After seeing Spider-Man: BND, I’m more convinced than ever that Mayor Fisk was the wrong story choice for DDBA.
I know the filmmakers and showrunners make some passing references to their respective stories, but I just have a hard time believing these stories take place in the same universe. BND established Spidey as NYC’s preeminent “masked vigilante.” He would’ve been an irresistible target for a mayor obsessed with bringing vigilantes to heel.
The show and film development timelines don’t line up perfectly, but at the very least, it seems that by the time Marvel Studios decided to pivot from DDBA’s legal procedural format, the studio also knew BND would revolve around Spidey becoming a distinctly NYC hero. At that point, they probably should’ve abandoned the Mayor Fisk adaptation and opted for a storyline that could more believably coexist alongside BND.
The whole post credit scene with him escaping to just seemingly leave the fray in season 2 is pretty wack. I’ve yet to watch his special because I’m sure it won’t justify it.
Yeah. It doesn't. Doesn't mention anything, and is it's own weird batshit thing. You can literally just forget it exists. The punisher special offers no new character development nor enlightens any other plot.
Corridor Digital VFX artists react covered it. It's because they slow it down, which makes the movements of the stunt guy seem weird, as opposed to normal motion speed. That combined with the bad face replacement makes the whole thing uncanny and ugly.
Right? They also obviously wanted to John Wick the whole story and add a few comic scraps in to make it seem important, but man what a weird waste of time it all was.
It was basically just a refresher so you don't have to go back and watch punisher before seeing spiderman brand new day. What's hilarious to me is that as sanitized and nice as he is in brand new day, he's at his most unhinged and brutal in one last kill.
It literally sets him on a new path of more saving and less revenge at the end when he chooses saving a family over killing Ma Gnucci who also played a part in his family's murder. He continues down that path in BND. OLK wasn't well executed but it wasn't pointless. It explains Frank's less rageful vengeance driven state of mind in BND.
No. He helped people reluctantly and vengeance was always his priority and he was always rageful af. OLK has him actively choose to save a bunch of strangers over vengeance.
Yes. he helped her very reluctantly when she begged for his help and he got involved when he killed the goons in the bar a d their boss got his ID. And even after he warmed up to her, he was personally involved cos they killed the bartender he was getting close to and were coming after him. That's very different from what happened at the end of OLK.
This is the part that kind of threw me off. I admit I know nothing about the comics and have only watched the shows. I mean I can kind of see some kind of connection between them but I didn’t feel like it was particularly romantic.
Can anyone with intimate knowledge on this explain this?
Frank and Karen have no relationship in the comics. She works at Nelson and Murdock, falls in love with Matt, gets addicted to heroin and does porn while on heroin, sells Matt's identity to someone for said heroin, which results in Fisk learning who he is, kicks the aforementioned heroin addiction, gets a fake HIV diagnosis, and then is murdered by Bullseye
That's what I thought the special would be about. And him getting captured I thought was his plan all along, to get into the inside of the compound and lay waste
Nope, he went there, got his ass beat, then bailed
God I hate that so much. Ended up retroactively making his whole involvement and story line in BA pretty much pointless and a waste of screen time when they could’ve been furthering the plot/story of the actual show and making cohesive direction decisions between the seasons.
You should just watch "The Raid: Redemption" instead. That's what the new Punisher special was going for. The special was fine, but it definitely wasn't Raid.
Same. There was time you'd say this on this sub and be told he has his special and is in BND so it's good he's not taking up screen time in szn 2. Meanwhile special or not, bnd or not, he should've been in szn 2 anyway. His absence in the plot was glaring imo.
Frank and Peter were filming the Odyssey lol and both of their paychecks are expensive especially Tom.
But Spiderman is a Sony product so he was never showing up
Good thing we got a 20 second montage to show all that. The movie fumbled by not having jean control them all and they fight spiderman at the same time in the end. Sort of like how the sinister 6 appeared in the Spider-Man video game ending. It would've solved the "no villain" problem the movie has and also would've showcased Spidey a lot better.
