I understand what Disney is attempting to do with Echo, a show they are releasing all at once, a rarity, with just five episodes, a bit over three hours in total, about the length of your average Avengers movie.
If you watch most of Echo’s promotional spots, you will see a heavy, heavy emphasis on the villain, Kingpin, rather than the protagonist (not exactly hero) Echo. And in most spots, you will also see Charlie Cox’s Daredevil in at least one fight scene with Echo, with reporting that it’s going to be seven minutes long.
And the show is leaning hard into its TV-MA rating, citing the kind of brutality found in Daredevil. And in its promotions, has also apparently established the original Netflix Daredevil series as canon. Now there’s a debate about whether Daredevil’s new costume is good enough.
Daredevil, Daredevil, Daredevil. Again, I get it, he’s a popular character. I would argue he’s one of the most popular characters in the MCU right now fans believe was unfairly axed after the Netflix show ended, and his two appearances in Spider-Man: No Way Home and She-Hulk got fans pumped for his return (I’d argue he got a bigger pop in the theater than the two alternate Spider-Men). He’s this popular and he hasn’t even gotten his own show yet. And Echo is still not his show, but it really is being treated like it kind of is.
I would really, really caution fans excited about Daredevil’s return to keep their expectations in check for Echo. I know they are leaning heavily on him to promote the show, as I believe Disney does not want another little-watched Disney Plus show on their hands, but his actual screen time? Looking at No Way Home, he barely had a minute or two for his cameo. In She-Hulk, he had part of one episode out of nine, even though it was a touch more involved. Will he show up in Echo for more than a cameo and that fight scene they keep showing? I kind of doubt it, especially with a runtime of just three hours total to tell the Echo and Kingpin story.
Of course there is a Daredevil show coming down the road, which now may in fact be some sort of continuation of the Netflix series. But that production has been troubled, as the original idea for the show was thrown out the window and those running it were replaced. Now they’ve been starting over from scratch and it seems to be very far away.
I am looking forward to Echo and also seeing Kingpin and Daredevil again. But I do think Disney is probably trying to fool viewers into watching for those likely scarce Daredevil moments, and expecting him to be a full co-lead is not wise.
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