James R | On 25, Sep 2018

Marvel hasn’t ruled out more episodes of The Defenders or Daredevil, it’s TV head has confirmed.

Marvel’s growing Netflix universe has become increasingly interwoven since it debuted with Matt Murdock and with each new solo outing it opens up new avenues for potential spin-offs and other crossovers. The first, The Defenders, was met with mostly positive reviews, but its future was cast into doubt last week, when Netflix rebranded its Facebook page for the show with a more generic “NX” account, for all of its geek-friendly content.

Marvel’s TV chief Jeph Loeb, though, has insisted that the show hasn’t been ruled out altogether – and might even involve a different combination of superheroes in the future.

“All we’ve ever said is that there are no plans right now [to do more],” he told EW in an interview. “It doesn’t mean that it’s off the table. And it doesn’t mean that it even has to be with the original characters that were in the first Defenders.”

“There are lots of Avengers, and through that, you should be able to ascertain that there may be lots of Defenders,” he added. “No one at any time referred to them as “The Defenders” — they didn’t wear a little “D” on their belts, and they didn’t go to a building that had a big “Defenders” [sign] in the air. They were four mismatched heroes who were joined by a lot of the other heroes that are in the stories that we do on Netflix, but that was that particular story.”

Marvel has also not ruled out more seasons of Daredevil, even with its third season only just about to debut.

“Does Marvel have an idea as to what Daredevil 4, 5, or 6 could be? Sure”, Loeb revealed. “But ultimately those things will be shifted and talked about by the two other important parties that are involved: the network — Netflix — and our showrunner.”

“Unlike the movie studio, which can announce a Captain Marvel movie will be out in 2019, the television studio will always be beholden to our networks,” he explained. “So if our networks want another season of Iron Fist, we’re ready to go,” he noted.

As for Daughters of the Dragon, would Marvel ever do that crossover series between Jessica Henwick’s Colleen Wing and Simone Missick’s Misty Knight?

“There are certainly great things that we could do with the characters that we have, and anywhere you go, people ask us about Daughters of the Dragon,” Loeb commented. “I think that’s as much a compliment to those original characters as it is to Jessica [Henwick] and Simone [Missick]’s portrayals, so that’s a regular thought.”
 
“To speculate out past that [in a way] that may reveal a few things that are coming,” he continued, “whenever we introduce a new character, whether it’s Vincent D’Onofrio as Wilson Fisk or Alice Eve as Typhoid Mary, we always wonder, as it is in the comics, “Is this a character that could sustain their own story?” But right now we do have five series, and that’s an enormous responsibility, to continue to tell great stories with Matt and Jessica and Luke and Danny and Frank.”

 

Netflix reduces odds of The Defenders’ return

20th September 2018

Netflix has just significantly lowered the odds of The Defenders returning for Season 2.

The streaming giant’s crossover event series brought together its four Hell’s Kitchen heroes – Daredevil (Charlie Cox), Jessica Jones Krysten Ritter), Luke Cage (Mike Colter) and Iron Fist (Finn Jones) – and saw them team up to defend New York from The Hand and a secret plot led by Sigourney Weaver’s sinister villain. While the show was generally well received (read our review here), there has been no word since about a potential second crossover, even as each hero has since gone on to enjoy their own solo outing sequel.

Now, as Daredevil prepares for a third run, fans have reacted angrily to what appears to be a step away from a second outing for The Defenders. This week, Netflix rebranded a Facebook page for The Defenders, renaming it “NX”, which is positioned as a general brand for Netflix’s geek-friendly content. Its Twitter handle remains @TheDefenders, with @NXOnNetflix instead launched from scratch. But in the modern age, social media brands and identities are a big step to take for a large company: by choosing to remove The Defenders’ presence from Facebook altogether, and reposition the page away from that specific show, Netflix appears to be happy to leave its Marvel crossover behind.

Marvel TV head Jeph Loeb has previously said that another Defenders series was “not in the plans right now”, and Netflix has consistently labelled the programme a “limited series”, which suggests that it will remain a one-off experiment.

Earlier this spring, when Jessica Jones launched its second season, Krysten Ritter told Vulture that she didn’t expect a second season:

“Y’know, I had a great time doing The Defenders and honestly, it was such a good experience that I would even do it again,” she said. “I don’t think we are doing it again. It was never intentioned to do it again, but, you know, if I was given another opportunity, I would. My heart is with my show because of the subject matter and because of the great drama that we get to do and the personal issues that we explore. For me, that is more the type of content that I enjoy as a viewer and as a performer. My heart is in Jessica Jones, but I did have a great time doing The Defenders with the guys. We had a good time. It is what it is.”

You can see fan comments in response to the Facebook page’s rebranding here.

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