The Reel Rejects - We Met The DAREDEVIL: BORN AGAIN Directors... They Broke It All Down & Teased What’s Next!

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Starting point is 00:01:20 Citizens of the Reject Nation, we are sitting down to talk to two legends of Marvel, Justin Benson, Aaron Morehead, they directed Loki Season 2, they directed some glorious Moon Night. They're directing and creating and making glory and Daredebel Bored again. You excited Greg? I'm super excited. These guys are amazing. All right, let's bring them in. Justin, Aaron, how are you?

Starting point is 00:01:39 I'm Coy Jondro, sitting down with the real rejects, sitting down with two of my favorite directors who I have never done this professionally with. In all of these years, it's finally time to talk to Aaron and Justin about their Marvel tenor. I'm so excited, guys. How you doing today? We are so happy to be here and with you in particular. Yeah, it's so good to see you. Yeah, man.

Starting point is 00:02:06 I've been obsessed with what you've done with some of my favorite characters for a very long time. Greg is likewise one of the most obsessive Daredevil fans I know. So I thought it'd be fun with a pair of friends that work together and a pair of friends that work together to talk all things Hell's Kitchen. But I want to kick off with some nerdiness. So I consider Spider-Man and Batman to have maybe the best rogues galleries. But when you look at Frank Miller, Zadarski, Kevin Smith, Bendis, Brubaker, Nocentee, Wade, Sol, I'd argue Daredevil might have the best. writers. And I don't feel like he gets the credit that say like rogues galleries getting all those flavors. Was there anything in reading Daredevil that surprised you at this caliber of writing?

Starting point is 00:02:45 And is there anything that's happened after divulging so much into these characters that has affected your view of comics or art? I, uh, it's, look, it would be ridiculous to say that comics, you know, haven't been dark until born again came around or something like that. Of course, there's so much, uh, plumbing of the, the more disturbing corners. of the human condition that's happened since forever. But I think reading Frank Miller's Born Again gives us a lot of license to tell incredibly specifically dark story

Starting point is 00:03:19 because Matt is so tortured and everybody around it is so tortured. And obviously we have an enormous amount of influences outside of Miller's Born Again. But I think since that's the namesake of the show, for us it's just the, the deep complexity of what goes beyond, you know, a batty of the week and into these, the mirrors that Fisk and Matt hold up to each other and how, yes, of course, they're trying to destroy each other's lives, but also if they ever did, they would be completely cast adrift.

Starting point is 00:03:56 And that's a very dark, strange, complicated thing to say that can't be said in a quick sentence. It can't be said like, hey, here's what this week is about. And that's what we want all of Born Again to be. We want the season and the entire show to have that kind of feeling that there's, there's always a much deeper resonance to all of our storylines. And the comics taught us that. Yeah. One thing that kind of maybe changed a little bit for us is that, you know, we, Alan Moore, for example. Alan Moore is probably one of the most influential people on our indie film work.

Starting point is 00:04:34 the way he writes comics in that medium, the way he writes them, that the story can only be told that way in that medium of the comic book. Working on Daredevil, I think we've changed to embrace something that's different than that, despite the fact that we still worship Alan Moore

Starting point is 00:04:51 and we still are still extremely influenced by him. Like, I think this is probably the first show where we've gone with more frequency to the comic books to mine for visuals and to honor someone. of the better the top tier visuals from the books over the years. I mean, I've absolutely adored the visuals that you guys have done across your entire Marvel tenure this entire time. And what I've noticed with a lot of your work, especially in Daredevil, and I would say even with Loki,

Starting point is 00:05:18 your work often makes the audience feel like it's a hybrid of sometimes voyeuristic. And then other times we're not just watching a character. We're temporarily trapped inside that character's perspective. And like in some scenes with Fisk, depending on perspective in that scene, there's the ability you guys have to not just shoot power but also capture fear of power. So in this season, whose subjectivity was the most creatively contagious for you this time? Was it Matt, Fis, Karen, Bolz, there's so many. And what did that visually unlock for you? Yeah, this season visually has distinctly two worlds.

