What To Know
Daredevil: Born Again star Michael Gandolfini breaks down Daniel’s shocking ending and reveals how it changed after filming.
Plus, he discusses that fight scene with Buck, Daniel’s feelings towards BB, and more.
Daredevil: Born Again gave Daniel Blake (Michael Gandolfini) a true hero’s arc in Season 2’s shocking penultimate episode, “The Hateful Darkness,” but it was almost an entirely different ending for the member of Wilson Fisk’s (Vincent D’Onofrio) camp, according to the star. Warning: Spoilers for Daredevil: Born Again Season 2 Episode 7 ahead!
In a different world, Daniel doesn’t die from a gunshot administered by Buck Cashman (Arty Froushan), but that’s just one little tidbit Gandolfini is sharing in the Q&A below. As viewers saw in the episode, Daniel was forced to think over his next move after discovering the flash drive in BB’s (Genneya Walton) pocket that would put them both in hot water.
Tasked with bringing BB in to answer for her actions against Wilson Fisk’s pursuits, Daniel isn’t able to follow through, choosing to let BB go free and face Buck alone. The end result is a bloody fight as Buck attempts to unearth BB’s whereabouts from Daniel, who doesn’t budge. Sadly, it’s the last act he’ll ever have as Buck pulled his gun and fired at Daniel.
Below, Gandolfini breaks down his hero’s arc, reveals how Episode 7 originally ended, and why it changed. Plus, he addresses where Daniel and BB really stood when it came to their will-they-won’t-they dynamic.
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It’s good to see you alive and well. How did you feel about learning that your character, Daniel, would die this season?Â
Michael Gandolfini: So, the crazy part is Daniel originally lives, and we shot [some scenes for] Episode 8, and as we were going through, I was just shocked. I was so grateful that he had this amazing arc, not every non-superhero character gets that, and I was so lucky that they gave it to me, and after we had shot [Episode] 7 and we were shooting 8, there was this weird thing of like, “OK, he had this great run, this great arc, what’s next?” I don’t think there’s really anywhere for him, and we had talked about some ideas, but these seasons are made in a vacuum; you can’t really think about Season 3. And I was just like, “I don’t know, it feels weird, it just doesn’t really make sense.”
So they came back to me, and they were like, “Hey, so we actually are going to kill you in [Episode 7].” And it just felt so right. It felt so freeing, and I remember saying, “Hey, if I didn’t think it was right, I’d fight it.” I love Daniel, but it’s so right. Where else is he gonna go? And he gets this little hero’s moment, and it just felt so great, I just felt so lucky. Again it’s hard, you’ve got Bullseye, Fisk, Karen Page, Matt Murdock, and including other like people from the comics, so sometimes, characters that don’t have superpowers don’t have the longest arcs, and they’re there to support the superheroes, which is great, but the fact that Daniel got to have this, I just felt so touched and that they trusted me… there’s only so much screen time that you get every episode, and so like the fact that they gave me a real journey to go on, I was very lucky.
In the lead-up to Daniel’s death, he let BB go. Why did he keep trusting her with information throughout the season, when it was clear she was leaking it? Was it a test, or does he genuinely think he can trust her?Â
He doesn’t trust her. I think he knows that things are gonna be leaked when they are. He hopes that when he says, “Hey, seriously this time, don’t do it,” and she does it, like leaking the hospital location. I think that is hurtful to him. But he is a wheeler and dealer, and so is BB, and that’s how they met. Daniel’s whole thing, I think, is he’s loyal to whoever’s in front of him, and he knows you got to do what you got to do. So, I don’t think he ever takes it personally. I just don’t think he ever thinks about her and goes, “Oh my God, like how could you have done this?” It’s f**king pissing him off, but I think he likes it. She’s doing her job, you know? I think he also feels a closeness to Vanessa and a loyalty to Fisk. So I think when [Vanessa]’s hurt, and [BB]’s still trying to get information, I think that’s when he’s like, “You’re really gonna do this right now?” I think that affects him and that makes him angry, but other than that, I think he likes that she is rebellious.
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On the flip side of Daniel and BB, you have his connection with Buck. When they’re driving to bury the body earlier in the season, you can sense Daniel’s nervousness. How did you like exploring that fear, especially under the mob lens?Â
You know, like, we didn’t really think about any of the mob tropes too much, but what we did think about was just like, he’s digging his own grave, but he doesn’t know it. He gets in the car happily. I think the writing is so good, right, because he has this moment where he’s like, “How’s Vanessa?” And Buck says, “She’s gonna be OK, you’re gonna be OK.” He’s kind of an older brother to him, so he loves him, and he gets in the car happily. I don’t think he even thinks that he could be in danger, but then it kind of all comes crumbling down, and he’s terrified. Could Buck actually do this? But I think that’s what the fear is. The fear is, instead of “Is Buck going to catch me?” it’s like, “Could he actually do this?” But it’s interesting what that episode [turns out to be]. He’s not trying to scare him; he’s just bringing him into the club, making sure his hands are dirty too, so he has that hanging over his head.
