A lot of people were vocally disappointed whenever Netflix made the call to cancel Marvel's Daredevil less than two months after its highly acclaimed third season premiered. But someone who remained silent about it was Matt Murdock himself, Charlie Cox. Now, a full week after the cancellation went down, Cox has opened up with how he feels about Daredevil ending on Netflix.
A lot of us really expected to keep going, and I certainly did. The truth is, I felt like we had a lot of stories to tell, and although I understand [the cancellation], I'm very saddened by that. It's just how business works. But also, these characters mean a lot to people. It's weird to think there's a chance I won't be playing Matt Murdock ever again. That's a bizarre feeling, because that character has been such a huge part of my life for the last four and a half years.
In vacating the role of a hugely popular superhero, Charlie Cox truly is in a particular position that few actors have experienced in the recent past. After three standalone seasons (and a temporary trip to The Defenders), Daredevil had the longest comic hero shelf life behind the Arrow-verse shows and Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., and none of those series look to be ending any time soon.
Granted, superhero casting changes aren't a new phenomenon on the big screen, and the DCEU current state could boost that average. But for television, where season-long commitments are a different ballgame than film sequels, superhero longevity is still relatively new. And despite the previous cancellations for Iron Fist and Luke Cage, Daredevil seemed primed to live and fight another day, if only because critics and fans championed Season 3 so hard.
Saddened as he may be, Charlie Cox is not putting the kibosh on the possibility of ever suiting up as either Matt Murdock or Daredevil again. As he put it to EW, he is definitely down with reprising the role in some way down the road.
Oh my God, yeah. I don't know how this would happen, but maybe one day we could pick up the baton and do it again.
When the cancellation news hit, it was made clear that Daredevil was still going to be showing up in some way in the MCU, though there wasn't much context for how that could happen. Will Marvel decide to spin a fourth season out of Daredevil for the upcoming streaming service Disney+? Or will the Man Without Fear finally get another shot at leading his own feature film?
Before and after the show's blindsiding cancellation, Daredevil showrunner Erik Oleson had talked about bringing the creative team's Season 4 pitch to Netflix, and how excited everyone was for it. One writer was literally planning out writing schedules when the news came down.
When Charlie Cox was asked about where Season 4 might have gone, he chose not to get into it, not wanting to feed into speculation about what the writers had put together. In his words:
It's so new, the news. It's quite painful for quite a lot of people. I was really excited about the ideas that were talked about for Season 4, and I think if I was to speculate about it and it went on the internet, it might not be very helpful to people.
Unfortunately, Charlie Cox didn't have any fantastical teases for where Daredevil might show up next. So for now, fans should just keep hopes alive that Marvel will figure out the best way possible to keep Matt Murdock around in the future, knowing that the actor would dive back into the role.
All three seasons of Daredevil are currently available to stream on Netflix, and Jessica Jones Season 3 and The Punisher Season 2 will be hitting the streaming service at some point in 2019. To see what else is on the way in the near future, head to our 2018 Netflix schedule and our midseason premiere guide.