Starting point is 00:05:52 We have the world of the resistance. And that has an aesthetic that's just not in the first season at all. It's very handheld. It's inspired by kind of gritty, real world kind of films like Fruitvale Station. There's a lot of the intimacy, meaning we like to stack more than one person in the frame. So you get over their shoulder and the other person's so in, you know, if you're shooting someone's close up, the person they're talking to is so in the other person's frame. They almost cover them sometimes.

Starting point is 00:06:27 We called it claustrophobic intimacy. We also called it our resistance language. And it's because these are the beating heart of New York. These are the real live people. And then there's the opposite of that, which is the institution. And the institution is cold and, oh, also color-wise on the resistance. It was warmer. You'll even see in like Matt and Carrad's hideout in Josie's.

Starting point is 00:06:49 We were talking about it. As we were watching it, this is exactly. We were saying like we were handheld than before. This is so warm. Like, this is exactly what we were saying. So it's just awesome to hear it validated. I'm glad to hear it that it resonated with you guys. And so the Fist's World is very similar to what it was in season one, very institutional, cold, white, neutral colors.

Starting point is 00:07:11 The camera doesn't like to move very much. If it does, it kind of zooms in this weird, methodical, obsessive way. But then also we have a lot of the psychology of the characters in that Vincent can act with the back of his head somehow. We shoot the back of Vincent's head and with everything else out of focus. He's the only thing in focus. And somehow you get a performance in a whole scene out of it. So he's not, you know, this cold, unfeeling institution is still a beating heart because Vincent can't do otherwise. It's so cool.

Starting point is 00:07:42 Actually, just hear like the confirmation of so many things. That was like, oh, wow, that's true. Something that was fun in our episodes among everything Aaron just said was the was how bull's eye is kind of haunting our episodes. And so when we're working with feeling him around the story, he's a little. hints and voyeurism and stuff like that. It feels like he's something supernatural, almost, like a ghost that's always kind of in the peripheral. And then when he finally makes his entrance, it's like you can be so with him that you can do really, really bold, extremely bold lighting choices. But, but yeah, that's also, it's just like, just take every opportunity we can to

Starting point is 00:08:22 talk about bull's eye. Yeah. Oh, we got bull's eye questions. I've got a selfish one first because I had this really great conversation with Theo Rossi once about Wu-Tang informing so much of Luke Cage, but beyond just the soundtrack, it was informing some of the visuals, it was informing the editing, it was informing the wardrobe, and how Wu-Tang was this beating heart of Luke Cage, and you and I, we've all talked about hip-up and being hip-up heads, and how much that informs a lot of art. So I'd love to know if there are artists you associate with key characters in this, like, what is the Daredevil soundtrack to you?

Starting point is 00:08:56 What is Cairns? What is Bullsyes? Like, are there sounds that you associate with these characters? We have, well, uh, Wilson, Bethel who plays bullseye. He also has an obsession with hip-hop. And, um, and we, we talk about like, you know, there's the blue rose at the top of episode eight, season one. We need to talk about that cool Keith song, uh, blue flowers.

Starting point is 00:09:18 A lot. Like, it was like that, that's the song that represents bullsards. Because it sounds like someone who's gone kind of mad, obviously the character of cool Keith that I'm sorry, Dr. Octagon. It's cool. Keep playing Dr.

Starting point is 00:09:30 Octagon and Dr. Octagon is kind of wild and mad and out there. So yeah. So there's a sound to that rose now. I love that.

Starting point is 00:09:37 There's like an actual connotation to it. It came from Dr. Octagon's blue flowers. Also, this is more of a season one thing, but it's carried through would be probably Tom York,

Starting point is 00:09:49 of course, because of the ending montage, but also PJ Harvey, just very New York sort of. Yeah. There's a playlist floating around between ourselves and Dario, the showrunner, and actually also these documentaries named Sean and Cass,

Starting point is 00:10:08 who helped shoot the City Without Fear stuff and helped shoot the BB report of season one. There's a shared playlist of like how this show feels. I don't even know. I'm sure Get Free was on it somewhere, but otherwise I'm not sure what actually ended up in the show of that playlist. but it did help kind of just start synchronizing our waveforms of it. I love that because I feel the musicality in it, and I really love that about the show, is that I feel that there's a character association with each one,

Starting point is 00:10:38 and I love that you guys have shared that with other creators throughout the different mediums in the show. We've pushed so hard to get, fuck Armageddon this is hell by bad religion into the show. So we haven't quite got it. Well, someday we'll get that. Season three, wish list. We tried that on Moon Night too.

