Maya Lopez, better known as Echo, was a unique addition to the MCU. While she was introduced in the lighthearted Christmas-themed miniseries Hawkeye, her character was dark and gritty, with a rough backstory involving her late father and Kingpin. She also introduced multiple historic firsts for the franchise as a Deaf character, an amputee, and an Indigenous hero.
Now Lopez is getting a show of her own, and the innovations keep coming. Echo is moving Marvel television into uncharted territory in ways that could completely change the MCU. We’ll dive into how, but first, check out the trailer below.
Marvel trailers have always been action-packed, but Echo’s is especially brutal. We see necks cracked, gunshot wounds, and plenty of blood. The last few seconds explain why: unlike all the other MCU shows on Disney+, Echo is rated TV-MA. The trailer specifically tells viewers you’ll have to “set your Disney+ profile to TV-MA to stream,” which will prevent children looking to watch The Little Mermaid from accidentally stumbling into a gory shootout.
However, you don’t even need Disney+ to watch Echo. In a first for modern Marvel, Echo will be streaming on both Disney+ and Hulu, another sign the series is targeting older viewers. And unlike all its Disney+ predecessors, Echo will use the binge model, releasing all its episodes on January 10, 2024, instead of releasing weekly.
What does this mean for the MCU? Well, a mature, bingeable show sure sounds a lot more like Daredevil, Jessica Jones, and Marvel’s other old Netflix shows rather than their Disney+ originals. Between those similarities, and how heavily old Netflix villain Kingpin features in the trailer, we may just see a welcome return to a style of Marvel TV that hasn’t been made in nearly a decade. Marvel has teased such a return for Daredevil: Born Again, and it looks like Echo will offer a tantalizing taste of the MCU’s new television strategy.
