Hawkeye fans have spotted a sneaky Daredevil Easter egg in the new Disney Plus show’s opening episode. The premiere of the Jeremy Renner vehicle, titled “Never Meet Your Heroes”, saw Hailee Steinfeld’s Kate Bishop infiltrate a black market auction, at which Clint Barton’s Ronin costume and sword were being sold, held at her mother’s charity gala. It’s easy to miss, but it turns out the swanky hotel the action happens at has already appeared in another Marvel show.
As pointed out by Twitter user @SchmoedownSaul amongst others, this is the same hotel that previously played a key role in Daredevil season 3. The location doubled up as the Presidential Hotel, which Wilson Fisk (Vincent D’Onofrio) makes his base of operations following his release from prison. In real life, it’s known as the Lotte New York Palace Hotel and is located at 455 Madison Avenue.
The location is never referred to as the Presidential Hotel on-screen in Hawkeye, so it’s unclear if the production team were even aware of the connection to the much-missed Netflix show when making use of the hotel. It’s possible it was just a convenient location to film at and nobody picked up on the crossover at the time. Regardless, it’s fun for fans to spot this reference to the world of the Hornhead, especially seeing as Hawkeye already dropped another link to DD in its opening episode.
At the end of episode 2, Alaqua Cox made her debut as Maya Lopez/Echo, who is set to get her own self-titled TV series before long. In the comics, Echo is both the lover of Daredevil and the adoptive daughter of Kingpin. It’s currently unclear if either of these connections will be retained for the MCU, but rumors of Charlie Cox and D’Onofrio’s returns in Echo definitely suggest they will be.
Look out for more Daredevil easter eggs as Hawkeye continues Wednesdays on Disney Plus.