It has finally happened, though it should not be all that surprising to anyone who was paying attention, or reading articles here on the site. Netflix has announced, a little over a month after the premiere of The Punisher’ Season 2, the cancellation of ‘The Punisher,’ and not only that, they also revealed that while ‘Jessica Jones’ will still air Season 3 on the streaming giant, that series has also been cancelled. Meaning there are now officially no active Marvel shows left on Netflix. Here’s the statement from Netflix that they gave to Deadline:
“Marvel’s The Punisher will not return for a third season on Netflix. Showrunner Steve Lightfoot,
the terrific crew, and exceptional cast including star Jon Bernthal, delivered an acclaimed and
compelling series for fans, and we are proud to showcase their work on Netflix for years to come. In
addition, in reviewing our Marvel programming, we have decided that the upcoming third season
will also be the final season for Marvel’s Jessica Jones. We are grateful to showrunner Melissa Rosenberg,
star Krysten Ritter and the entire cast and crew, for three incredible seasons of this groundbreaking
series, which was recognized by the Peabody Awards among many others. We are grateful to Marvel
or five years of our fruitful partnership and thank the passionate fans who have followed these series
from the beginning.”
In response to the official cancellation, Head of Marvel TV Jeph Loeb also released a statement from Marvel TV, which had a much more upbeat tone to it than most would have thought, and offered some hope for the future of these shows:
“It had never been done before. Four separate television series, each with different super-talented showrunners, writers, directors, cast and crew, coming out months apart and then …they would meet in a single event series all set in the heart of New York City. We called them The Defenders.
And together we were thrilled by stories of Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, Iron Fist and even the Punisher joined in! They said it couldn’t be done.But Marvel assembled amazing teams to write, produce, direct, edit, and score 13 seasons and 161 one-hour episodes. Take a moment and go online and look at the dazzling list of actors, writers, directors, and musicians who graced us with the very best of their craft.
We loved each and every minute of it.
And we did it all for you — the fans — who cheered for us around the world and made all the hard work worth it.
On behalf of everyone at Marvel Television, we couldn’t be more proud or more grateful to our audience. Our Network partner may have decided they no longer want to continue telling the tales of these great characters… but you know Marvel better than that.
As Matthew Murdock’s Dad once said, ‘The measure of a man is not how he gets knocked to the mat, it’s how he gets back up. To be continued…!”
Adding to the responses today are the Punisher himself, Jon Bernthal, who took to Instagram to share his own farewell to the character and thanks to those who inspired him:
So that’s it for the Marvel and Netflix relationship, sans the premiere of ‘Jessica Jones’ Season 3 later this year, which will be bittersweet as it will be our final chance to live in the “street level” MCU created by Marvel TV and Netflix 6 years ago. Of course, with Marvel and Hulu recently signing a familiar sounding deal for 4 series and a TV special on February 11th 2019, there may be hope for the future (unless this deal has nothing to do with the Netflix shows, as it might be about brand new series, but let’s hope not).
So with any luck, we may get to see more of the Defenders in a few years once that pesky Netflix clause is over and Marvel can use the characters again. Until then, we can celebrate the 13 seasons we did get on Netflix, and hope that Marvel TV has some big plans for the future to keep the fans happy after this loss.
Source: Deadline
