You know the era of gritty superhero depictions on television has arrived when two of the biggest comic-book brands in existence are in direct competition with their own moody shows. During a recent interview with SFX Magazine, Daredevil: Born Again showrunner Dario Scardapane says the upcoming Disney+ series is in competition with the current king of dark superhero dramas, The Penguin.
We first found out Daredevil: Born Again was in development in May 2022, nearly three years prior to its scheduled March 4, 2025 release date, and eight months after we first learned about The Penguin going into development. The 2023 Writers Guild of America strike halted production of both shows, but only Daredevil: Born Again was further delayed by Marvel Studios deciding to overhaul the entire series in late September 2023 and find new directors and writers. Daredevil: Born Again got its act together and resumed filming in January 2024, a month before The Penguin finished filming. Scardapane intimated that this headstart for Penguin, which released its Season 1 premiere in September 2024, made things a bit weird in the superhero TV show world.
“It’s really strange. You work in a vacuum and then something else comes out and you go, ‘Oh, wow.’ I would say in many ways The Penguin is our direct competition [but] we’re a little faster, meaner, cleaner in our storytelling.”
Marvel and DC Studios may be enemies among hardcore comic book fans, but rarely does that competitive nature get promoted by people involved with actually continuing each brand’s legacy. How true Scardapane’s comments are will be judged when Daredevil: Born Again debuts, but it’s going to be a tall order. While The Penguin prioritized meticulous dissections of the psyches of characters like Oswald ‘Oz’ Cobb (Colin Farrell) and Sofia Falcone (Cristin Milioti) over weekly bloodfests, there were still enough mother-son incinerations, shootouts, and climactic deaths to satiate the bloodthirsty.
On the other hand, Daredevil: Born Again’s two-minute trailer has more bone-breaking hand-to-hand combat than likely the entirety of The Penguin’s first season, along with Matt Murdock (Charlie Cox) exhibiting similar existential antihero turmoil as what Cobb struggled with in The Penguin. And that earned Farrell a Golden Globe.
Either way, when creatives are in competition, the winners are always the viewers. So, let’s sit back and enjoy the start of a true dark superhero drama renaissance.