Title: Daredevil: Born Again Starring: Charlie Cox, Vincent D’Onofrio

Year: 2025
Episodes: 9 Rating: ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐

Daredevil: Born Again is a Marvel Television series developed for Disney+. It stars Charlie Cox as Daredevil/Matt Murdoch, and Vincent D’Onofrio as his nemesis Wilson Fisk, aka the Kingpin.

Initially envisioned as a reboot, production on the show was halted mid-way to facilitate extensive reshoots, bringing it more in line with the original Netflix Daredevil series.

So, rather than a more family-friendly interpretation as originally intended, Daredevil: Born Again retains both narrative and tonal continuity from the Netflix series.

Not all of the original characters return, but we do, at least, get the same gritty visuals, adult themes, and spectacularly choreographed violence that made Netflix’s Daredevil so compelling.

Resuscitated

Daredevil: Born Again is the latest Marvel mashup comprised of two disparate Daredevil iterations.

The first is the shelved family-friendly Disney+ Daredevil which was halted mid-production amid fan uproar, and the second is the gritty, 180-degree reshoot, more in line with the original Netflix series.

While the cracks are obvious and the joins are often jarring, the series mostly works thanks to excellent performances from its two main protagonists.

First, there’s Charlie Cox, as the titular character Daredevil, facing off against Kingpin, Wilson Fisk, played with commanding malevolence by the great Vincent D’Onofrio.

Those expecting a full reunion of the original cast will be disappointed, though we do get some juicy cameos, including Wilson Bethel as Ben Poindexter/Bullseye and Jon Bernthal as The Punisher/Frank Castle.

Like Cox and D’Onofrio, these actors settle back into their roles comfortably. Seeing Punisher and Daredevil trading quips feels somehow reassuring to my soul. 

Atonement

The damage from Marvel’s post-pandemic derailment didn’t fully manifest itself until around 2023, with several key projects arriving DOA.

Echo and Secret Invasion are two notable examples. Both died on the operating table, the result of one too many edits.

Similarly, Daredevil: Born Again got off to a rocky start, but due to fan backlash, was completely retooled to distance itself from previous Disney+ flops like She-Hulk, where Cox’s Daredevil made his official MCU debut.

I could tell you the process was seamless, but not with a straight face.

Part of the fun is to watch the pendulum swing between the two conflicting visions.

One minute Daredevil’s bounding across ropey CGI rooftops more suited to the 2003 Ben Affleck movie, the next he’s embroiled in one of the most unhinged hallway fights in Daredevil history.

It’s still the best Disney+ series by miles, and one of the most cohesive, though admittedly, that’s a low bar.

The worst parts are still entertaining while the best bits match, and in some cases even surpass, the Netflix original series.

The only reason not to watch this series now is if you haven’t watched those originals yet – if not wtf? Go watch those first, then this, and you can thank me later.

As for those of you in need of a refresher, Matt Murdoch is a lawyer by day and a super-powered vigilante at night.

When a bizarre accident as a child caused him to lose his sight, he also gained extra-sensory powers, allowing him to fight crime as Daredevil, the man without fear, also known as the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen.

Charlie Cox eases into the role perfectly. It’s like he never left.

And of course, there’s Vincent D’Onofrio, stealing the show as always, as Wilson Fisk, who’s decided to run for mayor. (Crooks in politics being all the rage these days.)

It’s worth mentioning that Fisk has appeared in the MCU twice already, first in the 2021 series Hawkeye and later in the 2024 series Echo.

Chances are you didn’t notice, though, because nobody seems to have watched either of them.

With a little sleight of hand script writing, Daredevil: Born Again merges the Netflix series into the MCU, except that Murdoch’s decided to hang up his horns and focus on boring lawyery stuff.

The rise of Mayor Fisk is a compelling narrative choice and a timely one. By employing a classic story from the comics, we explore the nature of power and populism, while also getting an opportunity to re-examine the character from a different angle.

