Daredevil: Born Again stars on Matt Murdock and Wilson Fisk's stories and dynamics

Ahead of the show’s premiere, Daredevil: Born Again stars Charlie Cox and Vincent D’Onofrio shared their thoughts on their characters’ new stories, along with their on-screen dynamic during a recent media press conference.

It has been nearly seven years since the Netflix Daredevil series ended, and now, Born Again continues the story, and it features some interesting developments for Matt Murdock and Wilson Fisk.

While the show’s cast didn’t mention any specific spoilers, they did talk about what’s going on with their characters at the beginning of the new series. Firstly, Cox mentioned a traumatic event causes big changes for Matt:

“You know, early on, Matt has suffered a trauma. And that has meant that he’s had to kind of rethink and re-find his identity in a way that is probably more profound than we’ve seen before. He ends up going down a path which I think is best described as a Band-Aid that will have to be ripped off slowly and painfully.
For fans of the original show, it’s the same Matt Murdock, essentially, just, you know, influenced by his experiences.”

On the flip side, Wilson Fisk has also undergone major changes, but not because of Born Again’s intro. Instead, Fisk’s ending in Daredevil Season 3 served as a major catalyst for change, at least regarding his new plan.

D’Onofrio described Fisk’s new goals as follows:

“He’s on a mission. He’s the same guy he was in the Netflix show, but he’s got a new plan. First thing he’s gotta do is sort things out with his wife, ‘cause he’s been gone for a while. That turns into something extremely exciting. And then there’s the other side, which is he has a plan. His plan is to stretch his reach.
It’s the beginning of that, how far he’s gonna go for control. And it’s a struggle because he has to live in the daylight to do that.”

Daredevil and Kingpin going through major events at the start makes for an interesting premise, especially as the events also force the two to meet face to face fairly early on.

Even though the animosity is still there, what’s more interesting is the parallels between the two which D’Onofrio describes as:

“We’re trying to live in the daylight, the two of us. We have that in common. We’re broken men. If you think about the metaphor of vampires trying to live in the daylight, it’s a struggle that they’re going through. He’s got his thing, and I’ve got my plan, and you can’t put us together in the same scene a lot ’cause it’s not as powerful if you do that.
[We don’t have a lot of scenes], but it’s so good when we do. It’s good for us as the actors, you know, ‘cause we just like doing scenes together.”

As the topic of Murdock and Fisk came up, D’Onofrio and Cox soon shared their thoughts on working together, both in scenes they shared and during their solo scenes.

Their conversation is as follows:

D’Onofrio: [Filming together was] a lot of fun.
Cox: You said something yesterday which I think is great, which is like over the last 10 years obviously, we’ve become very good friends. And the good news is that it does feel like the better friends we become, the easier it is to hate each other.
D’Onofrio: It’s so true because we’ve known each other for so long, and we love playing these roles, we have a lot in common. And you fall, you know, I’ve fallen in love with Charlie. And the more I love him, the more I love to hate him. You know, it’s great. But to be serious about it, the other thing is trust. You know, we trust each other a lot.
I know that when I’m in the studio, when we’re shooting this thing, usually he’s on one side of the studio. I don’t even know what they’re doing. And I’m on another side of the studio doing something else. And I know that that side of the show is gonna be fine. Like, I never have to question it.
Cox: I feel the same way.
D’Onofrio: I have complete confidence in whatever is going on that I have no idea about. And it gives me a lift on my side to have that knowledge. And that’s because of our team, and I think Charlie, you know, in a big way. It’s great to have this kind of relationship with your partner in crime.

Daredevil: Born Again will premiere worldwide on March 4, exclusively on Disney+.