When the inaugural season of Marvel’s Daredevil: Born Again, a relaunch of the Marvel superhero’s 2015 – 2018 Netflix series, ended, the crime lord Wilson Fisk (Vincent D’Onofrio) has managed to become elected mayor of New York City and, through a forgotten legal loophole, has turned Red Hook in Brooklyn into a free port outside the purview of the United States government.
This “Battle for New York” that is shown across Daredevil: Born Again season two is more of a battle for the hearts and minds of New Yorkers than an all-out superhero brawl. (Though there is some of that as well.) News and viral video clips scattered throughout the season show city denizens initially on board with Fisk’s policies, though that starts to change as his crackdowns become more brutal and public. It’s hard not to draw parallels to current events in several major cities, even if these episodes were written and filmed a year ago.
Story-wise, this second season is far more even than the previous season, which had been laboring under a mid-shoot creative overhaul. Thematically, it is more cohesive, getting morally more complex as the situation escalates. With the AVTF starting to use stronger and stronger force, Karen (Deborah Ann Woll) tells Matt/Daredevil (Charlie Cox) that he may find himself in a position where he may have to take the life of an opponent. Matt resolutely states that he will not kill, partly because his Catholic faith tells him its wrong, partly because he knows that it would only prove to the public that Fisk was right. It is a stance that becomes tested as this run of episodes heads towards its conclusion and Cox and Woll play it well.
Of all the supporting cast, Michael Gandolfini perhaps makes out the best. Throughout the season his Deputy Mayor Daniel Blake continues to be seduced by the material trappings his of his position while facing the dark possibilities of what he will have to do to maintain his new found level of comfort. Matthew Lillard’s shadowy government agent in league with Fisk is an intriguing addition to the lineup, though doesn’t get much time to dig too deep into his character or his true motives.
The least served in the cast is probably Margarita Levieva. As Matt Murdoch’s love interest Dr Heather Glenn, whom he has to ultimately save from the psychotic serial killer Muse, Levieva had a fairly front and center role through most of season one. Here, however, the character’s role is very much diminished for a good chunk of season two, In part due to the ending of her relationship with Matt. Even her role as a psychiatrist sees her sidelined for most of the season except for two plot beats. What little we get beyond that seems more like set up for next year’s season three than anything pressing here.
