Daredevil: Born Again's season 2 finale was a weak imitation of the Netflix show

"The Southern Cross" copies the Netflix show's homework

Daredevil: Born Again season 2 ended on Tuesday with an explosive finale that put a cap on many of the show's major plotlines while also opening up new possibilities for season 3, which is currently in production. (I advise you to stay away from Mike Colter’s social media if you want to avoid spoilers.) The final episode, “The Southern Cross,” included some genuine surprises, like Matt Murdock (Charlie Cox) publicly revealing himself as Daredevil. It also included several retreads of moments from the original Netflix series finale that were already done better on that show.

[Ed. note: Spoilers below for Daredevil: Born Again season 2 episode 8.]

The finale continues Karen Page’s (Deborah Ann Woll) trial from the previous episode. Matt shows up wounded from a shootout with AVTF (Anti-Vigilante Task Force) agents, but perseveres. He and Kirsten McDuffie (Nikki M. James) call Mayor Wilson Fisk (Vincent D'Onofrio) to the stand, which the district attorney encourages because he sees this move as self-sabotage for Karen’s defense.

But interrogating Fisk isn’t Matt and Kirsten’s only ace-in-the-hole — they’re allowed to present the video testimony of Christofi Savva (Yorgos Karamihos), which Kirsten had recorded earlier in the season. In it, Christofi testifies that Fisk was behind the weapons shipment and the sinking of the Northern Star in the first episode, which set up the season’s main conflict.

Watching this unfold, I couldn’t help but think of season 3 of the Netflix Daredevil show. In it, a posthumous video revealing key information is also used to bring down Fisk. After being forcibly pulled into Fisk’s orbit throughout Daredevil season 3, FBI agent Ray Nadeem (Jay Ali) gets the last punch in — a video of him testifying to the crimes he had a hand in committing on behalf of Fisk gives authorities what they need to bring Fisk in for good.

Nadeem's video works so well because viewers spent the whole season getting to know the character and following his personal journey; he’s as important of a character in season 3 as any other. It works as the culmination of his character’s arc and offers him a bit of redemption at the end. The same can’t be said for the Savva video. It’s entirely a plot mechanic with no character arc tied to it.

The parallels between the Born Again season 2 finale and the Netflix show continue from there. Chaos abounds as protesters break into the courthouse in an attempt to remove Fisk from power. Daredevil, Jessica Jones (Krysten Ritter), and Angela del Toro/White Tiger (Camila Rodriguez) fight against AVTF agents. Their brawl takes place in a hallway, as did so many of the Netflix show’s best fight sequences.

The Born Again season 2 finale brawl is a poor imitation of what the Netflix series got right. It's stock superhero action and visually uninteresting; fighting in a hallway for the sake of fighting in a hallway. Admittedly, fight sequences have never been a strength of Born Again, so the finale’s so-so action shouldn’t be too surprising. Where the Netflix series set a high bar for action in its second episode, Born Again only produced pale imitations from the jump. At least seeing Fisk go full Darth Vader in a separate hallway was entertaining.

Born Again's season 2 finale ends with a final confrontation between Daredevil and Fisk, as it was always going to. Interestingly, Matt saves Fisk from protesters who were ready to tear him to shreds (if Fisk didn’t do that to them first). There’s no fight between an unmasked Daredevil and the Kingpin — they already had their brawl at the end of episode six — but instead one last dialogue. Matt encourages Fisk to go away lest they become trapped in this endless cycle of violence. Their conversation has a somber tone, with an exhausted Matt ready for all of this to end.

It’s a far cry from how the Netflix show ended. After a bloody fight (I forgot just how bloody that show could get), Matt nearly kills Fisk (his goal throughout the season) and instead settles for letting Fisk get taken away to prison. It’s emotionally charged, releasing three seasons’ worth of tension in a dramatic fistfight and battle of words. Nothing can top the way Cox’s Matt screams at Fisk after beating him; it’s still one of my favorite moments from any Marvel Cinematic Universe project.

Daredevil: Born Again has never been able to quite escape the shadow of the Netflix series. Its first season was held back by behind-the-scenes drama pushing and pulling it between a hard reset and a show that continued the continuity of Netflix’s Daredevil, and the final product was a mishmash of all those ideas. Season 2 paved its own way forward, but forgot some of the elements that made the original so great.

Born Again season 2 was also very plot-focused and lacked some of the character work that made the Netflix show so great. Whereas Foggy Nelson (Elden Henson) discovering Matt was Daredevil created a rift between friends, we don’t even get Kirsten’s reaction to this revelation, nor do we get to see the reunion between her and Matt. The closest Born Again’s second season got to Matt having a crisis of faith was his journey to get Bullseye (Wilson Bethel) away from the AVTF alive, but that episode relied on Netflix era flashbacks dipped in nostalgia. Matt barely even addresses his faith this season. (I need him to have heart-to-hearts with nuns!) Most of the character work in Born Again season 2 was given to Michael Gandolfini’s Daniel Blake, and he pays the ultimate price for his character development.

None of this is to say Daredevil: Born Again season 2 was a failure. I thought it was pretty good! And I will always celebrate the return of Ritter’s Jessica Jones. It’s just that the “pretty good” moments in Born Again season 2 were already done as “pretty damn awesome” in the original show.