The panel was moderated, in typical fashion, by Executive Vice President of Marvel Television Jeph Loeb, who was interrupted and awarded with a Comic-Con Ink Pot award for contributions to TV even before he could get proceedings underway. After a few tears and an impromptu speech about never giving up on your dreams, Loeb went on to thank Netflix's Vice President of Original Series Allie Goss for believing in their dream and going “in for 60,” a reference to the original planned 60 episode run of DAREDEVIL, JESSICA JONES, LUKE CAGE, IRON FIST, with 13 episodes a piece, and THE DEFENDERS crossover being eight episode. He even got Hall H to sing her Happy Birthday.
Just as the singing died down, John Bernthal made his way onstage to cheers from the crowd. It was no surprise he was at Comic-Con, such is the social media saturated world we live in, but it was great to see him. Loeb commented on what a surprise hit the Punisher character had been in DAREDEVIL Season 2 and how Netflix approached Marvel about giving the character his own spin-off series. Bernthal thanked police, servicemen and women, as the Punisher having a “military component” meaning Bernthal wanted to give his respects, ending finally with the fans of the character who made the whole thing possible. He then insisted Loeb play a clip, and that they did.
The footage shown included Frank Castle taking out bikers after a brief car chase, backing his vehicle up over one just to make sure he got him, Castle taking out a Mexican criminal with a sniper rifle only be be revealed that he was still on U.S. soil over the border when he took the shot and Castle taking out a guy in a bathroom stall, only for some other “customers” to interpret the grunts coming from within, telling them to “get a room.” The real meat though, was the imagery that opened the reel, with Frank teaching his daughter how to play the guitar, before cutting to a broken Frank, alone and struggling to play the same guitar. There were a few damp eyes in Hall H.
As the reel ended, and Bernthal left the stage, Loeb then introduced the lineup for THE DEFENDERS. This composed of showrunner Marco Ramirez, Jessica Henwick a.k.a. Colleen Wing, Deborah Anne Woll a.k.a. Karen Page, Elodie Yung a.k.a. Elektra, Sigourney Weaver a.k.a. Alexandra, and then the four main heroes themselves, Finn Jones a.k.a. Iron Fist, Mike Colter a.k.a. Luke Cage, Krysten Ritter a.k.a. Jessica Jones and Charlie Cox a.k.a. Daredevil.
Loeb gave special thanks to Ritter and Colter for flying in from New York for Comic-Con as they were busy shooting the second seasons of JESSICA JONES and LUKE CAGE, respectively.
As DAREDEVIL Season 3 had already been announced last year, Loeb rounded proceedings out by announcing, for possibly the first time — I'm sure Jones let this slip a few weeks back — that IRON FIST has been renewed and would get a second season. To top this off, he mentioned that a friend of Colleen's would be tuning up, a fact that made him “a little misty,” a clear nod to Misty Knight, who first appeared in LUKE CAGE and looks to be set following in her comic book counterpart's footsteps by joining with Colleen as the 'Daughter's of the Dragon.' IRON FIST Season 2 already sounds like an improvement over Season 1.
Henwick said Colleen would need to find a way to grieve and move forward following the events of IRON FIST, but it was Jones's comments that really caught my attention. Whilst Loeb referred to IRON FIST Season 1 as his “coming out party,” Jones said Danny Rand is now a man on a mission, considering Iron Fist and The Defenders to be his first complete arc... his “Phase 1.”
Inspired by his encounter with the other Defenders to use his powers in a more mature and constructive way. Basically he admit, albeit in a very diplomatic way, that Danny's development over the course of Season 1 left much to be desired. Also, they pointed out there would be more “kick butt-ery,” possibly a nod to the lacklustrer fights scenes in Season 1.
Loeb quizzed Ramirez on the challenge of putting together the puzzle that was THE DEFENDERS. Ramirez, who has previously served as producer/showrunner on DAREDEVIL, stated it was all about honouring the characters individually so they didn't feel like the were just “visiting Daredevil's world.” Ann Wall spoke briefly on reaching out to Rosario Dawson about appearing on multiple connected shows whilst shooting both THE DEFENDERS and THE PUNISHER at the same time, sometimes shooting one during the day and the other at night.
Elodie Yung gave a few hints as to where her Elektra is at, seeing as the last time we saw her she was dead. Evidently, she's been brought back by Sigourney's mysterious Alexandra and trained to be a human weapon for The Hand, with no memory of her life before she was resurrected. We got very little on exactly who the main villain Alexandra is, Sigourney instead choosing to share the anecdote that the first time she ever met THE DEFENDERS was when she was introduced on stage at New York Comic Con last October. But she said she loved the shows previous to being cast and as a New Yorker herself, loved that the Big Apple was “The Fifth Defender.”
Mike Colter kept it brief speaking about how Luke and Danny will become friends, like in the comics (Yay!) and Ritter touched upon Jessica Jones not playing well with the other Defenders, cutting them down, mocking Daredevil for his suit, but really, deep down, she has a “gooey inside” and does want to do good. Charlie Cox and Loeb back-and-forthed on the fact he was the first Defender and the other characters didn't even exist when they were making Daredevil. Cox vaguely remembered when signing to play the role, a part of the contract that mentioned THE DEFENDERS, but he seemed somewhat humbled being in Hall H celebrating this series of shows at his first ever San Diego Comic-Con.
Loeb finally announced, as a special treat, the crowd would be treated to a clip from THE DEFENDERS, a clip that just happened to run the exact length of the entire first episode! Audiences were treated to the whole thing as all the cameras got switched off.
Written by Nick Whitney, MCU Correspondent -- Click here to read Nick's posts
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