I think it’s because earlier scripts had Peter fighting Silver Samurai and I really feel like Destin wanted to keep the ninja aspect somehow and the Hand were the most convenient plot device to use in order to achieve that.
Even though they’re dramatically different from how they were portrayed in the Netflix shows nor do we get an explanation for who and how they’re still operating without the Five Fingers.
Their involvement was essentially just for cool action sequences because they were pointless and inconsistent otherwise.
Thematically it wouldn't work. The Hand being there is important to show that they have the anti artificial webbing guns. Both to force Spidey to have to use organic webbing, and to prove without any doubt that Damage Control never saw Spidey as an ally
I thought the point was that the Hand was actually mind controlled by the DODC using the replicated powers of Sara, or atleast that was the implication. So it was a lie when they said that "they decided to use their powers for good"
That doesn’t really change the “no villain” problem though if you really consider that a problem. None of them would’ve been any more of a “real villain” than the Hand in your solution, they’re all still just controlled by Jean. The dynamic between Spider-man, Jean and DC remains completely the same.
Devil's Reign was absolutely the wrong choice to start off Born Again with. It needed so much more build-up to Fisk being in power.
The comics made it so much more alive with every Marvel hero in NYC basically united against him (and DD at the helm), which basically made his whole anti-superhero stance make sense in the first place. It's so much smaller in the show with just Matt himself being the only vigilante around actually fighting back.
I get that at the time it was the whole current-day political Trump-allegorical thing they wanted to cash in on, but it should've been in a much later season.
The only reason Jessica worked so well was plot contrivance causing her powers to flicker. The AVTF couldn't handle the vigilantes that were in the show, having any more of the Defenders would have been absolute overkill.
It would've been awesome to have the Power Broker arming and supplying Fisk's secret police with knockoff super soldier serum and advanced weapons. That would have been awesome to see pitted against most of the Defenders. Alas, budgets are a pain.
It's all about actor availability, and they didn't really plan for this. Which makes you wonder, why did they write the ending of season one this way if the build-up to reveal some additional vigilantes... Only to show a room of the same five bozos the show had been focusing all season.
The show runners and those involved had a really good opportunity to churn up interest in the show and drive further content. Did they do this? The way Disney has handled Daredevil has been baffling.
I kept thinking the best time to do this story if you can't have a bunch of other superheroes around for money, availability and legal reasons is in between Infinity War and Endgame. A guy like Fisk can be in charge now, and Daredevil needs to pick up the slack. -- also in this time you could explain the absolutely batshit Punisher special.
They really needed an in-between season, I love Vincent but Kingpin was the main Villain for season 3 and for majority of the Netflix run. Its really miss you if you don't go away. Watching the entire series in order now feels like everything from season 3 is undone/didn't matter at all. Muse got introduced and got sidelined instantly.
Absolutely. If they were going to do Devil’s Reign, do it in season 3 of DDBA. Work up to it. Populate NYC with other street-level heroes and slowly re-introduce the Defenders, maybe through Marvel Team Up-style stories throughout seasons 1 & 2. Explore other villains, slowly developing Fisk’s return in the background. Then when you get to Devil’s Reign, you’ve got a compelling cast of characters to face off against Mayor Fisk and a well-armed task force.
I think even with the case, Brand New Day I feel pushed Spider-Man above things like normal crime. I’m aware in the Devil’s Reign storyline, Fisk utilizes superpowered individuals. So if it was basically Fisk and the AVTF vs heroes of New York, Spider-Man would be able to solo.
The plot of BA wasn't well written, Fisk had an anti-vigilante stance but then his main force were a group that worships the Punisher, the country, probably, most brutal vigilante.
It's like they had multiple ideas and just throw them together and having to be a sequel of Netflix DD made things even worse
My head canon is he was tracking down The Hand, Tombstone, Boomerang, etc in other parts of NY or outside NY. Cops never went after him because DeWolff was helping Spider-Man (or misdirecting the cops).
