Marvel Cinematic Universe by Slider_Quinn21 (Page 9 of 15)

I finished Iron Fist Season 2, and I agree with ireactions' assessment of the whole thing.  It, sorta, spoiled the way that the season ended up going, but I thought it was a really fun season.  I think it's easily the best season in a while and ranks up with Daredevil season 1 and Jessica Jones season 1 as one of the better Netflix Marvel seasons.  It's incredible the way they made all the boring characters into people I was interested in watching and following.

And while I don't understand the ending, I liked it.  Looking forward to more Danny and Colleen.

I finally saw Black Panther and really wasn't very impressed with it. One thing about Marvel movies that is getting old is the villains that are nothing more than a dark mirror of the hero (complete with the same powers).

BP was not very good.  None of these are very good.  If you're over the age of 16, and you want to see a good movie, try Three Billboards...

Iron Fist has been cancelled. That's a shame, since it was one of the more enjoyable shows. I'm not sure how this one gets canned, while Luke Cage lives on.

It's possible that Disney just wants these shows for their own service, or that the Iron Fist characters will move to other shows. As it stands though, the end of the series doesn't make a ton of sense to me. I guess it never will.

I wouldn't mind that, as long as whoever ran Luke Cage stayed far, far away from any new show.

If Disney does pick up the show, I hope they allow crossovers with the other shows still. With Danny making a big deal of Matt's death in season 2 of Iron Fist, it seems like those two should probably interact again at some point.

If they're moving Iron Fist to the streaming service, I'm guessing they'd eventually move all of them.  That's what I sorta meant.  Daredevil is just releasing season 3.  Jessica Jones is filming season 3 now.  Punisher season 2 is in pre-production.  Depending on whether or not Luke Cage was renewed for season 3 before or after the streaming service was official and in business, Iron Fist might've been the first show that they could've made the renew/cancel decision for.

If that's the plan, I'd expect to get a cancellation notice for Daredevil in the next couple months.  If it gets renewed, maybe they're just moving away from Danny and Colleen.

https://deadline.com/2018/10/luke-cage- … 202486487/

LUKE CAGE is cancelled. I'm shocked; the writers had been prepping Season 3, a renewal had been expected even after IRON FIST was cancelled. The first five episodes of Season 3 had been written.

Sets the stage for a consolidated, new show based on “Heroes for Hire”; but probably not.

I think the Loki and Scarlet Witch shows are definitely Disney streaming service material, but the company also owns a large chunk of Hulu. That is where the more mature shows would go.

Well, DAREDEVIL in Season 3 was awesome. Each episode had a meaningful purpose and identity of its own while forwarding the season-long arc. The choice to have Matt go back to a makeshift mask and a black sweater and pants was striking and showed how far the character had fallen. The darkness of Season 3 felt well-earned, simply depicting the corruptibility and fallibility of our institutions and establishments.
DAREDEVIL has Matt forced to consider if his deathless vigilantism is as worthless as the legal system that Wilson Fisk has co-opted and every time Matt tries to grudgingly accept the rules of law, he's flattened by a villain who fully acknowledges law and process but solely to manipulate them.

The use of imagery from iconic DAREDEVIL storylines like BORN AGAIN and GUARDIAN DEVIL serve a nice nods to the source material while creating a sense of terror for those who know that this is how Karen Page died in the comics and this is how Matt's career was destroyed. The secret origin of Karen Page is done with nuance and weight. And the finale leaves DAREDEVIL in a good place for a conclusion should the Netflix era be ending, most unlike IRON FIST's finale.

The only issue I had with Season 3 – there were points where it didn't make sense for Karen to be facing danger alone when she should and would have called her heavily armed and deeply devoted friend Frank Castle for help.

****

I am very much in the minority on this, but I felt that LUKE CAGE's conclusion at Season 2 was a strong ending for Luke Cage's arc. The problem with that ending for the fans, however, is that it wasn't a happy ending and so it felt like a cliffhanger much like QUANTUM LEAP declaring that Sam Becket never returned home. I didn't see it that way myself; in fact, I liked the uncertainty of Luke being on a knife's edge of heroism and corruption, a place where he'd always been and would always be. That lack of resolution, to me, was meaningful in depicting how the individual will always be at odds with society and its institutions whether legitimate or not.