Starting point is 00:10:56 shipping away every Marvel show. If I can ask, because Bullseye, the visual depiction of him has been so grand, for lack of a better word for this. And he's a fascinating character because he can read as terrifying. He can read as also at times like all at once, pathetic, disciplined, childlike, but deeply sad, all in the same scene. And when you approach someone like that, how do you prevent the psychological complexity from getting flattened into simply cool villain iconography? It's surprisingly, I don't want to call it easy, but it's not easy. It is obvious.

Starting point is 00:11:41 It's when it's happening, nobody involved wants it. Wilson definitely doesn't want it. We don't. The showrunner doesn't. And it's because Bullseye's psychology. is not psychopathic. He is, he has the ability to care and he has, he doesn't lack the limb of empathy and caring and all of that. It's just that his values are a little bit different than, than we would expect, and he's mentally broken. And so that's why he was in that institution

Starting point is 00:12:15 and so heavily medicated at the end of season one. And by leaning on the fact that it's a man who wants his mind back, and he's not just purely on a path of revenge, but on a path of redemption. I think it goes into something that Justin and I do in all of our work, Marvel or not, which is there's no bad people. There's people that do bad things,

Starting point is 00:12:39 but their reasons have to make sense, and that's how you make interesting characters. I don't even want to say interesting villains. And so sometimes, you know, those values, they clash with societal norms, of course, but at least they make sense. And add into it the fact that poor bullseye has only fragments of his mind, his redemption arc is actually that much stronger. Does that make sense?

Starting point is 00:13:05 It absolutely does make sense, yeah. I think the way it's been captured has been in a way that has been unexpected because you're right, he has turned from not just villain, but more into like a more interesting, morally complex antagonist on this journey that we've really enjoyed. How hard are you guys seen of the season? The three. We wanted to be on track with the audience.

Starting point is 00:13:27 You have some stuff in store for you. It was so hard not to go further. We didn't want to interview you guys knowing more than the audience would, but it's been so hard to not to be like, click. That's very fair. One of the things I love about the character in the comic books as well as in the Netflix series as well as in Born Again. And all this journey we've had them is I say that when writing is good and when characters are handled well, every punch lands twice.

Starting point is 00:13:55 Because you really care about Kingpin. You really care about Daredevil. So when they're fighting, you feel that. It's not just a traditional protagonist antagonist relationship. And I think the inversion of Matt and Wilson being two guys that really do care about their city, they're really invested is so interesting. And I love that Mr. Charles comes in and he feels like a different inversion of Kingpin. So you've got the Matt and Wilson inversion.

Starting point is 00:14:17 but now you've also got this like another power player, but he's all charm in his wimsy. And like the whimsy is obviously not something Wilson ever feels. Like I love the bravado of Mr. Charles. I'd love to know what it was like developing that dichotomy and also working with Matt in general because it's such a powerful introduction. Yeah. I mean, for one thing, Mr. Charles is is such a brainchild of Dario, our kind leader.

Starting point is 00:14:44 and it's something that like if you can see Dario's eyes light up when he talks about Charles you're Mr. Charles you understand like this character comes from such a passionate place and it's such an interesting thing to try to have a character come in who in some ways

Starting point is 00:15:06 Fisk is a little like Fiske is a bit vulnerable to this person that with what went with with the sinking of Northern Star and all of that. And there's something, there's just something interesting about Matthew Lillard, especially,

Starting point is 00:15:21 playing someone who, who has like a cloud of dread around them, that, that if the scariest, most powerful guy in our show, if he feels vulnerable to this, like, to Matthew Lillard,

Starting point is 00:15:34 who's got kind of like a goofy charm about him, he's got kind of unexpected. And you just wonder, like, what's underneath the mask of Mr. Charles? if he seems like he seems like he takes he takes things pretty lightly but you simultaneously understand the consequences of those things are going to be really bad and then but also like getting to

