Warning: Spoilers for Echo.

Summary

Echo is the grittiest MCU production, with realistic fight scenes and a TV-MA rating. Maya refuses to work with Kingpin/Fisk and realizes she’s not alone with the power of her ancestors. Maya overcomes Kingpin’s plan, embraces her Choctaw heritage, and stays with her family. In a post-credits scene, audiences see Kingpin’s plan to enter the mayoral race.

Marvel’s latest show, Echo, follows Maya Lopez (Alaqua Cox) as she navigates the world in the wake of learning the truth behind why her father was murdered. With its brutal and realistic fight scenes and TV-MA rating, the series is by far the grittiest MCU production to date. The show takes place shortly after Maya’s appearance in Hawkeye and continues her story as she returns to Oklahoma.

During the show’s first episode, viewers learn that Maya confronted Kingpin/Wilson Fisk (Vincent D’Onofrio), one of the best Netflix-era Marvel villains, and ultimately shot him in the face. Believing him dead, she returns to her home, where she puts in motion the necessary steps to take over Kingpin’s organization on her terms. Unbeknownst to her, at least in the beginning, Fisk survives her attack and later makes attempts to bring her back into the fold.

Leading up to the show’s finale, Maya refuses to leave Oklahoma with Fisk, seemingly rejecting his offer to work alongside him so he can ultimately groom her to take over under his wing. As her family prepares for their local powwow, Maya attempts to leave town. However, while making a pit stop at a roadside diner, Maya has a change of heart when she notices a bird lingering outside the window: the same type of bird her mother saved when she was a child. After her cousin texts her asking if she’s seen Bonnie (Devery Jacobs) or Chula (Tantoo Cardinal), Maya promptly heads back home, clearly concerned for their safety following her slight against Fisk.

Maya Realizes She’s Not Alone

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After racing back to Chula’s home, Maya encounters a vision of her mother, Taloa (Katarina Ziervogel), who helps her to understand that every generation of women before her echoes through her into the present. She isn’t alone because they are all a part of her. Having been in pain for so long following her mother’s death as a child, Taloa helps Maya to finally let it all go. With Taloa and the rest of her Choctaw ancestors standing with her, Maya accepts her path forward. Through her gifts of strategy, cunning, ferocity, and love, all of which were passed down by previous generations of powerful women dating back to the very first Choctaw, Maya truly understands that she’s not alone.

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Maya Overtakes Kingpin/Fisk

After donning the outfit Chula made, representing her Choctaw roots and the mighty women who came before her, Maya shows up at the powwow. She inevitably confronts Fisk, who has taken Bonnie and Chula hostage and has planned an even larger attack on those at the event. However, thanks to Biscuits (Cody Lightning) and Henry (Chaske Spencer), Fisk’s larger plan is ultimately thwarted.

Once Maya tracks down Fisk, she declares she’s the legacy of Bonnie, Chula, and the rest of her family, not the legacy of Fisk. Full of rage, he then promises to kill everyone in her family, just as he did her father. One of his goons delivers the first blow to Maya, which awakens the echoes of generations before her. Maya promptly stands tall with every powerful woman from the past who literally stands behind her. As their power surges her, she transfers that energy to Bonnie and Chula, and they swiftly defeat Fisk’s men.

When Fisk moves to attack Maya, she uses her power on his chest before moving to his head, which takes the two of them to the moment in Fisk’s life when he killed his own father. Full of so much pain and rage, Maya tries to help him let it all go. He’s unable to do so and immediately flees the scene. With the fighting over, Maya reflects on the moments of her past and is seen apparently riding out of town on her motorcycle. However, she happily shows up at a family cookout, and they welcome her with open arms. Maya is clearly there to stay.

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Kingpin/Fisk’s Plan for the Future

As is the case with nearly every Marvel production, the end of Echo contains a post-credit scene that offers insight into the direction of Echo and Daredevil: Born Again, slated for Disney+ sometime in 2025, might go. To begin with, Kingpin/Fisk isn’t going anywhere. The Thanos of street-level crime, Kingpin has now set his sights on politics. While on his plane heading back to New York, news about the mayoral race comes across on the television.

What catches Fisk’s attention the most is the pundit’s declaration that people want a real “bare-knuckle brawler” to enter the race rather than an established politician. Even though it’s late in the process, Fisk still has an opportunity to throw his name in the ring of candidates, which he clearly plans to do. Such a move would come with a hefty amount of power Fisk would be able to use against his enemies like Daredevil, who is returning in Daredevil: Born Again. All episodes of Echo are currently streaming on Disney+.

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