It's no secret that Daredevil had some of the most compelling characters ever introduced in the Marvel Universe. After all, the Netflix series featured a complex version of Wilson Fisk aka Kingpin, thanks to an amazing performance from Vincent D'onofrio.
However, it looks like the show almost gave some of the Asian characters like Nobu Yoshioka and Madame Gao an equally compelling storyline. Unfortunately, this was reportedly stopped by Marvel Television head Jeph Loeb as he made racist comments against the Asian cast members.
There is little doubt that people were curious about Nobu Yoshioka and Madame Gao when they were first introduced in the first season of Daredevil. Nobu was revealed to be a head of the Yakuza who works with Wilson Fisk and ends up being killed in a fight with Matt Murdock before mysteriously coming back in Season 2.
On the other hand, Madame Gao had her own heroin trade and was something of a mother figure to Fisk but both had surprisingly small roles in the show. Interestingly, actor Peter Shinkoda has revealed the shocking reason why both Nobu and Gao were reduced to cameos in the second season of the Marvel show.
Peter Shinkoda played Nobu Yoshioka in the first and second seasons of Daredevil and he recently took part in the #SaveDaredevilCon virtual panel during Comic-Con@Home. During the panel that also included his co-stars Tommy Walker and Geoffrey Cantor, Shinkoda didn't hold back as he exposed what Marvel Television head Jeph Loeb said about reducing the roles of Asian characters like Nobu and Madame Gao.
"I'm not into really protecting, you know, certain things anymore but Jeph Loeb told the writers room not to write for Nobu and Gao and this was reiterated many times by many of the writers and showrunners," Shinkoda said. He then added that Loeb didn't want to focus on the Asian characters' storylines.
"He said, 'Nobody cares about Chinese people and Asian people. There were three previous Marvel movies, a trilogy called Blade that was made where Wesley Snipes killed 200 Asians each movie. Nobody gives a s--t so don't write about Nobu and Gao.' And they were forced to put their storyline down and drop it," Shinkoda stated.
Peter Shinkoda wasn't the only one who had something to say about the way Jeph Loeb handled Asian characters. His Daredevil co-star Tommy Walker also revealed that someone had pitched for an Asian-American Iron Fist but was ultimately turned down.
"A very good friend of mine Doug Petrie, the showrunner of Season 2 of Daredevil, he was on Season 1 as you know and then an executive producer on Defenders. I think I can say this much safely that man came up with some brilliant pitches for Iron Fist early on before Iron Fist was well into production...but they were along those lines, very very thoughtful very progressive for the time," Walker said.
Jeph Loeb has yet to release a statement about the Daredevil stars' claims against him.