****

I think it's unlikely that Netflix will feature DAUGHTERS OF THE DRAGON with Jessica Henwick and Simone Missick or HEROES FOR HIRE with Mike Colter and Finn Jones. Marvel isn't going to create any new shows for Netflix. When the deal started, Marvel didn't have its own streaming service and needed Netflix, but now that Marvel has its own, it makes no sense to have an outside company do what they should be doing for themselves.

But Slider_Quinn21 is totally right: the Netflix era needs a finale to offer LUKE CAGE and IRON FIST a sendoff. I think they should do a second and final season of DEFENDERS too. Just throwing together an improvised outline here: the first four episodes feature Colleen and Misty investigating a new criminal element that draws in the cast of DAREDEVIL and JESSICA JONES and Danny. By the end of the fourth episode, all of them are ready to face off against the criminal mastermind who is revealed to be Luke Cage.

Episode five shows Luke's reluctant transition into becoming a crime boss who attempts to fill the power vacuum left by Fisk's downfall in the hope of consolidating crime under his organization so as to destroy it. Episode six shows Danny Rand's adventure after Season 2 of IRON FIST where he gained the Chi bullets and met a previous Iron Fist, Orson Randall, who taught him to master his own spirit without the Iron Fist.

Episodes seven to nine have the Defenders realizing Luke is on their side and that he needs their help and bring the story to a conclusion. If Netflix wants to go the extra mile, episodes ten to thirteen are each finale episodes, one for DAREDEVIL, one for JESSICA JONES, one for LUKE CAGE and one for IRON FIST.

(I'm leaving PUNISHER out of this because I can't really wrap my head around the Netflix version of the character even though I love Karen Page and her role in the series.)

The question is, does Netflix want to sink more money into an effectively expired product? Netflix is completing obligations to JESSICA JONES' third season and a second season for THE PUNISHER; I wouldn't count on Netflix doing anything else for Marvel after that.

LUKE CAGE's third season was certain until Netflix expressed disagreement with Marvel TV over the first five scripts. In the past, the studio and the broadcaster would have worked it out, but it seems that with the Marvel/Netflix partnership coming to an end, neither party saw the point of working through their dispute. LUKE CAGE was a dead end for Netflix whether it ended with Season 2 or 3, and that totally understandable view could nullify any chance for a DEFENDERS finale season.

Could Marvel do it themselves? Perhaps, but the current word is that the streaming service is going to aim for the family friendly audience of the AVENGERS movies as opposed to the adult-audience of the Netflix shows. I think it's likely that AGENT CARTER will return to the streaming service which Netflix declined to adopt because its lighthearted tone was off-brand for the darker Marvel shows.

I guess DEFENDERS finale could go to the Disney-owned FX or Hulu... if Marvel wants to make it at all.

It's funny. A few days ago, I was like "I might stop watching Arrow. It's just not worth it when there are shows like Daredevil and the other Netflix shows that are just much better quality."

Then they started killing the Netflix shows. So we'll be stuck with the Arrowverse and Agents of SHIELD. Sigh.

I was trying to figure out if they could merge the Netflix shows with the Legion universe, but I'm not sure that would work.

RIP Stan Lee

DAREDEVIL has been cancelled.
https://www.theverge.com/2018/11/29/181 … -iron-fist

Sad, but not surprised.

From everything I've read, this is a closing down of these properties.  The Disney Streaming Service is being run by Marvel Films, not Marvel TV (that's why they're suddenly doing properties related to the films, not using the limited roster that TV was able to use).  As ireactions has documented at length, those two sides hate each other.  Since the Netflix series' are Marvel TV, I'm guessing they're just axing them with no regard for them at all.

It sucks.  Some of them were terrible, but I think it'd be nice to get a resolution.  At this rate, we're either going to get a "finale" for this universe with Jessica Jones or Punisher...easily the two shows that are most on the outside of this sect of the universe.  And it's probably too late to turn either of them into any sort of wrap up.