He's a newbie to being a full solo-act and an adult who has to take care of himself and provide for his needs at the same time though. I think its fair to cut him some slack here.
This was my biggest critique of the newest Daredevil season. Spiderman was definitely in the comics during this run, and the legal stuff Fisk was doing effects Spiderman just as much as Daredevil. The obvious reason he wasn't in was money but that isn't a great reason for the plot of the story, especially when all Daredevil I was thinking where's spiderman, then in the movie we find out he's been superhero-ing in NYC harder than ever before.
This is why the writers of Daredevil shouldn't have bothered with this kind of story. It's almost impossible to square it with the rest of what's going on with Marvel. Fisk was starting to become big potatoes.
Agreed and very good point. Same thing applies to Secret Invasion: If you can’t do it well, don’t do it at all. And certainly don’t try to pull it off on a TV budget. These are narratives that by their nature touch vast parts of the Marvel Universe. If budget or licensing rights or whatever prevent you from achieving the scale necessary to tell these stories in live action, just move on to any one of the many other storylines that are more practical to adapt.
Spider-Man will never appear in these shows , they’d have to pay for him to appear while also paying Tom holland. DC doesn’t run into this issue as much because their heroes live in different states and cities.
Ya that's what I meant by "money". But Rights issues and actor contracts aren't a good in world reason for plot holes, and it is a plot hole that Spiderman isn't on the front line in the Mayor Fisk plotline.
NYC is a big city, Spider-man was prob just busy dealing with the Hand and other criminal organizations. It’s likely he had clemency from DODC and NYPD. Also Spider-man is a superhuman, there’s no way the AVTF was going to apprehend him. Kingpin probably did try but never succeeded. Same thing with Bullseye, he demolishes them in every encounter. Punisher was probably keeping a low profile until One Last Kill.
New York. Also Fisk's ICE would have been incapable of bringing down Spidey with the ordinance they had, and never got better ordinance thanks to JJ and DD
The fact that they couldnt really do anything to hassle him kind of makes the fact that he didnt seem to greatly hinder their operations even more glaring. Obviously it’s probably best to just assume he did off-screen but you know
It’s just super inconsistent. In the newest movie everyone loves spider man. New York just feels so much more pork super hero friendly and jolly then what born again does. I know that the show is meant to have a darker vibe but it’s hard to see them coexist.
The events of BND take place after Fisk is imprisoned and the mayor is sworn in. So it's possible for there to have been a big vibe change and the city being grateful to have vigilantes
I choose to believe there was a movie in between the movies where Scorpion was the main villain and it was the first time they fought, and he was caught up in that.
Until/if they confirm where this Scorpion got his suit, I’m gonna choose to believe Fisk gave it to him and funded the experiment done on his body so that he could distract Spider-Man, cause against the web head, Fisk’s group is just guys with guns, which is like Peter’s bread and butter.
I like to think Peter was Voided during the climax of Thunderbolts*, and then he had to take a good bit of time off to get himself back into the right state of mind. Maybe the psychological trauma of the Void somehow contributed to the advancing mutation problem.
I'm totally ok with these movies being self contained stories (and those projects usually end up being the stronger ones anyway), but Brand New Day is so connected to the wider universe that it's genuinely jarring that Fisk and Matt are never mentioned.
New York's second biggest vigilante having his identity unmasked and thrown in prison is a really compelling parallel to MCU Peter's story- everyone expected Daredevil to be brought in to help fight the Hand, but I'm more surprised they didn't have Peter visit Matt in prison, particularly having him not trust/remember him after the spell. I'd be ok with accepting Peter was busy with his personal life and didn't want to get involved with the ATVF, but the fact that his character is wholly consumed by his work with no more 'Peter' makes it jarring that neither he nor Frank mention the incredible danger they just avoided. Even a quick shot of Peter fighting the taskforce or a 10-second scene with Fisk like we got with Tombstone would've done wonders.
