You probably noticed the Avengers are nowhere to be found in Daredevil: Born Again season 2. Normally, that kind of MCU vanishing act drives me nuts. This time? It actually checks out... mostly.
New York is on fire, so where are Earth’s Mightiest?
We’ve all done the math before: the Avengers are supposed to handle the big, Earth-shaking stuff. So when Hydra pops up, or the Void threatens reality, or, in this case, Mayor Wilson Fisk declares all-out war on vigilantes, you expect a Quinjet or two. Instead, it’s Matt Murdock, Jessica Jones, and a handful of street-level allies taking the punch. Considering New York City is basically a superhero beehive, that feels weird at first glance. But given where the MCU is right now, the absence mostly makes sense.
Why their no-show actually tracks
Daredevil is literally building an army to take on Fisk’s Anti-Vigilante regime, but a bunch of usual suspects are either busy, scattered, or politically blocked from helping.
- The Avengers (what’s left of them): The classic team never really re-formed after Civil War. Tony Stark and Steve Rogers are gone. On paper, the roster is basically Sam Wilson as Captain America and Joaquin Torres as Falcon. They’re largely operating out of Washington D.C., not Hell’s Kitchen, and they may be preoccupied with getting a new Avengers lineup in shape off-screen ahead of Doomsday.
- The New Avengers (formerly the Thunderbolts ): They’re New York-based, so you’d think they’d be first in. Problem: they answer to Valentina Allegra de Fontaine. Val is the boss of Mr. Charles, who is partnered with Fisk. And since Daredevil’s current fight is zeroed in on North Star and the Red Hook Port, which tie into that partnership, Val is not about to greenlight her team to sabotage her own interests.
- The cosmic crowd: Thor, the Guardians, Captain Marvel, and company spend most of their time off-planet. Galactic fires take priority over one city’s anti-vigilante crackdown.
- The up-and-comers: The Young Avengers may be too busy becoming a thing to jump into New York’s municipal nightmare.
- The wizard problem: Doctor Strange does live in NYC, but Clea whisked him into the Dark Dimension. When your day job is patching holes in reality, you miss a few local elections-turned-dictatorships.
Put all that together and it’s not shocking that Born Again leans on Matt and the Defenders-adjacent crowd. Mayor Fisk’s goal is simple and brutal: end vigilantism, full stop. The Anti-Vigilante Task Force (AVTF) is the stick, and Fisk’s City Hall is the carrot for anyone who plays ball. In-universe, most of the heroes who could realistically help are just not available or are politically conflicted out of the fight.
But let’s be real: Spider- Man should be here
There is one person who does not have a good excuse: Spider-Man. Peter Parker is a New York lifer. He only leaves when the Avengers call him in, and thanks to the whole memory wipe, no one remembers Peter anyway — meaning he is not tied to any Avengers business right now.
The first Spider-Man: Brand New Day trailer straight-up shows Peter grinding through low-level villains since No Way Home. If he’s webbing up muggers and B-list baddies, he should absolutely notice when Mayor Fisk rolls out an anti-vigilante crusade in his backyard. The AVTF would be gunning for him daily. Even if Born Again doesn’t want to drop him into the action, you’d expect at least a tossed-off line about a certain spider-themed vigilante tangling with AVTF agents across the river.
From a world-building standpoint, it’s a layup. Fisk started as a Spider-Man villain. Spidey and Daredevil team up constantly in the comics. Leaving Peter out of Mayor Fisk’s New York is the one piece that does not click in-universe. If he’s missing here, the likeliest reasons are the unsexy ones: character rights and budget.
The bottom line
Born Again season 2 gives us a New York where the capes are either off-world, off-duty, or blocked by politics — and that part works. Fisk vs. the street-level heroes is a clean fit. The only snag is the guy who swings past Fisk Tower on his commute. Spider-Man not showing up — or even getting a namedrop while the AVTF hunts vigilantes — is the lone beat that rings false.