Even if there was just a Defenders 2-hour movie on Netflix, that'd allow for a proper wrap-up.

I mean wouldn't they just leave them on Netflix?  I haven't read that they'd move it - it's still Netflix's stuff, even if it's cancelled.

As of this writing, Informant is flat out wrong about the Netflix shows moving to Disney's streaming service. DAREDEVIL, JESSICA JONES, LUKE CAGE, PUNISHER, IRON FIST and DEFENDERS were all projects from Marvel TV made in a co-production deal with Netflix. The Disney streaming service is being driven by Marvel Film which, despite branding, has little to no professional collaboration with Marvel TV right now.

We need to understand that Marvel Film and Marvel TV are currently two separate entities due to an extremely acrimonious divorce. One side got the movies and the other side got the TV shows.

Marvel Film's billion dollar earnings allow it to dictate the course of the Marvel Cinematic Universe and Marvel TV is a lower-tier branch run by a former Marvel Film executive who was ousted from the movie division but retained control of the TV properties. Essentially, Marvel TV is like Pocket Books for STAR TREK, doing media tie-ins that just happen to be TV shows rather than novels.

However, despite the internal division, Netflix views a Disney streaming service as direct competition and is understandably disinclined to produce their competitions TV shows. Marvel Film has no involvement in the Netflix shows or the ABC shows (well, just one now) or the Hulu shows; they have about as much interest in these properties as J.J. Abrams would have in STAR WARS novels when directing the next movie except in this case, the Marvel Film/Marvel TV relationship is coldly indifferent on a good day and hostile on most days.

For this reason, it is currently not in the cards for the Disney streaming service to feature Peggy Carter, any Netflix shows or any Marvel TV content.

Could that change? Right now, I'm mildly astonished that Marvel Film hasn't simply ordered the ABC, Netflix and Hulu content to be stricken from the record, but the Marvel TV head seems to own too much Disney stock to be entirely dismissed at this point, so Marvel Film has settled for icily ignoring the TV shows.

Marvel TV content isn't going to be moving from Netflix to any platform led by Marvel Film. If Marvel TV wants a fourth season of DAREDEVIL or a second season of DEFENDERS, it's going to have to find a network or streaming service that will tolerate working for their own competition or come up with a Marvel TV streaming service of its own.

Any analysis that treats Marvel Film and Marvel TV as the same entity is simply misinformed.

Ike Perlmutter is the problem at Marvel.  He’s a notorious penny pincher who believes everything should be as low budget as possible (last year’s failed Inhumans theatrical roll-out being an example of his philosophy).  He’s also rather petty (an example being the death of the Fantastic Four comic because Fox wouldn’t do what he wanted on the film side).

That said, Perlmutter is still part of Marvel / Disney; so there’s not necessarily a reason to shop the shows around to other services.  Similar to Universal’s Brooklyn 99 going to Universal owned NBC after the Fox cancellation, the Marvel tv properties could “come home” to Hulu (which Disney now has a 60% stake in and likely about to be a 70% stake if they buy out Universal as has been reported).  It just depends on if there is the will for it inside Disney; and I’m betting that comes down to a numbers game.  Were the Netflix shows popular enough to justify continuing with a 60% to 70% stake in the profits - likely more than they were getting with Netflix).

But moreso, things are complicated by Netflix retaining some stake and keeping the existing episodes on their service.  Is this a Firefly / Serenity situation?  For an unspecified time, is Netflix the only service with the right to make an episodic television format of these characters while Marvel retained the right to make feature films?  Universal could have kept making Serenity movies; but Fox denied them the right to restart the tv show on Sci-Fi Channel.

Has anyone seen the Runaways series on Hulu? I haven't tried it yet, so I'm wondering what the style of Hulu's one current Marvel show is.

I don't think Perlmutter is necessarily a problem in that he's been isolated to the TV department which is doing pretty well? He has no influence on the film division anymore.

There are things about Perlmutter that I think are admirable and things that aren't. His penny pinching was, during the first phase of standalone movies, a pragmatic process to the successes of IRON MAN, THOR, CAPTAIN AMERICA and AVENGERS.

