SPOILER WARNING: This article contains major spoilers for first four episodes of The Defenders, streaming now on Netflix.


Operating largely on the periphery of the Marvel Comics universe since 1982, the Chaste stepped out of the shadows two years ago, alongside Matt Murdock's prickly mentor Stick, on the first season of Daredevil. An ancient order founded solely to oppose the Hand, and prevent it from deploying its ultimate weapon the Black Sky, the Chaste has battled the apocalyptic ninja cult through the centuries, and across the globe. But by the third episode of Marvel's The Defenders, that battle of good versus evil has come to an end -- and evil has won.

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The Netflix miniseries opens in the sewers of Phnom Penh, Cambodia, where a months-long quest by Danny Rand (Finn Jones) and Colleen Wing to hunt down the Hand encounters a roadblock when they're unable to save from an assassin's blade a man believed to possess valuable information. It's only a sign of what's to come, as the man turns out to be a member of the Chaste, and his mysterious killer a resurrected Elektra (Elodie Yung), now the Black Sky.

That assassination is part of the Hand's worldwide extermination of the Chaste, which has left a bloody trail of bodies all the way to Harlem and Hell's Kitchen. "Everyone else on your side is dead," Sigourney Weaver's Alexandra, the enigmatic leader of the Hand, tells a captive Stick (Scott Glenn) in the second episode. That's seemingly confirmed by the massacre discovered by Danny and Colleen at a New York City bladesmith's shop, the young men from Harlem enlisted to clean up such scenes, and by Stick himself. "They're all dead now," he later tells the assembled would-be Defenders. "Every one, except me."

Bodies of the Chaste on The Defenders
Bodies of the Chaste on The Defenders

We're left to wonder how, after a centuries-long rivalry, that Hand was able to extinguish the Chaste in one fell swoop. Perhaps the feat required the intervention of the Black Sky, newly embodied by the resurrected Elektra. Or maybe Alexandra's organization had been toying with its ancient foes all this time, and was merely waiting for the right time -- on the eve of hatching its mysterious, earth-shaking plot in New York -- to stomp out the Chaste. Whatever the case, we're given little time to dwell on the reason, because at the same time as Stick delivers the news of the Chaste's demise, he delivers a revised history for its order.

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Just as The Defenders rewrites the origin of the Hand -- its founders are no longer East Asian warlords who unlocked the secret to immortality but rather exiled elders of K'un-Lun -- it recasts the story of the Chaste. The order was said on Daredevil to trace its roots back to a boy who rose up centuries ago to defeat the Hand's best warriors following the slaughter of everyone in his village. Known simply as the Chaste, he began to recruit and train fighters for his crusade, which continued into the present day.

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Stick's Order, The Chaste is Really...

However, Stick reveals in the fourth episode of The Defenders that the Chaste actually follow the elders of K'un-Lun, which explains why there's a tapestry depicting the mystical city hanging in the bladesmith's shop, and the Iron Fist. "The Chaste is my army?" Danny asks. "Was," clarifies Stick.

Stick meets with fellow Chaste member Stone on Daredevil

Those revelations raise several questions, not the least of which is why Stick made no mention of the Iron Fist on Daredevil, or why no members of the Chaste came to Danny's aid on his own series (the Hand was aware of his presence in New York, and his identity, so presumably his own "army" would be as well). We can probably explain away the former by Stick's belief that the protector of K'un-Lun was thousands of miles away, performing his duty (which he probably was; the timeline isn't exactly clear), and therefore not on the board. The latter, though, is a bit more difficult to rationalize, ranking right up there with why Claire Temple didn't try to recruit Matt Murdock to help Danny in his fight against the Hand on Iron Fist.

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Of course, the actual explanation is more likely that the writers and producers of the individual Marvel dramas weren't yet certain how all the pieces would come together on The Defenders (a second season of Daredevil, which brought with it Elektra, Frank Castle and a deeper exploration of the Chaste and the Hand, wasn't part of the original plan). Therefore, a little revisionist history -- let's call it loose canon -- probably shouldn't be surprising.

It does, however, lead to a couple of enjoyable moments, as the frequently insolent Stick bows in respect upon meeting the Iron Fist, only to then insult him he reveals he learned the location of the four heroes because Danny had used his mobile phone to call Colleen: "Because this one, the Immortal Iron Fist, living weapon and protector of the ancient city, is still a thundering dumbass."

Considering all the other members of the Chaste are now dead, we'll likely never know whether "Thundering Dumbass" is a traditional epithet used by the order for the Iron Fist. And that destruction of knowledge may be the Hand's most evil act yet.


Available now on Netflix, the eight-episode Defenders stars Charlie Cox as Matt Murdock, Krysten Ritter as Jessica Jones, Mike Colter as Luke Cage, Finn Jones as Danny Rand, Elodie Yung as Elektra Natchios, Sigourney Weaver as Alexandra, Eka Darville as Malcolm Ducasse, Simone Missick as Misty Knight, Deborah Ann Woll as Karen Page, Elden Henson as Foggy Nelson, Carrie-Anne Moss as Jeri Hogarth, Scott Glenn as Stick, Rachael Taylor as Trish Walker, Rosario Dawson as Claire Temple and Jessica Henwick as Colleen Wing.