Fisk’s true intentions are obscured for much of the series. Has he reformed? Or is he worse than ever?

D’Onofrio is the Dude’s Rug of Daredevil: Born Again – he really ties the show together.

And when he’s together with Cox, even without saying a single word, the on-screen chemistry is mesmerising. Which is just as well, as it helps to distract us from some of the shoddy stitchwork on the script.

In addition to the jarring reshoots, the other major issue with Daredevil: Born Again is the way it speed runs story arcs.

We get introduced to Blind Tiger for a few scenes but then he’s killed.

Oh no, the guy who was in the show for 15 minutes is dead!

So yeah, spoilers for a character we barely get to see but it must be sad because the music says so.

Similarly, we have the Muse storyline, a terrifying villain who looms large at the beginning of the series then disappears with barely a whimper.

There’s also a low ratio of show to tell, with cumbersome exposition pieces delivered through shitty on-the-streets vox reports slipped between scenes, bulking it out like giant chunks of onion in a Chinese takeaway.

Everything seems rushed, similar to the otherwise brilliant X-Men 97, whose motivation seems to have been, “quick cram as much in as we can before the show gets cancelled!”, or our showrunner gets cancelled, or both – cuz you never can tell with Disney.

Seriously, there’s enough material for three seasons here if they took the time, with a season each focusing on the White Tiger trial, the Mayor Fisk story and the rise of Muse.

The new cast is mostly meh, the exception being Michael Gandolfini as Daniel Blake, a toadying young intern who idolises Fisk.

To be fair, the only other new character with anything to do is Ruibo Qian as Detective Angie Kim, who gets a few brief scenes to shine during the bank heist episode.

That episode stands out for a number of reasons. Firstly, it’s a self-contained “bottle” episode with shades of Die Hard and Dog Day Afternoon.

Matt Murdoch is looking for a loan but then crooks show up to rob the bank so we get the classic superhero dilemma. How does he save the day without compromising his secret identity?

We also get an unexpected cameo in the form of bank teller Yusaf Khan, father of Kamala Khan.

You remember Kamala Khan, right? She was in that Disney+ series Ms Marvel nobody watched. No?

She also starred in that hot mess of a movie The Marvels that catastrophically bombed not because it was a piece of shit but cuz it was woke apparently – which is what half the online reviewers say when a movie has more than zero women in it. (The rest are all Disney shills apparently.)

Yusaf Khan’s appearance provides a clearer indication of what this show’s original tone was going to be.

He’s a likeable character and has good rapport with Murdoch but his “my daughter’s a superhero” shtick quickly wears thin. 

Marvel has a long history of incongruous team-ups, like the Punisher teaming up with Spider-Man or, I dunno, Blade teaming up with Spider-Ham for some reason. (Ok I just made that last one up.)

Even so, Ms Marvel is not a particularly well-known Marvel character, and her series is the antithesis of Daredevil’s gritty violence.

Another Disney+ character shoehorned into the show is Swordsman, remember Swordsman? He was in Echo, no wait not Echo, the other one… Hawkeye.

Was it Hawkeye? Yeah, the arrow Avenger guy nobody gives a shit about. He had his own Disney+ show because the other Avengers cost too much. And they put Kingpin in it, he wore a Hawaiian shirt for some reason, remember?

No?

Well it doesn’t matter. Swordsman’s only in it for a few scenes and has little to no bearing on the plot other than reminding us that there are other vigilantes in New York and mayor Fisk wants to crack down on them.   

The Good

Fights: The opening scene of Daredevil: Born Again throws us straight into the action with a nifty new aspect ratio/zoom effect that perfectly conveys Murdoch’s perceptive powers in action. It’s also a great way of letting the audience know something’s not right here.

Barely a few minutes into the episode and we get our first fight, a brutal, bone-crunching, claustrophobic hallway fight, every bit as intense as the original Netflix series full of wait-what-did-he-do-there-I-need-to-rewind-that moments.