Starting point is 00:15:58 work with matthew lillard as uh as a person who's like i might not be a filmmaker if not for sLC punk yes got to got to meet him and erin and i do this thing called um pass fan film festival we're on the way to set we'll just work our way through movies and we did a rewatch of SLC punk because we were about to meet Lillard and um and we could not believe how well that that movie's so good it's the way we shot that day yeah like we got I mean SLC punk was crazier than this we got it we got to and it was it was like an honor to like go ask him questions about SLC cool and he was like his he like I think he liked it but he likes yeah the uh for me Mr. Charles is probably like exemplified in the last line he says in the

Starting point is 00:16:42 first scene we meet him where he says he says oh no I'll go myself and then he gives us his face and he goes I need the miles I feel like that line and that's why we had him turn towards us just at that moment because that line says everything is this is a game for him this is this whole thing the whole show of daredevil all of this everything Fiske and Matt do to each other is this little video game that Charles plays in order to, I don't even know if he needs miles in order to redeem them to fly around. He needs miles because he wants to have the most miles. And, you know, it's, it is points on a board and he doesn't really like losing. And it's just really interesting that he is, he is literally from outside Daredevil's world. And also, and that's why he's kind of like, he's a, he's

Starting point is 00:17:34 very larger than life. It's still very deliberate. He's, uh, you know, he kind of walks into. this very serious situation and and he sees the matrix that's really gratifying to hear because he actually feels like a true thematic extension of the story instead of just another moving piece on the board and watching his interactions and dynamics i've been loving all of us have been loving the different change up in character dynamics and interactions now we've only seen up to episode three so far we haven't yet gotten jessica jones and of course that's very exciting it's fucking jessica jones so it's not just because of the character, but also because of what she can bring that such a different emotional frequency than Matt, what interested you guys most about what she disrupts in

Starting point is 00:18:20 him psychologically, not just as a teammate, but perhaps as a mirror as well. Wait, Jessica Jones is in this season. Jessica Jones shows up at some point. New York Comic-Con, I heard something about. Is it the same Jessica Jones from, is it Kristen Ritter? I just, the phone book, it's a Jessica Jones that called someone in. I hope so. Yeah, that'd be crazy if not.

Starting point is 00:18:39 All right. All right. Yeah. Well, you're not far enough in the season to know exactly how much they impact. How much can we say? I mean, I can say this with certainty. The character, Kristen Ritter, would potentially play on this show. It's not her character from Breaking Bad. I think it's a crossover.

Starting point is 00:19:02 It's breaking bad, but it's not. Aaron Paul, not saying that. This is an exclusive. Yeah, it's not the same character from Breaking Bad. But it is the same one from Don't. trust the beat. Oh, okay. There's our YouTube thumbnail headline, right? I can see in the yellow font. Confirmed. I have a safer question that does not get us into territory of foreign beyond. Looking back, I love that Vincent is so invested in this world that David Mack did his biography

Starting point is 00:19:27 cover, like iconic daredevil artist David Mack and Charlie Cox, when I see that he sees, it is alarming to me. He is so invested in Matt Murdoch. Was there anything you learned about these characters from the men who played them before that really, formed your directing style or anything you wanted to tell going forward, anything from the actors themselves. Oh, man. Okay. So without being, without just paying lip service here, is we learned everything about how to, how to treat Matt and Fisk. And we mean not just how to direct them, but how to how to visually present them. I'll give a couple examples because getting specific is fun. I have a whole document that's called how to shoot.

Starting point is 00:20:09 Matt Murdoch that we hand to the other directors so that everybody knows. Because it's not obvious, you know. He doesn't have eye lines, you know. He can't look at it. You know, you can't have a shot where he looks directly into the camera. You know, that doesn't make any sense. And thus, like, what does his point of view look like? What does his sensory experience of the world look like?

Starting point is 00:20:32 You know, we have a really big version of that you've seen. We call the sensory grande where the whole, you know, we do a Dolly Zoom and it's really exciting. But his experience of the world was after a long conversation with Charlie. And we just took a lot of notes and then said, how do we present that and reflect that visually? And we sat down before this season began. It's like, okay, so last season, of course, was kind of a, for lack of a better term, like an addiction metaphor, right?

