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A picture is emerging of Daredevil: Born Again’s ratings, and it isn’t a particularly good one. The first season had a solid but comparatively low-key launch in Marvel terms, snagging 7.5 million views in its first five days. Previous MCU series Agatha All Along hit 9.3 million views in its first week on Disney+, so it was surprising to see Daredevil: Born Again fail to reach that level. Nielsen numbers then showed that the season had failed to chart in its Top 10s, and now it’s clear that season 2 hasn’t yet cracked these lists either, something that even She-Hulk and Ms. Marvel managed to accomplish.
Interestingly, Born Again season 2 has fared a bit better critically, scoring 91% on Rotten Tomatoes, compared to 87% for season 1. And we know that fans had waited years to see Daredevil back on their screens after its cancellation on Netflix, so why aren’t more people watching the revival? The answer is potentially complex; it’s likely not just that Marvel TV fatigue is real.
Daredevil Reborn, Kinda
Marvel originally had different ideas for Born Again season 1 before realizing that they weren’t working and the series needed to go back to the drawing board, halting filming and restarting after a retool and overhaul. The result was a delayed and uneven batch of episodes that swung between the gritty, street-level grudge match between Matt Murdock and Wilson Fisk and a rushed Muse storyline interrupted by a quasi Ms. Marvel crossover episode. Anything less than a slam dunk was going to be underwhelming after waiting that long for more Daredevil. Some higher expectations just weren’t met.
It also wasn’t clear to most people if Born Again was a reboot or a continuation of the Netflix era. It eventually settled on being the latter, with mixed results. Casual viewers may have already known they’d have to sit through the three previous seasons to fully appreciate Born Again and therefore probably didn’t bother to find out whether it was worth their time. As a result, the show became “I’ll probably get to it eventually” rather than “must-watch” stuff, since it was also clear that its smaller stakes were less pivotal than something like Loki, which had a much greater impact on the MCU’s overarching story.
Rebuilding the Defenders
The second season of Born Again has been cleaner, with a smoother overall arc for Daredevil and Kingpin. Season 2 has also teased a Defenders reunion after the first attempt at that team-up flopped, but the show hasn’t made much use of its major guest star so far. Jon Bernthal’s Punisher and Krysten Ritter’s Jessica Jones have both shown up briefly in Born Again, yet not enough to add any real juice to the ongoing story. These callbacks might please fans of the original run, but they do little to attract new viewers who may feel overwhelmed by its history. Now, they might not only be questioning if they have to go back and watch Daredevil, but also Jessica Jones, The Defenders, and The Punisher.
Born Again’s fate, at least in the near future, is set. There will indeed be a season 3 that promises to bring in the Defenders as a whole, including Luke Cage and Iron Fist. But the show’s viewership also appears to be set: its audience isn’t growing. Disney+ will have to decide if it’s happy with the streaming numbers it’s getting, or whether Daredevil should once again be shelved as the MCU heads toward a reset with Avengers: Secret Wars next year.
The post Why Aren’t More People Watching Daredevil: Born Again? appeared first on Den of Geek.
