Charlie Cox “very saddened” by Daredevil cancellation
David Farnor | On 07, Dec 2018
Charlie Cox has spoken out about the cancellation of Daredevil, saying that he’s “very saddened” by the end of the Netflix series.
The decision, which was announced at the end of last month, was a surprise to many, given Season 3 had just aired and received some of the highest praise given to any Netflix Marvel project. But the writing simultaneously seemed on the wall, after Netflix had cancelled both Luke Cage and Iron Fist this autumn, apparently indicating a parting of the ways between the streaming giant and Disney, which owns Marvel.
Cox, so far, has been silent on the abrupt end given to The Devil of Hell’s Kitchen, but in an interview with Entertainment Weekly, he has expressed his disappointment at the news.
“A lot of us really expected to keep going, and I certainly did,” Cox said. “The truth is, I felt like we had a lot of stories to tell, and although I understand [the cancelation], I’m very saddened by that.”
Cox has been Daredevil for longer than any of the other actors playing Marvel heroes for Netflix: the lawyer-turned-vigilante was the first character to be announced and released in the Hell Kitchen’s universe.
“It’s been just the most incredible job for me. It’s so fun to do. You get to do all the acting obviously, which is great, but then there’s also this really fun physical aspect to it with all the stunts and the fight choreography,” he explained.
“It’s just how business works,” he reflected on the loss of potential further seasons. “But also, these characters mean a lot to people. It’s weird to think there’s a chance I won’t be playing Matt Murdock ever again. That’s a bizarre feeling, because that character has been such a huge part of my life for the last four and a half years.”
When pressed on what stories the show might have told in the future, he declined to into details.
“I hate to be boring, but to be honest, I don’t think I should answer that. It’s so new, the news. It’s quite painful for quite a lot of people. I was really excited about the ideas that were talked about for season four, and I think if I was to speculate about it and it went on the internet, it might not be very helpful to people… Anything I say often gets picked up and circulated, and I just want to make sure I don’t give any false hope.”
Nonetheless, false hope has been doing the rounds, as a number of blogs and websites have speculated on statements made by Netflix and Marvel about Daredevil.
“While the series on Netflix has ended, the three existing seasons will remain on the service for years to come, while the Daredevil character will live on in future projects for Marvel,” said Netflix.
Marvel, meanwhile, said it looks “forward to more adventures with the Man without Fear in the future”.
Both of those statements, however, are more likely to refer to future Marvel comics, although there is a possibility that Cox might appear briefly in a crossover cameo in Jessica Jones or The Punisher, which will return to Netflix for the third and second seasons respectively, before also potentially being axed. Others have suggested that Disney will look to bring Daredevil to its new streaming service, Disney+. Unlikely though that is, with Disney+’s focus on family-friendly content, it is even more unlikely that a Disney+ incarnation would see Cox reprise his role.
“If I was a betting woman, you know, my guess is that it’s the end of the Marvel universe on Netflix,” Daredevil writer Tamara Becher-Wilkinson, who was in the middle of creating a writing schedule for Season 4 when the news broke, told io9.
“[Showrunner Erik Oleson] got a call asking him to go down to see the Marvel executives, and I jokingly went ‘Ooooooooh,’ like a third grader does when someone gets called to a principal’s office. Then, he waited for everybody to gather back in the writers’ room and he said, ‘Netflix has decided not to move forward with season four.’ And that’s all I remember, you know. I kind of missed the details because I was, like, so surprised.”
“The reviews were so overwhelmingly positive that I thought there was no way they would cancel it. I don’t know how well it does on Netflix or anything like that…[but] it was surprising to me they would cancel something that was so well received,” she added. “I thought it was too big to fail.”
“If Daredevil, as a series, were to end here, it would be hard to complain, as it’s a near-perfect wrap-up,” we wrote in our review.
Netflix cancels Daredevil after three seasons
30th November 2018
Netflix has officially cancelled Daredevil after three seasons.
Marvel’s series returned for its third run this October, with Matt Murdock (Charlie Cox) once again reprising his role as part-time lawyer and full-time vigilante in Hell’s Kitchen. But Hell’s Kitchen has seen its population slowly decrease in the last year, with two of its other heroes given the chop by Netflix: both Luke Cage and Iron Fist were not renewed by the streaming giant last month. After much speculation, and with The Defenders also apparently not planning to return after its 2017 crossover, The Man Without Fear has officially been dropped too.
“Marvel’s Daredevil will not return for a fourth season on Netflix,” Netflix confirmed to Deadline last night. “We are tremendously proud of the show’s last and final season and although it’s painful for the fans, we feel it best to close this chapter on a high note. We’re thankful to our partners at Marvel, showrunner Erik Oleson, the show’s writers, stellar crew and incredible cast including Charlie Cox as Daredevil himself, and we’re grateful to the fans who have supported the show over the years.”
The news appears to mark the final days for Netflix’s Marvel universe, just as Disney prepares to launch its own rival streaming platform. Indeed, Deadline reports that Luke Cage’s cancellation came after scripts had already started to be written for Season 3 of Harlem’s Hero’s solo series, indicating that the relationship between Marvel TV and Netflix has shifted in recent years and months. Nonetheless, Jessica Jones and The Punisher are both due to make their return for a third and second season respectively.
The news, in some consolation, sees Daredevil bow out on a high, as Season 3 saw Vincent D’Onofrio reprise his role as the iconic villain Wilson Fisk.
Disney’s streaming service, Disney+, meanwhile, is currently planning its own TV show for Loki, with other Marvel series in the pipeline.