He set a budget that forced producers and directors to work out a clear filming schedule, effective reshoots, extensive use of sets and locations to get as much money onscreen as possible -- and he refused to engage in the massive amounts of waste of other blockbuster films. This didn't work for me personally in that AVENGERS seems to be set almost entirely on the Helicarrier, but the world at large seemed fine with it.

In contrast, movies like JUSTICE LEAGUE overpay their actors with far more money than anyone could spend and unnecessary luxuries. Perlmutter mandated hiring newcomers like Evans and Hemsworth or diminished stars like Downey Jr. for their lower rates. He also refused to pay entourage travel expenses, allowing only one free travel companion per star. WB hired Ben Affleck and the Ben Affleck machine. Perlmutter demanded advance planning to minimize reshoots and cut down on unnecessary set days and location filming. JUSTICE LEAGUE blew hundreds of millions on sequences that aren't in the film. Perlmutter had premieres catered by Subway. The bulk of Marvel's money went to what's actually on the screen.

However, after the success of AVENGERS, Perlmutter continued to treat Marvel Film like a startup company, refusing to expand budgets even though the return on investment was now a certainty. This led to a massive fight over CIVIL WAR which originally had Downey Jr. booked for a few weeks of filming in a very small role for Tony Stark and a sizable role for Iron Man (in the armour, performed mostly through voiceover). Downey Jr. expressed the wish to play a larger role and receive a larger salary, feeling that Marvel Film's success could now afford it. Producer Kevin Feige felt the same way.

Perlmutter ordered Feige to fire Downey Jr. for asking for more money (even though he was offering to do more work). Perlmutter ordered that Tony Stark be written out of the script. Feige protested as CIVIL WAR was the story of Captain America vs. Iron Man.

Disney, observing Feige's success and uncomfortable with Perlmutter's bizarre behaviour, demoted Perlmutter to managing Marvel's comic book and television properties and promoted Feige to run the film division.

There's a lot to admire about Perlmutter when Marvel was struggling through a bankruptcy, when Marvel was trying to launch films after they'd sold Spider-Man to Sony and X-Men and Fantastic Four to FOX. But once Marvel Film was a success, Perlmutter's philosophy didn't make any sense. I haven't seen the IMAX INHUMANS (or any INHUMANS), but IMAX publically apologized for the cheapness of the production.

Perlmutter's attitude makes sense for a startup situation and I think his money management is the right approach for TV (but definitely not IMAX). TV is a factory of limited budgets and tight schedules; Perlmutter's obsessive planning and pennywise tactics are a good fit. You wouldn't see Perlmutter blowing the bulk of AGENTS OF SHIELD's season budget on, say, hiring Roger Daltrey and his band to perform a rock concert with filming to be done between binge drinking sessions. You'd never see lax safety standards leading to an actor dying while filming a car chase -- not because Perlmutter cares about safety, but he certainly cares about not wasting money on getting sued and fined. (That last one's conjecture, but work with me.)

I can also appreciate how Perlmutter, despite being an ardent Trump supporter and friend, permitted AGENTS OF SHIELD to actively mock the Trump administration in various lines of dialogue. Without Perlmutter, Marvel Film and Marvel TV wouldn't have ever gotten off the ground, but Marvel Film needed to fly free without him and maybe Marvel TV would benefit from the same -- if only to get its content onto the Marvel Film streaming platform.

When it comes to the movies, it's really impossible to try to discuss budgets and success based on box office results. For decades, Hollywood has literally built an internal industry out of twisting their accounting in order to benefit their overall company. It's impossible to tell how the budgets are being juggled, and to what end. Warner Bros could say that they spent X amount of money on the film, while paying the bulk of that money to their own internal companies (and thus to themselves). Reporting less net profits means that certain parties would be paid less, due to how their contracts were negotiated. You'd think that more money equals more profits and success, but that is not necessarily the case.

Meanwhile, Marvel is operating on a whole other system.

So to say "Justice League cost this, but made that" is really impossible. What we can judge is how the movies performed at the box office, compared to other movies released that year. We have to leave the budgets and profits to the studios, because they're the only ones who really know what the hell they're doing. Half of it is probably illegal.

