Charlie Cox Talks She-Hulk, Daredevil: Born Again Without Attacking Fans

Television

Some people at Marvel still have class. In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Charlie Cox discusses working on She-Hulk, when he was told Marvel wanted him back, and his hopes for Daredevil: Born Again. Most of it is fluffy stuff about his time on She-Hulk, but he has some important information as well. One is a clarification on whether the Matt Murdock he’ll be playing in Born Again is the same one from the Netflix series:

“It should be and it is always the same character. The difference is just like with people, we morph and change and are very different based on what’s going on in our lives… I don’t know what the new show will be like, but when I came over to do Spider-Man and She-Hulk, the tone is much more lighthearted and tongue in cheek and fun and witty and full of levity, so the hope was that Matt is able to fit into that world and participate in it without it being a different character, a different person.”

That’s good to know. As much as I have doubts about Born Again, one important step in the right direction is dispelling the rumors that this will be a different version of Daredevil. It would be a shame to undo the great work the Netflix show did in integrating Daredevil and the other Defenders into the MCU, and it would make it difficult to care about this version knowing that the one everybody loves was discarded. This doesn’t mean the show will be good, and I hope they don’t keep the tone like Spider-Man and She-Hulk (especially She-Hulk), but at least it’ll mean something.

But there’s another indication of the care those involved will put into Born Again – or Charlie Cox will, at least – when he talks about bringing Matt into She-Hulk:

“I felt like it was important that Matt Murdock didn’t become the overly serious one who’s the kind of butt of the joke. I felt it was important that he goes toe-to-toe with her and matches her in terms of his charisma and wit and sense of fun, and it was really fun to do.”

This was pulled off pretty well in She-Hulk, and Matt felt like Matt, albeit adapting to a lighter setting. I don’t necessarily want that tone for Born Again, but it’s heartening that Cox cares so much about the character and wants to keep him from being humiliated (a sentiment Mark Ruffalo clearly doesn’t share). He’s being very nice, but I wonder if we can infer that he had a hand in shaping how the writers portrayed Matt on the page, curtailing attempts to belittle him to make Jen look better. He actually comes off much better than she does in She-Hulk, but since Jen acts the same as always, the writers probably didn’t even notice.

Finally, did you notice how nice and gracious Cox comes off in this interview? He talks about his character without calling him “a fuck-you” to fans. He doesn’t denigrate anything else Marvel’s done. He says how much he liked working with Tatiana Maslany and hopes she’ll show up for Born Again. (You know, Charlie, there’s such a thing as being too nice.) He even shows humility in wondering why he and Daredevil were chosen to have an 18-episode season on Disney+ and gives some character-based reasons, side-stepping that it’s because of how loved the show and hero were. To be fair, Entertainment Weekly didn’t bait him the way Variety did the She-Hulk team, but the glee with which they talked about how much they hate Marvel fans seems alien to Charlie Cox.

Are you looking forward to Daredevil: Born Again? Did you like the way Daredevil was portrayed on She-Hulk? Is there a meta quality to Charlie Cox acting as his character’s attorney? Let us know in the comments, and stay tuned to Geeks + Gamers for more from the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen!