Disney+'s Daredevil: Born Again needs to fix one major thing to make Season 2 even better. While the Daredevil revival is mostly considered to be among the MCU's best streaming ventures, most agree it didn't quite live up to the infamous three-season Netflix show. That said, Born Again didn't exactly have a fair chance at complete success as the show underwent a full creative overhaul after the 2023 Hollywood strikes, which saw much of the original 18-episode plan thrown out.
Plans for an 18-episode legal procedural drama that almost completely rebooted the Netflix series were abandoned in favor of a continuation of the original show, which brought back more Daredevil stars and split the story across two seasons. As production was wrapped on select episodes before the overhaul, this left Born Again as a patchwork quilt of different visions, sparking some criticism about the pacing and flow of Season 1's larger storyline.
Daredevil: Born Again showrunner Dario Scardapane confirmed to TVLine that both the premiere and the final two episodes were "brand-spanking new." Additionally, the middle six episodes, which were created under original showrunners Matt Corman and Chris Ord, received "some rejiggering, and [new] framing, and bookends and stuff," with only a couple being "100% intact."
There's no denying that the series' three post-overhaul episodes were among the best received and generally did the most to push the Born Again story forward, while coming closest to recreating the tone, quality, and feel of the Netflix show.
More recently, executive producer Jesse Wigutow spoke to Collider and admitted that Season 1 was "jigsawed together." But he seemed to offer a strong update for the next season as he promised it has the "clarity of vision" that the freshman outing lacked and promised the climax will be "very satisfying:"
"I think it's a singular vision in a way that Season 1 is not. Season 1 is, to your point, not hodgepodge, but it was jigsawed together... There is clarity of vision. The showrunner has been awesome and really has a point of view that we've executed on. Nothing's perfect, but I do think Season 2 is quite good, and I think it's going to be very satisfying."
The Daredevil revival's middle-six episodes included storylines with the artistic serial killer Muse, street-level superhero Hector Ayala, aka White Tiger, and Matt Murdock stopping a bank robbery with Ms. Marvel's father, Yusuf Khan.
Unsurprisingly, these episodes didn't do much to push Born Again's larger storyline forward, with some being completely standalone and unchanged post-overhaul. In fact, Charlie Cox himself even proclaimed he "didn't like" one of these episodes while filming, and it was his "least favorite" of Season 1's nine chapters.
Fortunately, Born Again Season 2 has been developed and shot from the ground up under The Punisher showrunner Scardapane. This ought to leave the latest Daredevil outing feeling more focused with smoother pacing, and, hopefully, in line with the more Netflix-level quality found in Season 1's bookend episodes.
Why Daredevil: Born Again Season 2 Will Be Much Better Than the First
While Daredevil: Born Again Season 2 will only feature eight episodes as opposed to Season 1's eight, fans don't have to worry about things wrapping up in a hurry, as the TV-MA Disney+ series has already been renewed for an exciting Season 3.
Beyond that, Jon Bernthal's Punisher is getting his own Disney+ Special Presentation in 2026 that will connect to both Season 2 and his big-screen debut, with the MCU anti-hero set for a major role in Spider-Man: Brand New Day.
Moving into Born Again Season 2, fans can not only expect stronger pacing, more connections to the Netflix series, and possibly better quality, but also another Defender entering the fray as Krysten Ritter reprises Jessica Jones.
While speaking with Colldier, Jesse Wigutow hyped up Season 2's "really big storyline" that leads them to "drive it in the finale" to the series' crux:
"What I take away most from the season — and we're just going through cuts now, we're about to embark on Season 3 — is that we told this really big story, it got very wide, and then we kind of drive it in the finale to really what matters most."
The executive producer concluded that "what people care about" in Born Again is the conflict between Charlie Cox's Daredevil and Vincent D'Onofrio's Kingpin, which builds toward them being "face-to-face, in a really... satisfying climax:"
"I think what people care about are these two characters and the conflict that they're in, how deeply they hate each other, and how deeply they need each other. We really carve out all the stuff around them that we've built up, and it's just the two of them, face-to-face, in a really, I think, satisfying climax."
As the Daredevil revival brings in more Defenders, some may be concerned that Season 2 will have its own pacing problems. But it seems fans can sleep easily knowing that the rivalry between Matt Murdock and Wilson Fisk will remain at the crux of the next season, and likely in Born Again for years to come.
