Last week, Marvel dropped the first trailer for the Daredevil: Born Again series; fans were clearly excited about it. The trailer got millions of page views on multiple platforms within just a few hours. 

Daredevil was the first of a series of Marvel shows that were carried by Netflix in the 2010s; this was before Disney launched their streaming platform, Disney+. The Netflix shows were darker and grittier than the films in the MCU were, and mostly took place on a street level (usually in New York). The fight scenes were more intense and – particularly on Daredevil – they looked painful. 

Daredevil, which starred Charlie Cox as Matt Murdock, the blind lawyer who becomes the radar-enhanced crimefighter Daredevil, was the first series to debut, a decade ago in 2015. His arch nemesis was Wilson Fisk, aka the Kingpin, played by Vincent D’Onofrio. Daredevil was followed by Jessica Jones, with the title role played by Krysten Ritter. Jones is a former hero with super strength and a drinking problem who now works as a private detective (and might have a drinking problem). During the first season of her show, we meet Luke Cage (played by Mike Colter), who has super strength and bulletproof skin, and who soon got his own series. Then there was Iron Fist, starring Finn Jones as Danny Rand, the martial arts expert with a mystical “iron fist.”  Rosario Dawson’s Claire Temple, a hospital nurse, appeared across all four series, as well as in The Defenders, which united all four characters and their supporting casts. Punisher, starring Jon Bernthal as Frank Castle, started out in Daredevil and then got two seasons of his own show. 

The stories took place in the MCU, and would occasionally reference events or characters from the films (as well as the ABC TV series Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.), although there was never any interaction between characters from the Netflix shows and the films, and the films never referenced the shows. In fact, there was so little communication between the TV and movie divisions that Alfre Woodard was cast in Luke Cage and Captain America: Civil War as two different characters. 

But that all changed when Kevin Feige, who ran Marvel’s film division, took over the TV division as well. That’s when Charlie Cox’s Matt Murdock and his arch enemy, Vincent D’Onofrio’s Wilson Fisk, started appearing in the MCU. 

Here’s a list of all the shows (and one film) in which the characters we’ll see in Daredevil: Born Again have appeared; besides Daredevil, the show will prominently feature Kingpin and Punisher. We’ll note that there are some spoilers here. Also note: each season of Daredevil and Punisher was 13 episodes, one hour each. The Defenders was eight episodes; right there, that’s 73 hours of content, so if you’re a completist, you’ll want to start early!

• Daredevil (Season 1) (2015)

  Here, we meet Matt Murdock, the blind lawyer, who has enhanced abilities that allow him to “see” via a sonar; his other senses are enhanced, and he’s a great martial artist. He’s kind of like Spider-Man without the webs or super strength. He fights injustice as a lawyer by day and as a vigilante at night – for most of the season, he doesn’t even have a costume. Murdock runs a law firm with his pal “Foggy” Nelson, and they soon hire Karen Page. We also meet Wilson Fisk, aka the Kingpin, and learn why he has become such a ruthless gangster. Like many of Marvel’s best villains – from Erik Killmonger to Thanos – his motivations are at least a bit relatable. You may not like him or approve of his methods, but you can understand why he is who he is. Most of the show takes place in Hell’s Kitchen in the aftermath of “The Battle Of New York” (as seen in 2012’s The Avengers).

• Daredevil (Season 2) (2016)

  Enter: The Punisher! In this season, we learn why Frank Castle is the way he is: a veteran who has lost everything thanks to organized crime and has sworn revenge on the underworld. Naturally, he finds himself at odds with Daredevil, who doesn’t kill. Castle finds that approach to be naive and ineffective. We also meet Murdock’s ex-girlfriend, Elektra (played perfectly by Elodie Yung), who is just as lethal of a fighter as he is. And she is working with the Hand, an ancient crime organization (who also a big part of the Iron Fist series). The Hand bring a bit of mysticism to the usually street-level tales in the Netflix corner of the MCU.

• The Defenders (2017)

  Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Luke Cage and Iron Fist, along with Claire Temple and some of the other support characters, notably Jessica Henwick’s Colleen Wing from the Iron Fist series, team up to take on the Hand. Elektra, who has no memory of her past life, is now working with the Hand. One of the villains – Alexandra, one of the leaders of the Hand – was played deliciously by Sigourney Weaver. The series was a lot of fun: kind of like the Avengers, it united characters who we were invested in from following their own adventures; it was cool to see them all together. But the series has a big impact on Daredevil: as the series ends, his teamates and friends believe that he has died.

