Here's where we start: four superheroes with five, 13-episode seasons, more than seven villains, and one cinematic universe. Recapping everything that’s happened in New York City since the Man Without Fear first came on the scene takes a lot of hours of TV into consideration, but below is a quick rundown of the major plot points from each season leading up to The Defenders. If you don’t feel like spending weeks bingeing all of Marvel's solo Netflix series before the streaming giant unleashes its Avengers-style miniseries event, we have you covered with what has happened in each, how’s it all connected, and what we know about The Defenders. Spoilers, obviously, for each show are below.

Daredevil

daredevil-season-1
Image via Netflix

Origins

Matt Murdock (Charlie Cox) lost his sight at age 9 when he was exposed to hazardous waste, though his other senses were subsequently heightened to superhuman levels. His dad, who purposely lost boxing matches for a local mobster, was then killed after reneging on a deal. Young Murdock was sent to live at a church-run orphanage, during which time he met Stick, a martial arts master from a group called The Chaste, who instructed the boy in how to fight. Murdock, relying on his Catholic faith to guide him, later attended law school, during which time he met Foggy Nelson, his best friend and current law associate, and Elektra, a soon-to-be ex lover and assassin also trained by Stick. Murdock currently works with Nelson as one half of the Nelson and Murdock law firm in Hell’s Kitchen, fighting evil through the legal system by day, and with his fists as the masked vigilante known as the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen by night.

What Happened In Season 1?

After helping Karen Page, who was framed for murder for unearthing a money-laundering scheme by her employer Union Allied Construction, Murdock learns Wilson Fisk, a.k.a. the Kingpin, is the shadowy force behind much of the city’s corruption. With ties to the Russian mob and Madam Gao (a mysterious woman running a heroine operation for an ancient evil ninja organization called The Hand), Fisk turns the public against Daredevil. Murdock continues to fight and investigate this mastermind of the criminal underworld, as well as The Hand’s plot to smuggle in a weapon known as Black Sky, but his plans keep getting foiled as more bodies of his allies pile up. Complicating matters is Nelson’s discovery that Murdock is the masked vigilante. Murdock is finally able to expose Fisk in rescuing a corrupt detective and convincing him to come clean to the authorities, but Fisk escapes from police custody, leading to a final showdown against Daredevil -- with his newly improved armored suit. Guess who wins?

What Happened In Season 2?

Daredevil meets his polar opposite in Frank Castle, a.k.a. The Punisher, an ex-army brat who slaughters criminals in retribution for the deaths of his wife and child. It’s a complicated relationship, as Murdock becomes overwhelmed by Castle’s brutality and expert marksmanship, yet he understands the hurt. When Castle is arrested and put on trial, Nelson and Murdock represent him, but their loss in court prompts the law firm to disband — hopefully temporarily. Fisk makes a surprise return from prison as the man who orchestrates Castle’s escape. Castle kills a drug dealer, Blacksmith, for being the true cause behind the death of his family, but Punisher ends up assisting Murdock with his bigger problem: Elektra returns to the city and helps him discover some of what The Hand is plotting. They find a sarcophagus that can resurrect the dead by draining blood from caged children and learn that Elektra is the true Black Sky -- not the mysterious child Stick killed in the previous season. Elektra dies in the final battle against these ninjas, but The Hand recovers her body and places it in the sarcophagus. Meanwhile, Murdock sparks a relationship with Page and reveals to her his Daredevil identity.

How Is It Connected to The Defenders?

  • Claire Temple is the biggest thread linking all the Defenders series. In Daredevil, she acts as Murdock’s “night nurse,” treating his wounds when he can’t go to the hospital.
  • The Hand is too big for one superhero to battle, which is why they’re likely to pop up again in The Defenders. Murdock even notes how one of their ninjas is very young, which is perhaps foreshadowing a moment in Iron Fist when Bakuto recruits young fighters off the street to join The Hand. As the Iron Fist, Danny Rand is “the sworn enemy of The Hand,” and both his and Murdock’s storylines mention the Roxxon Corporation, another company with ties to the organization.
  • The Steel Serpent heroine ring is another reference to Iron Fist, as it bears a similar logo to the mark on Rand’s chest. Madame Gao also returns in that series to show off her supernatural skills and reveals herself as an agent of The Hand.
  • Turk Barrett is a small-time criminal who was part of Fisk’s underworld network, but later appeared in Luke Cage to sell Diamondback guns.
  • Midland Circle is the mysterious company behind the construction site housing a giant hole in the ground. Daredevil and Elektra discover it, but are immediately attacked by ninjas. All four New York heroes meet each other when they infiltrate the Midland Circle headquarters in The Defenders.