Yes, we can still see some glaring remnants of what the Disney+ show was going to be throughout the series, but we also get plenty of hand to hand combat, bloody knives, shattered kneecaps, cracked skulls and one gruesome dislocated jaw.

Fisk: Vincent D’Onofrio has already cameoed twice in the MCU, but it always felt like Fisk Lite. Whereas this time we get the Fisk we know from the Netflix series, ice cold and calculating on the outside but utterly unhinged underneath.

Daredevil: Born Again adds yet another dimension to the performance as Fisk plays politics, navigating his mayoral obligations, feigning diplomacy and forcing crocodile smiles – biding his time until he can finally put his plan into action.

Michael Gandolfini: the standout performance from the (otherwise forgettable) new characters, Michael Gandolfini’s Daniel is over-ambitious, obsequious and ultimately incompetent, but all the more dangerous for it.

He’s a true believer, a Fisk fanatic, fully prepared to do whatever it takes to demonstrate his fealty to a would-be father figure. In Daniel’s mind, Fisk is a strongman who gets things done. To Fisk, Daniel’s loyalty makes him useful, but once that usefulness runs out, no doubt he’ll be disposed of in dramatic fashion.

The Bad

New Characters: Except for Michael Gandolfini mentioned above, the only standout performance is Rubio Qian as Detective Angie Kim, who we get to see in action during the bank heist episode. Otherwise, all the heavy lifting is done by legacy actors from the Netflix original.

I’d describe the rest of the newbie characters as one-note but they’re not even that, some barely qualify as nannoquavers, which brings me to my next point…

Another Marvel Speed Run: We’re introduced to a few new promising characters, but they’re hardly on screen for more than two episodes.

The White Tiger and Muse storylines had enough juice for each to enjoy a full season but are promptly jettisoned.

Show Don’t Tell: In addition to speed running plotlines, the show is heavy on tell and light on show.

We see Fisk become mayor, but we’re not given much reason as to why he was elected.

The only view of the world outside the main characters perspective comes via cringey guerrilla news interview sections. These are then slipped randomly between scenes and grow increasingly more annoying as the show progresses.

I get that this show was slashed to pieces and then glued back together, but the interview segments feel like the screenwriter’s equivalent of the Aldi duct tape currently holding my car together.

The Messy

Clunky Dialogue: While there are some great moments, especially between legacy characters, the series falls foul of several common Marvel issues, including clunky exposition, sketchy dialogue and shoehorning characters and references to other Marvel properties into the script at the last minute.

The bank heist episode wins Marvel bingo by attempting to do all three, sometimes in the space of a single sentence, as bank manager Yusaf Khan keeps namedropping his daughter Kamala.

Kamala Khan is the real name of Ms Marvel, but since her series and movie debuts both bombed, you probably don’t know that.

Realising this perhaps too late, an otherwise tense and entertaining episode features entire lines of dialogue clearly rewritten by an executive who’s too even braindead to use ChatGPT.  

The result is the most unwieldy dialogue since Madame Web’s mother was in the Amazon researching spiders right before she died.

Clearly this episode is a holdover from the original family-friendly incarnation Disney was planning, which would likely have included a cameo from the squeaky clean Ms Marvel and therefore not included a…

Blood-Splattered Wilson Fisk: While there are flashes of Fisk’s rage throughout the series, we don’t get to see that fully unleashed until later in the series in a scene that’s literally jaw-dropping.

Woke Disney at its finest.

Memorable Moments

• Fisk and Murdoch meeting in the diner – even without speaking a word, just having them both on screen again gives me a warm feeling.

• That literal jaw-dropping scene where we all realise this ain’t the Disney series you were expecting. If you’ve watched the show already, you’ll know what I mean, if not, go watch it and you’ll go, aaaaah!

• Compare and contrast the image of the Kingpin sitting under a Mayor Fisk banner at a school appearance while gritting his teeth through a tuneless rendition of We Built This City. (Mayor Fisk and I may disagree on key issues, but we both agree that song is an abomination.)