• Punisher (Season 1) (2017)

  Frank Castle is drawn back into vigilante life and is hunting for the people responsible for murdering his family. It’s not a spoiler to say that things get ugly. We see the origin of Jigsaw – one of Punisher’s arch-enemies in the comic books. We also meet Punisher ally “Micro,” aka David Lieberman, played by Ebon Moss-Bachrach (of The Bear fame; he’s about to play a higher profile character in the MCU when he takes on Ben “The Thing” Grimm in the upcoming Fantastic Four movie this summer). The season doesn’t have much connection to Daredevil, although Deborah Ann Woll’s Karen Page, always an ally to Castle, is in the support cast of the show.

• Daredevil (Season 3) (2018)

  Picking up after the events of The Defenders, Daredevil is thought to be dead (as is Elektra). Matt is nursed back to health in Saint Agnes Orphanage but keeps the fact that he is alive a secret from his friends. Wilson Fisk makes a deal with the government and gets out of jail but lives in a guarded hotel room under supervision; he is often guarded by Benjamin “Dex” Poindexter, an impressionable special agent who becomes a pawn of Fisk and one of Matt’s enemies: in fact, he steals the Daredevil costume and goes on to ruin his name and reputation. Like Fisk and Frank Castle, “Dex” is returning in the new series Born Again. Daredevil season three contains the best fight scene that we’ve seen in the series; in fact, it is one of the best fight scenes in Marvel’s history, if not the best one.

• The Punisher (Season 2) (2019)

  Frank has had his revenge, as we saw in season one. Here, he tries to move on and live a somewhat normal life. Surprise! It doesn’t work out, and he gets drawn back into his life as the Punisher. At the beginning of the season, he has left most of his support cast from season one behind, but thankfully, they return by the end of the season, including Deborah Ann Woll’s Karen Page.

• Hawkeye (2021)

  This series tells the story of Jeremy Renner’s Clint (Hawkeye) Barton, after the events of Avengers: Endgame. He’s reconnecting with his family, who he lost during “The Blip” (he was later reunited with them). It also introduces his number one fan, Kate Bishop, played by Hailee Steinfeld (who will have a larger role in the MCU in the next few years), and Maya Lopez, aka Echo (played by Alaqua Cox). It also brings Florence Pugh’s Yelena Belova (first introduced in 2021’s Black Widow film) into the story. Throughout much of the series, it was hinted that Wilson Fisk was a part of the story. This was confirmed, to the delight of fans of Marvel’s Netflix series, by the end of the fifth episode, which aired on December 15, 2021. Vincent D’Onofrio’s Kingpin returned in his full glory (although he seems to have some super strength and invulnerability that he didn’t have in the Netflix shows) in the final episode, which aired on December 22.

• Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021)

  Marvel’s multiverse is a big place: this film sees Tom Holland’s Peter Parker, aka Spider-Man, join forces with Andrew Garfield and Tobey Maguire’s versions of the character from earlier versions of the franchise. But we also caught our first sighting of Charlie Cox’s Matt Murdock in a MCU film; he had just a cameo as Peter Parker’s lawyer and it’s obivous that he has “enhanced abilities.” This isn’t essential viewing, but it was a fun movie. But if you don’t want to commit, you can watch the scene with Murdock above. The film was released on December 17, 2021, between the fifth and sixth episodes of Hawkeye; it was a good week for fans of the Netflix Marvel series. Another fun thing to point out here is that Jon Favreau is playing “Happy” Hogan, friend of Tony Stark and mentor (or sorts) to Tom Holland’s Peter Parker. But in the ill-fated (and very forgettable) 2003 Daredevil film, he played Murdock’s best friend, Franklin “Foggy” Nelson.

• She-Hulk: Attorney At Law (2022)

  We get a lot more of Charlie Cox’s Daredevil and Matt Murdock in this series, which takes place on the West Coast and is a lot more light-hearted than the Netflix series was. It’s a lot of fun although it goes a bit over the top and gets even more self-aware than the Deadpool films. But Murdock takes on She-Hulk in the courtroom… and beyond. We don’t yet know if the events of this series will be referenced in Born Again.

• Echo (2024)

  The above trailer makes it seem like Charlie Cox’s Daredevil is a bigger part of the series than he actually is. In reality, he just appears in one flashback scene where he fights Alaqua Cox’s Maya Lopez (BTW Charlie Cox and Alaqua Cox are not related). But Vincent D’Onofrio’s Wilson Fisk is a major character in this five-episode series and the last moments seem to lead into some of the developments in Daredevil: Born Again.

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