Perhaps one of the greatest and indeed surprising encounters in Daredevil season 2 was the moment when Jon Bernthal’s Frank Castle was thrown in jail, only to strike up an unlikely alliance with Kingpin, the criminal overlord played close to perfection by Vincent D’Onofrio.
That nail-biting tension culminated in a good old-fashioned brawl between the two villains, leading to The Punisher escaping back onto the streets of Hell’s Kitchen. It’s here that we expect Netflix’s planned solo series to kick into gear, but given the overwhelmingly positive reaction to Frank Castle’s clash with Kingpin, one might assume that the Powers That Be at Marvel and Netflix would find a workaround to ensure Vincent D’Onofrio reprises as the mob boss later this year. Sadly, that’s not the case, with D’Onofrio debunking those rumors via Twitter.
First spotted by Screen Rant, the Jurassic World actor was fairly decisive in his response, but there’s always a minute possibility that the Tweet below is actually a red herring. We’ll keep you posted regardless.
Nope not a chance. No plans. Zero https://t.co/MC5oqdKekk
— Vincent D'Onofrio (@vincentdonofrio) February 8, 2017
This isn’t the first time that Kingpin has been thrust under the spotlight; earlier this week, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 star Chris Pratt lobbied for Star-Lord to cross paths with Vincent D’Onofrio’s villain at some point in the future. There are, of course, logistics to consider, and so far Marvel boss Kevin Feige has remained coy about a potential crossover between film and television. Will Kingpin be the one to break the mold? Time will tell.
Putting speculation to one side for the time being, we know that The Punisher‘s cast has room in its ranks for Daniel Webber, Jason R. Moore, Paul Schulze, Jaime Ray Newman, Michael Nathanson, Amber Rose Revah, Ben Barnes, Ebon Moss-Bachrach and Daredevil stalwart Deborah Ann Woll. A late 2017 release date is the target, lending Netflix’s spinoff series some breathing space from both Iron Fist (March 17th) and The Defenders (summer 2017).