Warning: This interview contains SPOILERS for Daredevil: Born Again Season 2, Episode 5. Did Vanessa Fisk (Ayelet Zurer) survive? That was the lingering question going into last night’s episode of Daredevil: Born Again, aptly titled “The Grand Design.” The prior week’s Gloves Off saw Wilson Fisk set a trap to lure Bullseye out in the open. Vanessa was sent away for safety, but she chose to show up packing heat. It all culminated in a boxing ring where the assassin threw a glass statue of the city at Wilson. He deflected the object with his belt, shattering it into pieces. Sadly, one of those shards hit Vanessa in the head, and she collapsed.
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“The Grand Design” picked up with Vanessa in critical condition and teetering at Death’s door. She underwent surgery, and the possibility of recovery seemed positive. After some flashbacks to how Wilson and Vanessa met, something went very wrong, and she began grasping for air. Moments later, Vanessa died, leaving a heartbroken… and undoubtedly unhinged… Wilson. In the wake of the explosive episode, Ayelet spoke to ComicBook and discussed the possibility of Vanessa returning.
CB: Vanessa also dies in the comic book, but that’s not the last we see of her. She lingers around in a ghostly form. She’s resurrected and Fisk also becomes obsessed with bringing her back to life. Are you hoping that in some way, Vanessa will be back?
Ayelet Zurer: I hope so. I love her. I like working with these people. I like Vincent. I think there is so much more to do. If it’s something great, which I’m sure if they decide it will be useful to them, they will create something great and I’ll be there, for sure.
Don’t forget. Foggy was back in last night’s episode and he’s dead dead.
AZ: Speaking of…
There’s always a way to bring Vanessa back in some shape or form.
AZ: Yeah, there was a bit of a discussion about that, but I don’t know how they are going to build it up. It needs to work as a whole, in terms of story.
The rest of our interview with Ayelet Zurer continues below, as we discussed Vanessa’s strength, her character’s fate, and Wilson’s next move.
It would have been easy for Vanessa to have lived in Wilson Fisk’s shadow. What made Vanessa a force to reckon with all by herself?
Well, I don’t see her as living in his shadow at all. I think they are very equal, first of all. I feel like they are yin and yang in some ways. One can’t live without the other. He’s very intensely empty on the inside. It’s like that white wall he faced when he was a child. She, on the other side, is really capable of accepting him with no question. That’s the inherent, basic relationship between them. But, really in the sense of what they want in the world, I feel like it’s never ending with him. He is always wanting more. More power. And control for more power. But with Vanessa, it’s really enough. That’s the only difference between them, I feel like, because they are very similar. She’s impressed by his brutality, but can hold it back a bit just because she understands how to protect what she has with him, and to protect him, actually. He may be a mastermind, but she’s a master manipulator. At the same time, she does not have the same interests he does.
One of the best lines came from the governor who stated she would not back Wilson Fisk, but she would back Wilson and Vanessa Fisk.
Yes, exactly. She gets something. She understands that Vanessa has a capability of holding that energy a bit, to restrain him. But what she doesn’t know is Vanessa, in the second season, already realized that she can’t quite restrain him like she thought. When Vanessa says to him, “Let’s go live on the island. Let’s just leave it. We have everything we want.” He basically says no with a line of, “I don’t like sand.” What he’s really saying to her is it’s not enough and he is going to continue going in a certain direction. Suddenly, she realizes that she’s not enough. I think that breaks her heart.
How and when did you find out that Vanessa was going to fall victim to Bullseye?
Well, they called me. You get that call. You get a call from the writer and the producer, each one separately, saying why and explaining the journey. In a way, they wanted to protect me from thinking it’s personal and they really wanted me to know that they needed it [Vanessa’s death] to use the best tool to have an explosion, a cataclysmic explosion with Fisk just losing his mind after this loss. They really needed to go all the way. Once that was being told, I think Vince tried to change the destiny a bit, but unsuccessfully. So, we went for it. I appreciate the way they ended her because they gave Vanessa a reason and a journey. And, she’s also going out with a fight. She really shows up at the boxing match with a gun, making sure she’s giving a fight. In a crazy subconscious way, I think she may be protecting Fisk by doing that, thinking that she will take the bullet.
It almost felt Vanessa was going to pull through until those final moments. Did you appreciate that fake out? Did the fact that it was a sudden turn for the worse make it all the more poignant?
What a scene. Yeah, people are used to watching movies. Even though they are the villains, people are really rooting for them. The audience loved them, in some crazy way, for who they are. They gave so much color to the show as a couple. So, people really hope. I think the writers played into that hope that, “Hey, Vanessa is in a hospital. Maybe she won’t die. Maybe, just like in some of the comics, she will survive.” What it really does is it gives Fisk hope… and then it takes the hope away. That’s the most brutal thing you can do to a person is to give them hope and then take it away. If you don’t have hope from the beginning, it’s done. But if you give hope and then take it away, it emphasizes the emotional experience of loss.
Fisk is obviously devastated. This is the most vulnerable and crushed that we have seen him. How do you imagine that loss is going to impact Fisk moving forward?
He will not stop at any means. Like I said, this is a cataclysmic event.
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