Daniel turns down a kiss that BB tries to initiate. Is that because he’s still deciding if he’s going to have to deliver her to Buck or because he feels uncertain of her motivations? Do you think they had potential as a couple if they weren’t on opposite sides of the fight?Â
I think he would want to kiss her one hundred percent of the time. I think in that moment, he was just so f**king hurt that he found the flash drive, and he was like, “We’re f**ked.” He likes that she’s being rebellious and leaking, but now that she’s done this, he’s like, “Well, now I’m really f**ked. I don’t know how to keep you safe.” And so, I think it’s not that he wouldn’t want to be [a couple], I think he does more than BB maybe, but in that moment, it’s just like “I can’t even think about kissing you because you’re gonna die, and I might turn you over to him.” He hasn’t made up his mind yet, either.
Speaking of not making his mind up yet, you are left up until the final moments guessing if Daniel will turn BB over to Buck. Once he does let BB go, do you think he realizes the confrontation with Buck would be so deadly?
I don’t think he knows the severity of the consequences. There’s no way in any world he thinks he’s going to die, and I think that has to do with the writing, and it has to do with the fact that I didn’t think I was going to die. I think that helped because it left so many loose ends just dangling, and that’s how it happens, the last scene with his mom, he says, “Everything’s fine, I’ll see you soon.” Even this goodbye to BB is nice, but it’s quite anticlimactic. It’s not like this melancholy, I’ll see you on the other side. It doesn’t feel like that because [he doesn’t think] he’s gonna die. All of these unfinished moments, that’s what’s so painful and beautiful about the fact that he dies. It’s all unfinished, and I think in the moment of, am I gonna get BB killed or am I gonna turn BB in? He confesses to her that he buried the body with Buck, and I think he just doesn’t want to live with another bad omen on his shoulder. He doesn’t want to know that he got her killed.
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In Daniel’s final face-off with Buck, why does he need to deliver that final “F**k you, Buck,” and how was it fighting with Arty Froushan?
I love that line. I think it’s a great line. It’s a very subtle callback, but Fisk in the first season says “Thank you, Buck,” a lot, and that’s like kind of their call sign. Then in the last episode of the first season, Buck talks, and I say “Thank you, Buck,” to foreshadow what I could become, and so, “F**k you, Buck,” it was sort of like the same kind of rhythmic thing, which I really liked. Again, I don’t even think it’s like you’re a bad guy. I think it’s like, “F**k you for making me consider bringing her here, and f**k you for considering killing her. Because the thing is, Daniel’s fine knowing that bad s**t’s happening. He’s OK with that. He just doesn’t want to see it. I don’t wanna be involved. That’s kind of his whole thing.
He says integrity costs, he knows this s**t’s happening, but he’s not involved. And so I think the “F**k you” is also like “F**k you for making me involved.” The fight scene was great, Arty and I had so much fun. It was a trillion degrees — it was literally 110 [degrees] that day — and it was so brutal. We had to change 3 times, [we were] sweating through our clothes, but we did all the stunts, and we rehearsed it with Phil [J. Silvera], which was so fun, and I hadn’t gotten to do anything like that in the show, so that was amazing. And we just really had a great time, and fun because I didn’t die, it wasn’t sad.
Did they have to go back and reshoot the scene to add in your death?
So, no, Buck pulls a gun on me, holds it on me, and then ends up putting it down and walking away, and we have some dialogue, and so what they added was that gunshot flare, and they add some blood with me on the floor. I ended up calling Arty and telling him, “You know you killed me?” And he was like, “What do you mean?” And I was like, “Yeah, I’m dead.” He was so distraught. He was so upset, but it just felt so right, and I’m so glad we didn’t know because your job is to never anticipate, but if I might have known, maybe I would have leaned into it a little tiny bit more, and the fact that I didn’t, I think really helps.
When did you find out you were gonna die if it was added after you wrapped filming?Â
I found out in about October, and so I told Arty, and then Charlie [Cox] called me and was very sweet, and Vincent called me and was very sweet, so I talked to those three, and then no one knew. At the premiere of Season 2, I was talking about it, and the two best [reactions] were Wilson [Bethel] and Zabryna [Guevara], who plays Sheila. She was like, “Oh my god, what do you mean? Because Daniel and Sheila had a scene in the last episode [that’s now cut]. So it was this really beautiful thing of telling people, and people slowly learning about it.
Daredevil: Born Again, Season 2, Tuesdays, 9/8c, Disney+