Marvel hasn't been shy about teasing the darker, violent themes and images audiences will get to see when Echo premieres on Disney+ and Hulu. The latest look at the series, though, provides a look at the cultural roots of Echo, herself, and the lengths Marvel Studios went to be faithful to Choctaw Nation that will be key to the titular character's arc in the series.
The behind the scenes look at the series, posted to Marvel's YouTube channel, shows the collaborative effort that went into the series between the creative team and the Choctaw Cultural Council. Series director and executive producer Sydney Freeland described it as “a collaborative effort in every sense of the word” after sharing Echo's scripts with the council.
Additional members of Echo's production team reinforced with collaborative work to ensure everything from sets to small costume details were authentic to Choctaw culture.
While most of Echo's backstory from the comics appears to remain largely unchanged for the Disney+ series, she was originally of Cheyenne decent. This was changed to Choctaw for the upcoming series due, in part, to writer Stephen Paul Judd being of Choctaw decent and thus able to provide more insight into a specific Native culture rather than the “blanket approach” Hollywood has employed for decades.
It is also another example of how more productions are making an effort to spotlight the individual Native cultures across the U.S. on both movie and TV screens. One of the most notable examples was 2022's Prey, also released on Hulu, which served as a prequel for the entire Predator film series.
The film focused on a young Comanche woman, Naru, living on the Great Plains in 1719 who finds herself in a deadly game of cat-and-mouse against a lone Predator making its first trip to Earth. Director Dan Trachtenberg and producer Jhane Myers made a point of ensuring the film presented the Comanche of the time in an authentic way, with the film even being redubbed entirely in the Comanche language.
Echo is scheduled to premier on Disney+ on January 9, 2024.
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