Echo: Chafa

 "You have greatness in you..."

Bear with me; Robin of Sherwood will follow in this blogging "slot", then more Twin Peaks, but first I need to catch up with the MCU; I'm well behind.

Already this is different, with a warning about "mature content" and the Marvel Spotlight logo. I'm avoiding online spoilers as far as I can, but Bob Iger's changes at Marvel Studios are clearly under way, with this the first truly street level series under the Disney Plus imprint. Hawkeye came close, but we haven't really seen anything like this since the Netflix shows.

And this opening episode is, basically, superb, Indeed, all the more so for much of the first half being a recap of Maya's backstory that we've already seen in Hawkeye. There's greater depth, though. We see more of Maya's family, her childhood in Oklahoma, her identity as Choctaw. I love the riffing on what I assume to be Choctaw mythology.

All of the backstory is in greater depth, though. This time it is Maya Lopez, not Clint Barton, who is the star. It may look like a recap, but it works. Plus we get a nice little Daredevil cameo.

It's all extraordinarily shot, too. The many fight scenes are truly cinematic. I'm one of those people who are easily bored by fight scenes, and I couldn't take my eyes off the screen. And then we learn (well, we suspected, but...) that Wilson Fisk, just as Maya determines to take over his empire, is alive. I'm hooked.