The writer’s strike might have caused a physical delay to Daredevil: Born Again, but it gave Marvel Studios time to reflect and reevaluate their TV strategy and especially Daredevil. They had shot less than half of the 18 episodes ordered for the series, but they came to the conclusion that the series just wasn’t working.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, Marvel let go of head writers Chris Ord and Matt Corman and also released the directors for the remainder of the season. The hunt is now on for new writers and directors for the Charlie Cox–led series.
Marvel TV started off incredibly strong with series like WandaVision, Loki, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, Hawkeye, Moon Knight, and Ms. Marvel. The issue was that each of the series cost $150 million+, had no showrunner to supply vision across the production, and they relied heavily on reshoots and post-production to fix things that didn’t work. These issues came to a head with Secret Invasion and She-Hulk. She-Hulk was a successful series that was fantastic, but Marvel realized that Jessica Gao was basically acting as a showrunner across the production. Her vision gave it a consistency from the top down.
As for Daredevil: Born Again, THR is reporting that the character didn’t even show up in costume until the fourth episode. The show more closely resembled a legal procedural than the action-heavy Netflix series. Ord and Corman will still be on as Executive Producers on the series.
Secret Invasion ended up with the most changes from a creative standpoint. They went through several writers on the series and also had tensions behind the scenes between creatives. The show fell behind in schedule and almost led to several actors having to leave because of scheduling. It got so bad at points that Marvel had to dispatch Jonathan Schwartz, a senior executive and member of Marvel’s creative steering committee known as The Parliament, to get the show back on track.
Because of all the behind the scenes turmoil on the series, they’ve made the decision to hire showrunners on their TV. The studio also plans on hiring full-time TV executives rather than splitting their current ones between TV and movies. Marvel will also have writers write a show bible and a pilot, instead of pushing forward with the entire series at once. Loki season two has been such a success with viewers. That model is looking more promising for Marvel with multi-season stories instead of limited series.
This is a huge development for Marvel TV going forward and reflects a change at the studio after so many years of expansion. They’re not contracting, but they are rethinking the release model for all of their properties.
We’ll have to see how it works when we get more projects down the road with the new creative choices.
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Source: The Hollywood Reporter
