Alaqua Cox’s Maya Lopez immediately stood out when she appeared on Disney Plus’ Hawkeye in 2021. Among a cast of charismatic idiots and assassins with a heart of gold, Maya was a terrifyingly deadly foe, constantly reminding the audience and the characters of the stakes. Disney was so enamored with Cox’s portrayal of the deaf Native American heroine that it greenlit a spinoff, and we got our first look at it on Friday. We also got the surprise announcement that the show, Echo, would come to Disney Plus and Hulu at the same time.
This news comes just a few days after Disney committed to buying Comcast’s stake in Hulu, and right as we’re all starting to wonder what that means for the future of the smaller streaming service. Hulu doesn’t have nearly the same subscription base as Disney Plus, but what it does have is live TV and a willingness to stream much more violent and “adult” content than kid-friendly Disney Plus.
Watch the trailer for Echo, including people being beaten to death and shot in the head, it’s pretty clear why it would make its way to Hulu. That’s where things like Y: The last manabout the graphic death of all creatures with Y chromosomes, and The Handmaid’s Tale, about the violent, explicit subjugation of women in a patriarchal theocracy, current. When Disney first launched Disney Plus, it differentiated between the two services in a similar way. Disney Plus was the place where you went to watch things with the whole family. Hulu is what you watched after the kids went to bed.
But as Disney has become more adventurous with programming on Disney Plus, the lines have blurred with more adult fare Loki And Andor. Premiere Echo, starring a character who first appeared on Disney Plus, on Hulu makes sense in that context. Echo looks way too violent for Disney Plus – even if the earlier seasons of Daredevil And Jessica Jones (both originally produced for Netflix) are available.
But the show couldn’t have been on Hulu and not on Disney Plus, since Disney Plus is where the Marvel canon lives – thus the simultaneous release. I’m sure the fact that Echo‘s executive producer, Sydney Freeland, previously worked on Reservation dogs at Hulu also helped.
The show will premiere on both services on January 10 and next Variety As mentioned in a story today, it will feature a largely indigenous cast and Mayan’s Choctaw heritage will be a prominent part of the story. Notably, Vincent D’Onofrio’s Wilson Fisk also plays a major role in the show. Fisk was originally introduced on Daredevil and made a surprise return Hawkeye. Presumably he will also return for the next season of Daredevilbut that show is facing a major production overhaul after Marvel hated the show’s direction and its focus on courtroom drama instead of the violent action scenes that made the original show breakout on Netflix.
If Daredevil plans to be as violent as Echo seems to be, it will likely appear on both streamers as well. So Echo is, in a sense, a test balloon for Disney as it figures out how these two streamers – including the new one it will soon own – can work together.