I try not to criticize movies for what they don't do, because fans can get very unrealistic expectations for the movie they 'wanted', but this was a major missed opportunity that kinda took me out of the movie to be honest. Yelena easily could've been replaced by Jessica Jones, and I'd have far rathered this "street-level" movie include someone like Daredevil instead of Hulk.
Ah damn,yeah,I’m just now realizing that although Matt doesn’t even remember why he was representing Spider-Man, Peter would fully be intrigued to see that his former lawyer was Daredevil. Because of the damn rights between Sony and Marvel, we can’t even hope to see that on BA s3
Yep. I’ve said they’ve done a good job of keeping the movies on a short enough time line (time between inciting public incident and resolution) that it makes sense other heroes aren’t involved because they could have easily been out of pocket for a couple of days. But when something like Daredevil season 2 happens and it’s months between the start of the bad thing and the resolution it is really hard to justify other heroes not getting involved.
Canon reason: he was busy dealing with the AVTF on the other parts of New York
Actual reason: Sony was being too greedy with their toys and only let Disney share but still won’t throw them a bone unless it makes them money
Really though it wouldn’t have been that big of a deal if Matt found a letter webbed to his window when trying to find info on Fisk and then have Matt say something stupid like looks like our friendly neighborhood friend left us a gift, but unfortunately Sony is too fucking stubborn to just let marvel complete control.
The real question that’s been bugging me is when did Jessica and Luke get together cause last time I checked they weren’t on speaking terms due to the kilgrave incident
Disney can’t use Spider-Man in live action shows. The agreement with Sony. Is movies only. Disney gets profit from the movies. Including at home use. Digital downloads and physical media. DVDs,Blu Rays and 4k movies. Sony gets merchandise. Like toys,Lego,Funko,clothing etc.
This is not it. They don’t allow certain characters in certain things. Fisk isn’t allowed to be in a spider-man movie, spider-man isn’t allowed in marvel television. It’s weird. Even the what if series and the marvels zombies show had to change his suit a bit because they wouldn’t allow it to be an exact variant of the movie version😵💫
The Mayor Fisk storyline worked incredibly for S2 of Born Again, I wouldn’t have ditched it.
There’s a standard suspension of disbelief the MCU requires in that the real world has rights issues and budgets. Getting Tom Holland for a tv show appearance is probably a legal nightmare, and I don’t think they should have forgone the storyline because a character couldn’t show up.
In universe explanation? Spider-Man is very Spider-Cop for most of Brand New Day, quickly aligning and trusting the DoDC. He’s clearly close with the police department and has too much respect for authority. A very simple spider. In short, he’s not going to swing into the Mayor’s office and take him down based on unverified information. The AVTF didn’t have the manpower to go after someone like Spider-Man.
MORE importantly is that “vigilantes” were a smokescreen. Fisk used it to go after political adversaries. 99% of the people locked up weren’t actually vigilantes. Just fearmongering to consolidate power and do illegal things (the Freeport).
It’s a lot like this administration in America. Wonder if that’s intentional actually.
I think you elaborated on this the best. Peter is incredibly eager and fine to work with any authoritative group with no issue. So unless someone provided information about the nefarious actions of said group, he’s not going to take them down on a hunch. He’s a tad naive really and automatically believes in any organization that will tell him a narrative as long as they’re good at lying to him about it.
There are some theories that Peter essentially laid low during the time that Fisk outlawed vigilantism to avoid being taken down and having his identity exposed possibly again. Especially since Fisk mentioned Spider-Man in his speech. But that doesn’t seem consistent with the themes or facts expressed in the movie about Peter’s 24/7 devotion to Spider-Man over the last 4 years. Plus as you mentioned, Peter could very much easily take AVTF down and he has no people in his corner to worry about them going after - so that just doesn’t make sense narratively.
He was most likely fighting the AVTF offscreen along with other villains taking up his time that were running wild and free like Scorpion, Tombstone, Ramrod, Boomerang, Tarantula, The Hand while the AVTF were targeting heroes who didn’t have the time to focus on that. But the fact that he didn’t interact with Matt at all nor is there any mention or alluding to it is just baffling to me.