Jessica Jones

marvel-jessica-jones-season-1-image
Image via Netflix

Origins

A car crash that killed her parents landed Jessica Jones (Krysten Ritter) in the hospital, where, unbeknownst to her, a paramilitary organization specializing in the enhancement of soldiers through chemicals provided the funding to bring her back to health. Jones was adopted by a talent agent as a publicity stunt for child star Trish Walker, but the two formed an unbreakable bond. When Jones manifested super strength, enhanced speed, regenerative healing, and very limited flight (she described it more as jumping and then falling), Walker urged her to use her powers for good. As an adult, Jones encountered Kilgrave, another enhanced individual with the ability to control peoples’ minds through voice commands. He immediately enslaved Jones and caused her a lifetime of torment by forcing her to have sex with him against her will. She escaped this sadistic prison when Kilgrave forced her to kill Reva Connors, the wife of Luke Cage, who possessed a hard-drive containing information on his past. As a private investigator in New York, she numbs her PTSD with hard liquor.

What Happened In Season 1?

After having faked his own death, Kilgrave takes a new victim, a woman named Hope. Consumed with guilt, Jones rescues her and becomes a support system, even after Hope is forced to kill her own parents and finds herself pregnant with Kilgrave’s baby. The private eye enlists Jeri Hogarth, a lawyer who hires Jones occasionally to dig up dirt, to represent Hope in the ensuing court case. While striking up a sexual relationship with Luke Cage, Jones seeks to track down Kilgrave, who commanded one of her neighbors, Malcolm Ducasse, to spy on her for him and made a cop, Will Simpson, try to kill Trish Walker. While Ducasse eventually becomes Jones’ assistant at Alias Investigations, Simpson is driven insane by pills that grant him superhuman strength, and is taken in by the same company that’s linked to Jones’ powers. Kilgrave asks Jones to live with him in her childhood home under threat that he’d command the entire police force to kill themselves. Learning of the experiments his parents conducted on him as a child, Jones urges him to use his abilities for good, but that doesn’t last, and she’s forced to take him captive. Kilgrave, newly enraged, wreaks havoc when he breaks free, kidnapping Hope, sending Hogarth’s girlfriend to try and kill her, and commanding Cage to attack Jones. Realizing her new immunity to his commands, Jones launches a final assault on Kilgrave with Walker, and snaps his neck.

How Is It Connected to The Defenders?

  • Cage’s relationship with Jones is a nod to their comic book history where they become husband and wife. His appearance here also sets up his own standalone series. Cage mentions a man named Melvin ate wings at Luke’s Bar, perhaps a reference to Daredevil’s armorer, Melvin Potter.
  • The Union Allied corruption scandal from Daredevil is in a newspaper clipping hanging on a wall in the police station, so the events of that series are very much felt in Jessica Jones.
  • Claire Temple, "the night nurse" pops up again to treat a Kilgrave-controlled Cage after Jones is forced to shoot him with a rifle at close range. The nurse mentions she has a friend just like Jones and Cage, meaning Daredevil.

Luke Cage

luke-cage-mike-colter
Image via Netflix

Origins

A former marine and Savannah cop, Carl Lucas (Mike Colter) was framed for a crime he didn’t commit and sent to Seagate Prison. He found solace in his therapist (and future wife), Reva, while he was forced by the guards to fight in illegal boxing matches. Carl planned to expose these crimes at Seagate, but the guards got wind of it and had him beaten close to death. Subjected to the prison’s off-the-books experiments, he awoke with incredible strength and indestructible skin. Taking the name Luke Cage after his father’s favorite Bible verse, he used these abilities to break out and start a new life with Reva in Harlem. After his wife died in what was thought to be a bus crash — but really she was murdered by a Kilgrave-controlled Jessica Jones — Cage dedicated his life to finding out what really happened. He found the truth when he opened a bar in New York City and became embroiled in Jones’ mission against Kilgrave. Now he’s based in Harlem out of Pop’s Barbershop and the nightclub Harlem’s Paradise.

What Happened In Season 1?

Cage’s efforts to clean up the streets of Harlem put him in the crossfire of Cornell “Cottonmouth” Stokes and his gang of sundries from Seagate. The tension erupted when Cage’s mentor and boss at the barber shop was killed by Cottonmouth’s men during a drive by. Detective Misty Knight, who Cage thought was merely a one-night fling of his, investigated Cottonmouth’s affairs. The Harlem big shot tried tarnishing Cage’s image, but the strongman attacked his businesses, bringing Cottonmouth to his lowest. His death came from his own sister, Mariah, lost in a frenzy from her failing career as a corrupt councilwoman. Unhinged, she reluctantly teams up with a new face in the underworld, William “Diamondback” Stryker, the half-brother Luke never knew he had. Using weapons from Hammer Industries, Diamondback was able to pierce Cage’s skin (causing a desperate search for medical treatment), claim Cottonmouth’s criminal underworld, and attempted to frame Cage for multiple murders. He was defeated by Cage in a very public showdown in Harlem, though Mariah walked away when the witness against her was killed.

