Since Wesley Snipes’s appearance in the previous Blade Trilogy in the early 2000s, people have wanted another iteration of the half-mortal vampire-slaying badass monster hunter. And in 2019’s San Diego Comic-Con, we were finally graced with the news about a Blade film in the works as Kevin Feige himself confirmed it at the end of the Marvel panel. Since then fans have been eagerly waiting for a release date or a trailer to pop up any time now.
Unfortunately, seems like bad luck always tends to follow this feature project around.
In a recent turn of events, we see the director helming Blade, Bassam Tariq, leave the project. Due to this, Marvel Studios have paused the production of the whole film till they can find a new director to replace and drive it forward.
Why Has Blade Been Put On Hold
In the wake of parting ways with director Bassam Tariq two weeks ago, the studio is pressing pause on the vampire adventure thriller that is to star Oscar winner Mahershala Ali. Marvel is temporarily shutting down production-related activities in Atlanta, where the project was to have been shot starting in November, while it conducts a search for a filmmaker and further develop it.
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Furthermore, it seems like Mahershala Ali, the star who is cast as the titular protagonist in the Blade Reboot is seemingly not happy with how the script and the progression of the film are heading. He called the script “lackluster” and also expressed the lack of any flare in the project.
Furthermore, in a recent tweet by The Ankler’s Jeff Sneider, he said that at this point, he thinks that Kevin Feige is too stretched out to even bat an eye at the project after the MCU’s expansion, which is why the production is hitting so many setbacks.
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Why Reboot Blade?
Blade was created by writer Marv Wolfman and artist Gene Colan for 1973’s The Tomb of Dracula No. 10. He is a half-mortal, half-immortal who hunts vampires in order to avenge his mother, who was killed by a vampire as she gave birth to him. Wesley Snipes previously played the character in a trilogy released in the early 2000s.
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Blade was one of the most well-known characters from Marvel Comics as he was one of the first few heroes that had their own franchises, which was a rare situation for a character from the Marvel universe. These types of big-budget flicks were mostly reserved for DC superheroes, namely Superman and Batman. So there is no surprise that Feige wanted to revive this character to pay homage and encompass the whole Marvel Cinematic Universe.
Source: The Hollywood Reporter
