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Inside Marvel Studios' wild plan to save Daredevil: Born Again (and the MCU's TV future)

Why not change tack halfway through a project?

Charlie Cox, Vincent D'Onofrio, and Kevin Feige standing on stage at D23
Image credit: Walt Disney Studios/Getty Images

Sometimes things don't go as planned. Sometimes plans change. Or, sometimes a strike or two disrupts a television show mid-production, giving the higher ups the time to take another look at what's been made so far and fire the showrunners and revamp their entire plan for the series - and that's exactly what happened to Disney+ 's Daredevil: Born Again.

Earlier this month, Marvel Studios let go their Daredevil: Born Again head writers Chris Ord and Matt Corman, midway through shooting their first season. According to a report from The Hollywood Reporter, the show functioned as a legal procedural, with Matt Murdock in civillian clothes all the way until episode 4, and the studio was not happy. Marvel’s head of streaming, television, and animation, Brad Winderbaum, called the change part of a larger movement in Marvel television to move towards more traditional television practices, with showrunners getting more creative freedom on their projects.

Now what does this mean for Daredevil: Born Again specifically? Well, not all of that work that Ord and Corman and the rest of the team is going away. Parts of what has already been filmed will be used for the final, new version of the show, under a new creative team.

Following that plan, this week The Hollywood Reporter announced the new team that's taking over Daredevil: Born Again, and the team includes some familiar names for Marvel fans, including someone from the Netflix Marvel era. Dario Scardapane, who worked on the Netflix Punisher series, will be serving as showrunner, with director team Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead, who just directed episodes of Loki season 2, taking on the remaining episodes. Perhaps its a bit telling that, even though Winderbaum has promised more creative freedom for their creative teams, the studio has turned back to Marvel alums to turn the show in its new direction.

And sure, there's a bit of irony in the thought of Marvel deciding that their big new move is to center the voices of their creatives by... firing their creatives and replacing them by new ones, but that's showbiz, right?


Daredevil: Born Again - Everything we know about the new Daredevil series coming to Disney+ .

Tiffany Babb

Tiffany Babb: Tiffany Babb is a professional lurker (aka critic) who once served as Popverse’s deputy editor and resident Sondheim enthusiast.

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