Old School. Biblically Independent.
By Mike Redmond | News | October 16, 2026
At New York Comic-Con last weekend, Charlie Cox took the stage with all of the Defenders — save Mike Colter — to promote Daredevil: Born Again Season 3. There was just one very awkward elephant in the room: The show had been canceled. Once again, Cox’s version of ol’ hornhead made it to Season 3 on a streaming platform, and once again, that was the end of the line.
Knowing full well the power of fan campaigns, Cox naturally gave a shout out to “Save Daredevil” after the crowd booed when Born Again’s demise was brought up. “All I’ll the say is, I imagine the ‘Save Daredevil’ campaign will be gearing up for round two,” Cox said. “Listen, we don’t want to invite the wrath of the ‘Save Daredevil’ people.”
Unfortunately, it’s going to take more than hashtags and emails this time around. While stopping by The Brandon Davis Show, Marvel TV head Brad Winderbaum got blunt about Daredevil’s fate.
Via Total Film:
“You know it’s interesting the internet, it’s not what it used to be even a few years ago when you could stage a campaign and get something made like that. ‘Save Daredevil’ is great but we also need ‘hashtag Watch Daredevil’. The biggest leverage I have, and I say this all the time, is the actual viewership numbers. That’s what people are looking for, that’s where I get my power to be able to make something or not. I just want people to watch the show.”
Winderbaum is not wrong. If people don’t watch these shows, Disney isn’t going to throw money at them. (Anymore.) As I’ve reported before, the numbers for Born Again Season 2 were in the toilet, which was already the case for Season 1. Viewership went even further down the pipe, and a lot of people don’t know that the same thing happened with the Netflix show. Despite the Marvel of it all and social media chatter making it seem otherwise, people just aren’t watching these shows. Frankly, I think that’s an even more pronounced problem with Disney+ across the board because every time streaming prices go up, it’s always the first platform people ditch if they haven’t already.
Here’s what it looks like on our end and from industry reporting.
HBO shows: Do crazy numbers.
Netflix shows: Do crazy numbers.
Peacock shows: Do surprisingly decent numbers.
Hulu shows: Do numbers… I think? (Don’t quote me on that.)
Disney+ shows: *crickets*
Gone are the days of The Mandalorian, which was a mammoth success and without COVID. It dropped in November 2019 and just steamrolled everything. Of course, it helped that Disney+ was only $7 and boasted every Disney movie in its catalog? People are going to jump on that, but they’re not going to stick around for driving beloved franchises into the ground, which will be Disney+’s entire legacy. It killed not one, but two golden gooses while a pandemic was keeping people indoors. There’s never been a more colossal bag drop.
