Netflix's Rights to 'Daredevil' Have Officially Expired & Reverted To Marvel/Disney...But Now What?

Back In January of 2019, Charlie Cox was quoted as saying the following in an interview with AV Club:

"I’m kind of more in the dark about if that’s in any way possible for anyone else, if that show will have a future. I’m sure it will probably take a while to let go of a character that you’ve played for a long time, I still feel like I am that character right now. I don’t know. I guess it is what it is. It’s the uncertainty that kills you. In a way, I think I just put that in the back of my mind, and I’m focused on other work right now, and we’ll see what happens, and if it’s meant to be, it’s meant to be.”

Watching the slow and agonizing death of Netflix's little corner of the MCU was really not fun to witness. We saw Luke Cage, Iron Fist, Punisher, Jessica Jones and Daredevil(as well as The Defenders) all be snuffed out, one by one on the streaming platform.

Why was this happening?

Well, it's complicated.

Netflix never had full rights to these types of shows and despite their popularity, it was difficult to keep them afloat financially. Marvel is an expensive property to have licensing from and at one point they were throwing everything including the kitchen sink at Marvel TV to make it stick.

Daredevil killed it all 3 seasons.

Luke Cage knocked it out of the park for the first season, then seemingly dropped off with critics.

Jessica Jones seemed to fizzle out after season 2. We get it, you're drunk.

I feel like everyone hated Iron Fist almost off the bat. Poor kid.

The Defenders was clunky, handling so many main characters at once. Got lost in the shuffle IMO.

This made for a difficult era keeping track of everything and Rremember, THREE of these shows started in 2015 alone...that's a lot to have people binging at once to keep up with the mini-verse of Marvel TV while the MCU is also beating us into oblivion almost monthly at the box office.

There was also a stipulation in the Marvel-Netflix deal that prevented TV characters from appearing in the MCU physically, despite having an easter egg or two over the years. Here we are two years after the death blow to Daredevil, the rights to the show have reverted back to Disney and Marvel fully, the problem is that nobody really knows what that means for the franchises. The trend #SaveDaredevil has been making its way around social media in order to gain the attention of the almighty Mouse overlord to make a fourth Daredevil season and keep the cast exactly as it was. In short, Charlie Cox & crew ARE the Daredevil show that deserves to go on as intended.

IF this were to happen(big IF), we could see another smash-hit property land on Disney+ but the streaming service is already putting on Falcon & Winter Soldier, WandaVision, Loki soon PLUS the new shows for She-Hulk & Moon Knight...is there room?

Movie theaters are closed. We don't know if the world is even gonna BE here in a few months the way things are going, but I personally feel right now is the time to start making comebacks for properties we miss so much. I don't think it'll be lost on anyone if we can time these out right. Wishful thinking.

Paul Brown is the Founder of Kulture Popped and an avid pop culture aficionado.