Most fans of the Marvel Cinematic Universe – both the big-screen and TV variety – know by now that The Punisher is getting his own Netflix series, the first such series to come from the Marvel-Netflix relationship that was unplanned at the beginning of the process. Jon Bernthal stepped in to play tortured serviceman Frank Castle in the second season of Netflix’s ‘Daredevil,’ to great acclaim and appreciation from fans. The new series will be premiering on the streaming giant’s service later this year – and now, thanks to one Marvel executive, we have a hint that another Marvel hero may be seen on the show as well.
Per a report from the MCU Exchange, the info was given at the Asia Pop Comic-Con over the weekend. At a panel focused on MCU properties, Marvel’s Senior Vice President of Creator and Content Development, C.B. Cebulski, was speaking about the upcoming ‘The Punisher’ TV series when he remarked, apparently off-handedly:
“…another Marvel hero may be showing up [in ‘The Punisher’ series].”
No further information was given, of course, and one would assume that the topic was shifted quickly thereafter, as this seems like the type of info that hasn’t been wide-spread as of yet.
The MCU Exchange folks went on to speculate about who this “other hero” could be, making decent cases for Iron Fist and, more intriguingly, Moon Knight. I’ll take things one step further and guess a few extra names of my own, based on nothing more than what’s inside my head:
- Black Panther: a bit of a stretch, as he’s already featured in the cinematic arm of the MCU, but Panther is the only Marvel character of the original late-1990s “Marvel Knights” comic book line to not be featured in a Marvel TV show. The others – namely, Daredevil and The Inhumans, along with The Punisher – have shows of their own. It would be neat if any Inhumans showed up as well.
- Ghost Rider: another hanger-on from the “Marvel Knights” days, the most recent ‘Punisher’ and ‘Ghost Rider’ films were produced under a specific “division” of Marvel as shown in the opening credits of the film, called – you guessed it, “Marvel Knights.” We’ve already seen one version of Ghost Rider, Robbie Reyes, in last season’s ‘Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.’ – could a vengeful-antihero crossover be in the works?
- Dagger from Cloak & Dagger: another potential Marvel TV crossover, as Cloak & Dagger have their own series in development on the Freeform Network. Yes, another stretch, but Dagger was a part of Daredevil’s team unofficially called (this is a recording) the Marvel Knights – a group put together for the specific purpose of hunting down and capturing The Punisher.
Moon Knight is probably the easy-money favorite, and it would be an interesting way of gauging viewer interest in the character, possibly to see if he could garner enough interest for his own spin-off series, much like the Punisher did in ‘Daredevil.’ We won’t know more for sure until ‘The Punisher’ debuts on Netflix later this year.