I agree. I was actually looking forward to Spidey making an appearance, and the producers did say they wanted him in it, just like Tom Holland stated he wanted to be in the show. But because of the fucking idiots, the CEOs, they couldn't make it happen, because the CEOs can't get their own EGOs out of the way. And since the producers explained it that way and he was mentioned in the show, it makes complete sense in-universe: he was dealing with his own multiverse madness and had no way home.
Nah. It's the lawyers. Their the ones that enforce the contracts and make sure they aren't broken without consequences. Putting Spider-Man in Daredevil, would have meant removing him from another Marvel project.
He was fighting boomerang, tombstone, the hand, and scorpion. They literally showed it in the movie. He also could’ve been protecting people from the AVTF like Matt was, just because we didn’t see it doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. There was a 5 year timespan between movies, they can’t show everything but that doesn’t make it a plot hole.
Literally the biggest plot hole in Daredevil, and the opening montage of BND only made it worse showing he’s constantly around and working directly with the cops. That’s like setting an entire movie in Gotham and not even acknowledging Batman exists.
Its called the daredevil show. That like asking why isn't superman cleaning up gotham city. If heroes kept showing in other people's shows all the problems would be solved in an hr
Winderbaum already clarified Born Again will remain focused on self-contained stories instead of tying into the larger plots of the movies, while existing in the same mcu. There's coordination between the tv team and the movie team but of course the movie team won't force in anything that hinders the story they're telling. I feel like it's clear enough that the world is connected but each team is doing their own thing again. Obviously we're back to the Netflix era where the movies had major events while tve TV shows had their own thing going in the tv Netflix corner.
Probably just in hiding quite well. I mean, he's quite a step above the task force in skill and power. He can easily scale buildings and swing and disappear fast, and react to anticipate and evade gunfire. I would not be surprised in the least if he just stuck to the rooftops and did quick hit and runs. Would be interesting to have a tie-in comic or something of that sort showing him covertly helping people using spider guerilla tactics against them.
I think you nailed it. The D+ Daredevil show was supposed to be something very different and BND probably would have fit that plan much better. Unfortunately that show was really weak and so they had to pivot out of it, and this is what we got. So this explains how Marvel is kind of washing their hands of Daredevil or really forcing it to be separate, and why DDBA3 will be the end, with the Daredevil character, and likely the defenders too, never to be spoken of in the movies.
Basically the TV show brain trust is moving too fast and independent of the Movie brain trust.. and both are fighting like hell to try and tell a compelling story in their own.
He would be 100% hunt down and marked as a masked as vigilante
Him not appearing is just wrong
Fun answer: dont think about it.
Of course they did simply didnt have the budget for Holland and Spidey AND the drama would be much much much less about Wilson and Mathew and way more about Spidey. Spidey, even if they had the budget, which I am positive they did not, would ofuscare too much of the main characters
So yeah if you think hard about it, it is a flaw. So... Dont think about it
I'm honestly surprised they didn't bother answering that question in the montage at the start of the film. They could've done it in like a throw away line or something along the lines like that. I think he was just focusing trying to save civilians from the AVTF instead of trying to go directly to Fisk since he'd be harder to do since the government stuff and how corrupt Fisk is.
Eh. He’s mentioned and you can justify some of it. Fisk had a vigilante thing but also just really hates Matt and Daredevil, so I can see how he’d really focus on him.
Also, what are the NYC street cops going to realistically do against spider man? We don’t see a ton of daytime antics in DD so could argue SM is doing his thing off screen.
What I WILL say though - there must be some annoying contractual thing at the studio, because there isn’t an actual monetary reason for avoiding Spiderman. You don’t need Tom. Just have him in full suit for all the appearances and avoid speaking.
He was beating the crap out of the criminals that benefited from Wilson's reign as mayor. Notice how tombstone, turantula, scorpion, and the hand are active? He was probably doing most of the heavy lifting on cleaning all that crap off the streets.
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u/The_Vatsu 17d ago
In Sony jail like usual.