Marvel's Echo (Full Series Review)

 

Marvel Studios has been restructuring and repurposing lately due to how recent entries to the ever-growing franchise are being received (even if I think sometimes people are being too harsh). With a new banner introduced to the Marvel Studios umbrella called Marvel Spotlight, spotlighting the ground-level heroes and their stories, audiences are re-introduced to Echo aka Maya Lopez with her headlining a 5 episode series. Alaqua Cox reprises the role from the Hawkeye miniseries alongside Vincent D'Nofrio's Wilson Fisk, bringing the franchise to a new era of Marvel television. 

This Echo TV show has been marketed as Disney Plus' first mature show featuring warnings of viewer discretion at the start of each episode. With expectations to be in a similar vein as the Marvel Netflix shows, Echo does not come to par with the tones and grittiness of what the Daredevil or Jessica Jones shows were and that might be a good thing. Echo realistically portrays fight scenes that are well-choreographed with the right amount of violence, unlike most shows that go overboard like The Boys. and  I do not think Marvel wants to go entirely far. However, this does not affect the show in any other way other than that it portrays Maya Lopez as a force to be reckoned with. 

Unlike her forgettable performance in Hawkeye, a show revolving around Maya Lopez was a good idea to change the audience's perspective of her purpose in the MCU. When Kevin Feige announced this spin-off show, no one was excited but all that changed when the first trailer dropped almost two months ago, promising a grittier tone and the return to form to Marvel's darker side. Despite the holdback, Echo does fulfill that promise of being a show that takes bigger swings and that Marvel can be bolder. This is just one step further but they have only scratched the surface without it glorifying immense violence and having one swear word per sentence. 

Other than that, Echo is another entry of the franchise that infuses culture into Marvel lore, the same way they did with Shang Chi and Ms Marvel. Echo delves deep into Native Americans, superficially the Choctaw culture, with Maya reconnecting with her family and ancestry in the midst of trying to deal with her family circumstances after the death of her father. The story is very rich in that way, including more quiet moments of characters talking off one another. The groundedness that was promised is very much present in this show. 

It is even better that most of the series is spoken through sign language since Maya is deaf, making the MCU further inclusive. In this aspect alone, you can tell that Marvel isn't capitalizing on inclusivity than most Hollywood films and shows nowadays do to fit the criteria of a diverse cast. Echo's choices in story, casting choices and the style of story they were going for were intentional and effective. A great stylistic choice that was made that worked well with differentiating the point of view between Maya and the other characters is when the sounds are muted. It is a great addition for audiences to differentiate how Maya sees the world, or in her case, hears the world.

Also unlike most of the Disney Plus shows, specifically ones made by Marvel Studios, everything introduced in this show was tied up properly by the end of the episode. The choice to have it be 5 episodes to tell this story was a mistake and kept things very tight, especially when it came to the finale that rushed the plot by the time episode 4 came. However, it does manage to not leave too many unnecessary plotholes to deal with in a future Marvel project. The intent was clear and it fulfills the message it intended to portray.

One thing that I’m not particularly sure with the show’s choice of Maya’s turn of the leaf. It is a mystery whether the motivations of this show do change her character from villain to anti-hero but I’d rather if they kept Maya a villain that happens to be not so black and white. The same can be said for Kingpin but even if he isn’t his most brutal self here. He is very much bringing his A-Game to this character as you can tell since D’Nofrio is very much excited to return as Wilson Fisk. His future motivation is clear but it is hard to tell if it is for good or bad.

Other than those inconsistencies that will obviously be left for the next chapter in the MCU, Echo is still a solid entry to the franchise. It may not be the best thing Marvel has done but it is pretty good, and a good step forward to stories that are fleshed out well within the franchise. Here's to hope that the scarce amount of Marvel content this year will bring the franchise to its former glory.