How Is It Connected to The Defenders?

  • Jones’ murder of Reva haunts Cage, who has recurring flashbacks of his love. There are also multiple references to his appearance on Jessica Jones, like when he “took a bullet at point blank range.”
  • Cage’s true identity is discovered and he’s carted away back to Seagate, but before he does, Temple mentions she knows a lawyer (Murdock) who can help him.
  • Temple takes a slip off a flyer for Colleen Wing’s dojo, foreshadowing both her and Wing’s role in the following series, Iron Fist.
  • Walker is heard over the radio talking about Cage on Trish Talk.

Iron Fist

iron-fist-image
Image via Netflix

Origins

The son of the billionaire behind Rand Enterprises, Danny Rand (Finn Jones) lost his parents when their plane crashed in the Himalayas. The young boy, presumed dead by the rest of the world, was taken in by monks to the mystical city of K’un-Lun, whose gate to the outside world only opens every 15 years. He learned the ways of martial arts and at 19 underwent trials to claim the power of the Immortal Iron Fist, a living weapon and enemy of The Hand. Besting a dragon in a cave, Danny emerged with the mark of the Iron Fist on his chest and the ability to mystically channel his chi energy into his hand for added power. Confused about his place in the world and haunted by his parents’ death, Rand fled K’un-Lun for home in New York City.

What Happened In Season 1?

Danny’s return to New York City is met with hostility, as his childhood friends Joy and Ward Meachum, who now run Rand Enterprises, have him committed to a psychiatric hospital. He enlists attorney Jeri Hogarth, another friend from his past, to help him reclaim his name and place at the company, but his duties as Rand’s majority shareholder constantly conflict with his duties as the Iron Fist. Rand discovers that his father’s old business partner, Harold Meachum, thought to be dead to the world, has been secretly kept alive by The Hand, while Madame Gao has been funneling her heroine business through Rand Enterprises. Colleen Wing, a martial artist he meets when he first comes to New York, helps him learn more about The Hand’s dealings and eventually captures Gao. But they are soon swarmed by Bakuto, Wing’s sensei, and taken back to his hideout. Rands learns his new friend is actually a member of The Hand looking to build an army of young warriors off the street. Bakuto is killed in a face-off by Danny’s comrade from K’un-Lun, Davos, but his body is never recovered. Meanwhile, Harold, the one who caused Rand’s plane to crash, frames the Iron Fist for the corruption within the company, leading the pair to a rooftop fight that ends with Harold falling to his death.

How Is It Connected to The Defenders?

  • The series references Karen Page, who now writes for the New York Bulletin and will be returning for The Defenders.
  • Claire Temple gives Rand a shirt that’s riddled with bullet holes, a nod to Cage’s biggest grievance from fighting crime. She also uses Cage’s signature catchphrase, “Sweet Christmas,” when helping Wing try to protect the Russian chemist forced to make drugs for Gao.
  • Joy mentions to Ward that her private investigator was “worth every penny when she’s sober.” Suffice it to say, Jones hasn’t kicked the bottle just yet.
  • When Wing discovers the truth about Bakuto, The Hand's ninjas strap her to a chair with plans to drain her blood from her body in a similar manner to how the caged children in Daredevil were being used to power the resurrecting sarcophagus.

The Defenders

defenders-social
Image via Netflix

What We Know About The Defenders So Far:

  • The heroes first meet at the headquarters to Midland Circle. They are all following their own leads to uncover a mystery happening in NYC, but they weren’t expecting to meet each other on this night. They have to make quick with niceties as they are accosted by a group of adversaries.
  • Sigourney Weaver plays the villain, Alexandra, described as “sophisticated, intellectual, dangerous,” “an utter badass,” and “a very powerful force in New York City.” If the showrunners can be believed, she has no comic book counterpart — but we’ve been lied to before!
  • Murdock has lost a bit of himself. Taking the death of Elektra hard, he tries to refrain from his vigilante ways.
  • Elektra will return, so we can assume the sarcophagus worked its magic. But is she on the side of The Hand now?
  • Other characters from the solo series who will join the team-up season include Misty Knight, Colleen Wing, Trish Walker, Malcolm Ducasse, Foggy Nelson, Karen Page, Stick, Jeri Hogarth, and Claire Temple.
  • Doug Petrie and Marco Ramirez, the same showrunners behind Daredevil Season 2, are in charge of The Defenders.

The Defenders premieres in its entirety on Netflix this August 18. For Allison Keene's spoiler-free review of the first four episodes, go here.

defenders-mike-colter-charlie-cox-finn-jones
Image via Netflix
defenders-mike-colter-charlie-cox
Image via Netflix
defenders-finn-jones-mike-colter-krysten-ritter
Image via Netflix
the-defenders-netflix-charlie-cox-krysten-ritter
Image via Sarah Shatz/Netflix