such as Matt Murdock’s new superhero costume and Jessica Jones’ return. Daredevil: Born Again Season 2 is set to premiere on Disney+ in March 2026.
As Cox alludes to, the original variant idea made sense. The relationship between the Netflix shows and the MCU movies was always tenuous at best, so it’s not as if Marvel would have been overtly breaking canon if it pushed the Defenders saga into an alternate reality. Additionally, Daredevil Season 3 released back in 2018, so a lot of time had passed before Born Again was announced. With Marvel looking to scale back movie and TV releases each year now, Daredevil: Born Again took on a greater sense of importance as the studio’s premier small screen project. Wiping the slate clean would have made Born Again an easy entry point for those who never watched the Netflix series, allowing it to appeal to a greater percentage of viewers.
Arguably, the results of retooling Born Again into a direct continuation are mixed. Longtime fans are happy that the versions of the characters they fell in love with on Netflix are still around and now part of the main MCU continuity. However, the low ratings indicate the higher-ups might have been on to something regarding alienating viewers. Those unfamiliar with the Netflix series might have been less inclined to check in so they didn’t feel lost in the middle of a story they hadn’t been following. The good news is that Marvel fans have plenty of time to catch up on all of Daredevil and Born Again before Season 2 arrives next year, so perhaps that’ll be a bigger hit.