IMDb: Tell me a little bit about using these great characters, The Punisher and Elektra, as reflections of Daredevil, in terms of vigilantism.

Marco Ramirez: I worked with David Goyer a while ago, the guy who wrote The Dark Knight franchise, and he said something about using characters as foils to bring your character on specific journeys. This is specifically what we had the opportunity to do with Elektra and Daredevil, and with Matt and Frank.

We talked a lot about Fight Club. We talked a lot about [Elektra] tempting him and saying, "Come on. Let’s go do bad things at night." We talk a lot about Frank saying, basically, "No, no. We’re soldiers in a war. We need to go take this to the street. This shouldn’t be fun. This was never supposed to be fun."

These are both huge parts of who Matt is. So, we look at it as an opportunity that pulls him in two different directions and just use these two characters to do that to him. In a way, we just used [Elektra and Frank] as tools to rip Matt Murdock in half.

Doug Petrie: When the devil shows up, according to Lord, the devil doesn’t tempt you with something that you hate, the devil tempts you with something that’s already inside your heart. In Season 1, Matt Murdock threw a Russian gangster off a roof and into a dumpster, then he confessed that he liked it. So The Punisher shows up and says, "Great idea. I love that. P.S. I have a gun." That just changes everything for Matt.

And Elektra is very similar. She’s like, "Why do you go most of the way, but not all the way?" In terms of Matt and homicide, going all the way is something that he struggles with.

The action and the stunt work is, once again, mind-blowing. Tell me about that element of the show, incorporating that scale of action into an otherwise fairly realistic, urban, gritty environment.

Ramirez: I think that for us the action scenes always come from the character. Season 1 was very much a brawler show. It was about a guy who was a kid when his father was a boxer, and he’s trying to figure out what it means to be a vigilante. His fight choreography is what it is.

This season, we organically, character-first, got to say, “Now, there’s a guy who does kung fu coming into this world. There’s The Punisher, who uses a lot more artillery. And on the flip side of it, there’s a lot more martial arts being used because of what Elektra is and what her training is."

So, it’s not that we actively set out to say, "Oh, this is what we want to do." Just by design, it felt like "Well, this is what Elektra needs to do, and this is what The Punisher does. This is how they operate in the Marvel Universe." So, yeah, we did open it up a little bit, but only really because there was no Punisher and no Elektra in Season 1.

Can you reveal any fun nods toward the greater Marvel Cinematic Universe as we move closer to the street-level heroes uniting for "The Defenders."

Petrie: Well, I think what we were aware in Season 2 is that our audience is very sophisticated and very sensitive to the smallest of Easter eggs, and a little goes a long way, whether you’re nodding to the original canon, be it Marv Wolfman or Frank Miller or Brian Michael Bendis, any of those great runs of the comic, but also the bigger universe.

I think where we loved pushing that this year was where last year Hell’s Kitchen was his backyard, it was his rough playground, and he ruled it as he saw fit. And this year, we’re kind of aware, "You’re not the only vigilante in town. You’re not the only sheriff in town." And I don’t think Matt likes that very much. So, it’s always fun to challenge and push him and let him know that he’s not the only rough kid on the playground, and he’s not the only one who knows how to fight.

Ramirez: It’s not always a vision that Doug and I necessarily have to make, which is great. Sometimes it’s Marvel TV being centralized with Jeph Loeb at the head of it. They own knowledge of what’s happening on “Luke Cage” and what’s happening on “Jessica Jones” and “Iron Fist” certainly. So, sometimes it’s just very organic.

We’re saying, OK, this is what’s going to happen. Daredevil’s going to interact with this lawyer or this police officer or somebody, and they say, "Why don’t we make that the person from 'Jessica?' Why don’t we use this on 'Cage?'" It’s their way of making it woven or connected, and it’s always organic. We’re like, "Sure, why not?? So as an audience member, Doug and I love shows like this and love comics like this. We love it when people show up and you feel like you know who they are.

One of my favorite moments in comics ever is when Daredevil shows up in "Alias," the Jessica Jones run of comics as Matt Murdock the lawyer; he’s there to represent her. It just feels so right and so cool to have worlds collide that way.