Starting point is 00:20:57 It's like you can't. You want to pick up that bottle. You want to put that mask back on, but you can't. You know you can't handle it, right? But then what happens when you do? That is no longer this season. So who is he? And the quick and dirty of who he is, and they'll hand it off to you for Fisk and Vincent,

Starting point is 00:21:14 is he has never quite been on the back foot before. He's like Fisk is a planner, but as a schemer, but so is Matt, especially as a lawyer. But he's no longer a lawyer in this season. He doesn't get to be. He is, he is a daredevil, which is really exciting for him. He no longer has to hide and wear this mask of a man who doesn't beat people up at night. And that's really exciting for him, but also it weirdly sets him a drift. because he's never done this before.

Starting point is 00:21:40 And also, he's in hiding. He's on the lamb. He, uh, and, and, and this, this first moment with the Northern Star, this is the first time he found any chink and fisk's armor. This, this is a big hit that he's made after presumably months of just having to, to run away and then skirmish and all of that. And so, you know, this is, this was his first big victory. And so a lot of Charlie was just like, like, the fact that I can say, I don't know in response

Starting point is 00:22:07 to what do we do next is a big deal for him and be able to hand that over to Karen and his love for Karen and be able to finally actualize, you know, how much they care about each other and say, what do you think? And they can come up with ideas together and actually make moves on fist together. That was very new for Charlie. And we, you know, that resistance language, that kind of like shakier feel to the whole thing, the more handheld thing, reflects that that kind of like anything could happen electricity to the fact to his plans. And then I'll hand it off to you for Vincent.

Starting point is 00:22:43 I mean, it's actually just worth saying about every actor on the show has been playing these characters for a problem over 15 years. I always get the math wrong, but for a very long time, they've been playing these characters. And whether it's, whether it's Charlie or it's Vincent, or it's Deborah,

Starting point is 00:22:59 or it's Wilson, whoever it is, they are like walking libraries of Alexandria on these characters. They, they, They know a profound amount of everything about the souls of these characters, and they're eager to help and share with that always. This is a show where I'm not joking. We've literally never waited for an actor to come out of a trailer. I don't even know if they had trailers at this point because they're always right there, like behind you on set.

Starting point is 00:23:27 And it's amazing. And it's like these are some of the greatest living actors, and they're so passionate about these characters, and they've had the luxury of playing them for so long. It's a very special experience you get to be among. But yeah, they're all walking individual libraries of Alexandria, whether it's Karen, Matt, Fisk. And I mean, and also it's like, you know, to get to have a conversation with Vincent Dinoffrio about a character he's been playing that long that's so special to him.

Starting point is 00:23:55 It's like anytime you get to do that, it feels like it's such a special experience. It's such an honor. Well, we have like 20 more questions, but we know you guys got to go. So hopefully maybe at the end of the season or something, we'll sit down when it's safe for a talk. about, you know, the B in Apartment 23 and that exciting crossover when it comes.

Starting point is 00:24:10 Let's do it. Time will tell. But it was so good to see you guys, just on a real level. Yeah. Oh, dude, it's so good to have you guys. We're about to head into production. I think when the season ends is roughly when we'll be rapping so we can chat again. Are you going to be back in town?

Starting point is 00:24:25 In L.A. Are you guys there? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, we'll be around. Okay. Yeah, let's hopefully do something here. A much nicer studio than what you're looking at right now. The sound doesn't echo there.

Starting point is 00:24:33 This is great. It was so hard not to talk about low. Loki. Like, Loki Season 2 is my favorite Marvel thing ever made. Like, you guys made my favorite Marvel thing. But I know you have a heart out. So Loki season two will be sprinkled in because it is truly art and so special. And every time I see Justin at Comic Con, I just yell Loki things at him. So it was absolutely a pleasure. I think so let's let's talk to Comic Conn. This year. Do you have something there? No, Koi just needs to yell at me at my phone. Let's talk tennis and Tom Hiddleston. We're like, Jesser, you're going to Comic Con this year. Do you have something there? No, Koi just needs to yell at me at my face. So at the EW party, I'm gonna courier. All right, well, did you guys get back to work? So appreciate it.

Starting point is 00:25:14 This season is so special. I have really loved seeing this character, seen the way I see him. And it's really cool to see you guys get to play in a sandbox. I've known so well in like absolutely crush. And everyone go watch Spring. It's how I met these guys. It's something special. Thank you.

Starting point is 00:25:29 Thank you. Thank you, guys.

The Reel Rejects - We Met The DAREDEVIL: BORN AGAIN Directors... They Broke It All Down & Teased What’s Next!

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