Daredevil: Born Again is one of the most eagerly awaited shows of 2025. The original series on Netflix concluded its thrilling run in 2018, leaving fans yearning for more of the iconic hero. Though the beloved character Matt Murdock, also known as Daredevil, made appearances in the Disney+ series She-Hulk and the blockbuster film Spider-Man: No Way Home, the clamour for a deeper dive into his world has only grown. Thankfully, that fervent demand has been met, as Daredevil returns in Daredevil: Born Again, which streams on Disney+ this March. We tuned into the global press conference, where Charlie Cox and Vincent D’Onofrio took centre stage alongside key members of the creative team. They offered glimpses of the adventures and emotional depth that await audiences in this highly anticipated revival, but were mindful not to give away any spoilers.
Cox, who plays Daredevil, says we find Matt in a dark place in the new show. “Some time has passed since the end of series three. It’s hard to talk about without spoilers. Early on, Matt has suffered a trauma, and that has meant that he’s had to rethink and re-find his identity in a way that is probably more profound than we’ve seen before. He ends up going down a path which I think is best described as a band-aid that will have to be ripped off slowly and painfully.”
He assures fans of the original show that Matt Murdock is the same in Born Again but that his recent experiences have influenced him.
D’Onofrio, who plays Daredevil’s nemesis, Wilson Fisk, says the two characters have more in common in this outing than before.
“We’re trying to live in the daylight, the two of us. We have that in common. We’re broken men. If you can think about the metaphor of vampires trying to live in the daylight, it’s a struggle that they’re going through. He’s got his thing, and I’ve got my plan, and you can’t put us together in the same scene a lot because it’s not as powerful if you do that.”
He explains that the two characters have rarely appeared on screen together over the course of both shows, but when they do, the stakes are high. “It’s great for the story because it always means something. It’s always either at the beginning of something or the end of something or sometimes both. It’s intense.”
Like Murdock, we meet Fisk in a very different phase of his life, which D’Onofrio talks about while keeping spoilers to a minimum.
“He’s on a mission. He’s the same guy he was in the Netflix show, but he’s got a new plan. First thing he’s gotta do is sort things out with his wife, because he’s been gone for a while. Then there’s the other side, which is that he has a plan. His plan is to stretch his reach. It’s the beginning of that, how far he’s gonna go for control. And it’s a struggle because he has to live in the daylight to do that.”
Dario Scardapane, Executive Producer and showrunner, says that Daredevil is a mixture of heart and muscle and realizing that was the key to unlocking the characters in keeping with the Netflix versions we know and love yet continue their stories in their new Disney+ home.
“There’s a humanity to both characters, and there’s a struggle that both have with their past. And then they’re battling each other. So, you try to find that humanity inside of a heightened world with action that is trying to reset the bar for television. You have to use a whole bunch of different tools.”
“You wanna do really, really high-octane action, you wanna have moments of depth of character, and then you wanna put these two [against] each other across the city. I think they did that brilliantly in the earlier show, and we’re just trying to be an evolution of that.”
There is a new baddie in town, but Scardapane isn’t willing to reveal too much. We know there will be some incredible fight scenes between Daredevil and the baddie.
Sana Amanat, an Executive Producer, discussed the action sequences that the original show was famous for and stressed how important it was to make sure they continued the legacy Netflix created.
“As a fan, my first thing was, we have to make sure the action is hopefully as good as the old show. If we could make that bar, that would be amazing. We brought Phil Silvera back, who is the stunt coordinator of the old show and our second unit director. It’s transformative, what they do with the action. We hope people appreciate how hard [everyone] worked on the show, and if you can get the same joy [as us], we’ll be very happy.”
Brad Winderbaum, who is also an executive producer on the show, says that Cox and D’Onofrio inhabit their characters better than anyone else. “When I picture Matt Murdock, even when I’m reading a comic or reading something about Wilson Fisk, I think about these two actors in those roles. There are so many tragic storylines in the Daredevil comics that challenge Matt and Wilson, and that is something that we’re honouring in a massive way in Born Again.”
Winderbaum says they choose to push the characters to the limit to meet fan expectations.
“We may have taken a soft approach at the beginning but pushed it farther and farther. As we saw the material come in, we knew that it had to go a little farther to meet fan expectations and meet our own expectations. Part of Dario’s vision is to really push it. We never found the breaking point, you know? We really put it all out there on the screen for the biggest dramatic punch we could achieve.”
Cox says that while the show is named Born Again, it doesn’t follow the Born Again storyline from the comics.
“It’s important to add that we’re not doing the Born Again story. It’s the name of the show in reference to coming back after so many years, a homage to Frank Miller’s iconic run. We’re always trying to find the best version of Matt Murdock, AKA Daredevil, but in finding the best version, we also seek out the worst version. I think that’s what makes him such a compelling character and so relatable.”
Marvel Television’s DAREDEVIL: BORN AGAIN launches on Disney + March 5th
Words – Cara O’Doherty