Do I think that the shows will be picked up by Disney+? No. I think there's a chance that we see some version of these shows on Hulu... meaning group miniseries, etc. Possibly using characters who aren't the title characters of the Netflix shows. I'm not saying that I think this will definitely happen, but a large part of what Disney has been doing over the past decade or so has been driven by bringing their properties "home". The Fox deal makes no sense to Disney without Star Wars and the Marvel titles. Even then, I'm not sure that it was worth what they paid. The fact that they now own a controlling share of Hulu is not something that they will be ignoring. They will want to build that brand far more than where it's at now, and bringing known titles to that service is one way to do that.

Disney+, as well as the Marvel movies, are family-friendly cartoonish franchises. Honestly, I'm not sure that the plan for that platform is looking good, from what I've seen, but we'll see. I still don't get how the movies perform so well. Though my nephews love them, so I guess that explains it a bit.

Hulu is a different creature though. As is FX. We have a show like Legion, which is far more Daredevil than it is Spider-Man Homecoming. We also have a movie like Deadpool, which is clearly never going to be streaming on Disney+. There is an audience for these more "mature" or "darker" shows and movies, and Disney now has the ability to display those titles under different brands, but they need Hulu to survive in order for that to work. Moreso than they need FX, really.

I expect some sort of investment in Hulu, with big titles, geared toward more mature audiences (hopefully they will pursue this through quality and not just cheap "sex sells" tactics). The Netflix universe would be a template for that, if not the direct source.

It's fun to speculate, but I guess we don't really know. We don't know what Disney wants to invest in, what it's willing to let die, and how much they are willing to spend/lose on either of those desires.

Given that in the aftermath of JUSTICE LEAGUE's box office, we have no JUSTICE LEAGUE II, no MAN OF STEEL II, no Ben Affleck BATMAN film, DC Films division producer Jon Berg dismissed, DC chief Geoff Johns demoted, it's safe to say JUSTICE LEAGUE didn't do well. It's a simple metric that a film must earn three times its production budget to turn a profit and JUSTICE LEAGUE having cost $300 million to earn $660 million, the film's short by $240 million.

If the first AVENGERS movie had earned $660 million on its $220 million budget, it would have been considered an adequate (but not spectacular) return. But it cracked 1.5 billion -- and yet, Perlmutter fought any budget increases for the subsequent films. Financially, DC has been spending too much before it had won its sought after billion dollar success and the Marvel film division was spending too little after it had proven to be a billion dollar earner.

And yet... when the Netflix shows were first announced, Informant noted the costly New York City location filming and how he doubted the project could justify its costs. He was dead wrong for the first season of DAREDEVIL, JESSICA JONES and PUNISHER but he has proven correct for LUKE CAGE, IRON FIST, DEFENDERS and the subsequent seasons of DAREDEVIL and JJ. The viewership fell drastically after the double bomb of IRON FIST and DEFENDERS and Netflix no longer wants to pay for any of it.

Anyway. Marvel Entertainment (TV, comics under Perlmutter) has the Marvel Unlimited service for digital comic books. They could conceivably reinvest in that and restructure it to give the TV division a new home, but currently, their business model has been to shop shows to networks and streaming services who then pay to produce and air it.

However, Perlmutter brought Marvel Studios (film) into existence with the view that they shouldn't be selling film rights (and profits) to other studios when they could make the films themselves and keep the earnings. Perhaps he might consider that Marvel Entertainment needs to start airing their own shows...

I dunno. Whether I like it or not, the Marvel Cinematic Universe is oriented not around the very excellent DAREDEVIL series, not around AGENTS OF SHIELD and not around AGENT CARTER or the MARVEL ONE SHOTS or the tie-in comics. The core MCU content is the AVENGERS movies and I wonder what they'll do with AVENGERS ENDGAME. Here's the trailer.

https://www.newsarama.com/43019-avenger … ailer.html

I am not a wholehearted admirer of the widescreen, massive battle aesthetic of AVENGERS INFINITY WAR and I'm expecting more of the same in ENDGAME. That said, just because a piece of art isn't for me doesn't mean it's not good. There are lots of things that aren't for me -- sex with men, alcohol, pornography, episodes of QUANTUM LEAP, horror films, Lays potato chips -- that doesn't mean they need to be replaced or removed from reality itself by way of a finger snap from Thanos.