He Has Risen!

Daredevil: Born Again is far from perfect but is enjoyable on the whole.

Marvel is finally learning from past mistakes and attempting to course correct. The results are now readily apparent.

For this reason, Daredevil: Born Again is a pivotal series. I think we will look back at it and see it as the moment when Marvel realised they were going in the wrong direction, stopped, and turned around.

We’re so lucky they did, too, because the show is peppered with hints as to how horribly wrong things could have gone.

But the charisma and dedication of the core cast, coupled with some amazing fight scenes and set pieces makes me hopeful that Disney can carry the Daredevil torch well into the future.

Given the general state of the MCU over the past two years and how messy the production of this show was, Daredevil: Born Again should have been a disaster.

Instead of their initial pick-and-mix approach of rebooting the series with some of the original actors, Marvel relented, listened to the fans, and made the Netflix series canon.

This means that the core characters have history to build on, and all of this shines through in their performances.

The commitment these actors bring to their respective roles helps to elevate what could well have been another fragmented mess like Secret Invasion.

Daredevil: Born Again is MCU Kintsugi, something shattered but lovingly repaired, flawed but held together with gold.

The gold in question being the performances of the core players, namely Cox and D’Onofrio, alongside Jon Bernthal as Punisher and other welcome returns such as Ayelet Zurer as Vanessa Fisk.

Against all odds, this show stuck the landing. Best of all it sets up a second season with the opportunity to reunite the rest of the Marvel Netflix cast with fellow Defenders like Jessica Jones and Luke Cage. (Sorry Danny Rand, talk to the Hand.)

The prospect of them fighting alongside existing MCU heroes is a thrilling one, though what I’m really holding out for is the chance to see Spider-Man (Tom Holland, Toby, Garfield, whoever, doesn’t matter) go toe-to-toe with D’Onofrio’s Kingpin on the big screen.

Similar Viewing:

Daredevil: The original Daredevil Netflix series ran for three seasons starting exactly ten years ago, back in 2015.

If you’ve not seen it already, I strongly recommend you watch it first before watching Daredevil: Born Again to immerse yourself in the mythos.

Don’t tell me though, because I’ll be seething with jealousy remembering back to how it felt watching it for the first time.

With great storytelling, unforgettable performances and vicious hallway fights that would make John Wick blush, this is one of the best comic book adaptations ever made.

The Punisher: Jon Bernthal achieved what nobody else has managed to do previously; he made Frank Castle not just relatable, but likeable.

First appearing in the Netflix Daredevil series, the character proved so popular that he got his own spin-off. The show does what no other Punisher adaptation has managed, it makes us care about the character by showing us his humanity.

Don’t get me wrong, he’s still every bit as uncompromising and ferocious as his comic counterpart, except this time we’re rooting for him.

Also, she’s a fucking trainwreck with a serious alcohol problem and all kinds of other issues.

The second season is iffy in my opinion, but you should certainly watch the first season which features former Doctor Who, David Tennant, as Kilgrave, a twisted supervillain with mind control powers.

As with other Netflix Marvel shows, Jessica Jones is a more nuanced take on the superhero genre that isn’t afraid to go super dark.

It’s also heavy with subtext, exploring themes like addiction, co-dependence and toxic relationships as Jessica tries to extricate herself from the control and manipulation of those around her.

Luke Cage: First appearing in Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, played by Mike Colter, is a superhero from Harlem with enhanced strength and skin that’s impervious to bullets.

The show features unforgettable characters and has a distinctive aesthetic drawing influences from 70s Blaxploitation movies and 90s hip-hop.

The main villain has a huge picture of Biggie on the wall wearing a crown – nuff said.

The soundtrack is packed with more bangers than a fireworks factory, while the score by Adrian Younge and DJ Ali Shaheed Muhammad from A Tribe Called Quest is a love-letter to classic funk and soul.