The success of an AVENGERS movie can only be good for AGENTS OF SHIELD, a potential third season of AGENT CARTER, a new home for the Netflix shows, continued development of DC's superhero properties and if the Russos have another hit, maybe they would turn their star power to bringing about a COMMUNITY movie. If an AVENGERS film succeeds, then superheroes succeed.

It isn't really in the MCU, but it's a Marvel movie.

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is legitimately great.  I absolutely loved it.

I watched season 3 of Daredevil over Christmas break.  I'm really bummed that this show was cancelled.  It's been the one whose quality has remained fairly high throughout, and it might be the only one that can consistently support 13 episodes.  Not only that, I think Wilson Fisk is one of the best villains, not just from these series but from the MCU as a whole.  I don't know how much of the Netflix stuff is worth preserving if this world is truly dead, but I think Cox as Daredevil and D'onofrio as Fisk are definitely worth keeping around, even if they're watered down into an MCU-acceptable version.

I just really liked the whole season.  Matt is broken from his experience and sees no value in Matt Murdock.  His friends are both hoping he's alive and wanting to move on with their lives.  Fisk gives the appearance of being broken and desperate to save Vanessa.  And I thought all the moves and turns in the season were earned and made sense.  I really liked the addition of Ray Nadeem, although I wish that things had turned out better for him.

The Fisk stuff was legitimately terrifying and disturbing.  I loved how they used the imagery of the penthouse to really send home how much power he'd accumulated.  He goes from a barren room with nothing, wearing his prison jumpsuits to an elegantly decorated room wearing his trademark suits.  He goes from being watched to watching them.  He goes from being yelled at by guys like Poindexter and other agents to having them call him sir and take his orders.  Again, it was a bit disturbing and made me worry about the system in the same way that Matt does.  I'm sure stuff like this happens all the time....maybe not to this extent but to a large-enough extent.  Fisk felt so powerful, so untouchable, and even going into the last episode, it seemed like there was no hope.

I was a little disappointed that we never saw Matt back in the red suit, but I understand why they didn't.  And unlike the other Netflix shows, which feel dragged out - they actually only told half of Poindexter's story - as he now can truly become Bullseye.  I thought he was another 3-dimensional character who made a lot of sense.  I really loved the scene where Fisk is overlooking Dex's childhood memories.  That was effective.

All in all, I really liked the season.  I'd have loved to see where they were going for season 4, and I'm sad we won't get these characters again.

We might find ourselves watching THE PUNISHER and wondering where the hell Karen is when Frank needs her, as both the new season of PUNISHER and the last season of DAREDEVIL were filmed at the same time leading to actor unavailabilities.

Karen will be in PUNISHER's upcoming season, but I'm not sure how much she'll be in it as the actress was busy filming DAREDEVIL.

My guess -- and it is just a guess -- they simply couldn't get Frank's actor in Season 3 to the degree in which they would have needed him. He's a difficult character to bring in for a cameo and usher away if Karen's in danger and you'd spend the rest of the season wondering why he didn't come back. So rather they decided not to raise the issue at all. It reminds me of when Worf got married on DEEP SPACE NINE and production could only secure appearances for Riker and LaForge, which would leave the audience wondering if Picard, Data, Crusher and Troi didn't like Worf anymore, so rather than bring up a question that could not be satisfactorily addressed, it was set aside entirely.

I can't see this working at all. Frank loves Karen. I don't know that it's necessarily romantic, but there is a devotion. A caring that goes beyond pleasantries and deeply into respect, appreciation, longing, and there is nothing Karen could say that could keep him away if she were in danger nor would he keep his distance even if Bullseye's only trying to scare her. And if Frank doesn't answer Karen's phone call or isn't at her doorstep within an hour of a voicemail, then Frank is being written out of character.

There is no way to mention Frank briefly and have him be unavailable when a person he cherishes and treasures and to whom he has the utmost loyalty and respect is being hunted without having Bernthal onscreen to establish that he's physically unable to get to Karen for whatever reason and the only way to make that plausible would be to turn it into a PUNISHER story when it's a season of DAREDEVIL. I don't think Frank is in love with Karen -- I don't think he's over his wife and he may never recover from her loss, but (by process of elimination), Karen is the most important person in the world to him. Could YOUR wife convince you to stay away if she were in trouble?

What explanation would satisfy? Frank had food poisoning? Constipation? Flu? Silent retreat in the wilderness? Would any of these convincingly keep Frank away?

This is pretty much they were going for, I think. They couldn't come up with a convincing answer, so they decided not to raise the question. If Bernthal had been available, they probably could have done a few episodes where Frank is helping Karen but Frank is injured or arrested by the Fisk-corrupted FBI and taken out of the series until he escapes for the finale and helps Matt get through security to confront Fisk in his penthouse. You could even do a thing where Frank sizes Bullseye up, determines that he can't beat him and leaves it to Matt and Matt's supersenses, choosing to focus on helping Karen instead. But the actor was filming his own show.

If I HAD to explain it, I would probably say that there were many, many, many more attempts on Karen's life than we actually saw onscreen and Frank was dealing with them off camera so covertly, so quietly and in such a black-ops manner that nobody ever knew he was there. A similar joke was made in an AVENGERS comic (actually, it was an issue of THE ULTIMATES) where Hawkeye yells at Quicksilver for not helping out in a battle against Ultron and Quicksilver says that he saved Hawkeye's life 30 - 40 times at superspeed and he's annoyed that Hawkeye isn't grateful. Or that episode of COMMUNITY where Jack Black was edited into flashbacks or that episode of LOST that I can't remember, but I know you like LOST references.

This is a pretty good idea, but it's not without its problems. The audience loses focus on how Matt is clearly losing his mind as he abandons his identity and is increasingly suicidal, on how Fisk has gone from a jumpsuit and a half-eaten TV dinner to living in the lap of luxury, on how Karen is outgunned and Matt is concerned for her safety but distant from her situation -- and instead, the focus becomes entirely on Castle even if he's only heard in a voiceover. Why is Frank behaving out of character? Why has the show rendered him in a fashion completely against his love for Karen in his previous appearances?

It's (gleefully and cleverly) calling attention to a problem that serves only to distract the viewer when it's preferable to move this issue to the realm of what TV Tropes calls Fridge Logic, something you only wonder about after the credits have rolled and you're getting something to eat.

If Netflix weren't urgently exciting the Marvel Cinematic Universe, I'd expect one of those ONE-SHOT type short films where Frank we either have the story you described above or we see Frank surveilling Karen throughout Season 3: he uses a sniper rifle to take down gunmen chasing her, is crouched behind a porch when streetpunks menace her on the street, he's impersonating one of the FBI agents searching the church and misdirecting them, he's listening quietly when Karen reveals how she got her brother killed, etc..

But this raises its own problems too: if Karen's danger is retroactively reduced because Castle was lurking slightly out of frame the entire time, it diminishes Season 3's sense of threat. Also, there's a certain comedic goofiness to this blatant retcon that might be awkward for a militaristic, serious series like THE PUNISHER.

This reminds me of an episode of SMALLVILLE where Oliver (please try to think of Justin Hartley) is looking to murder Lex Luthor and Clark is trying to prevent this passively by refusing to hand over a router that could lead to Lex's location. Oliver agrees to let Clark handle it, but then speaks with a subordinate who informs Oliver that he has copied the data from the router. This would be the unplugged, disconnected router that Clark was holding in his hand which this anonymous suit claims he could somehow read and clone without ever going near it. It makes no sense whatsoever.

The reason for this error: the subordinate was supposed to be Cyborg and his ability to interface with any technology remotely and power it regardless of its disconnection, but actor Lee Thompson Young backed out at the last second and with no time for a rewrite, Cyborg's dialogue was given to another performer.

Regardless, it reminds me of my old SLIDERS standby when asked how the cast could alternate between the same outfits and how the Professor always had a tailored suit -- all plot and production problems are just one missing story away from being explained.