Despite many false departures, the beginnings of Mahershala Ali as a vampire killer in “Blade” are still in preparation, confirmed the chief of Marvel Studios, Kevin Feige.
“Mahershala is still attached,” Feige told a journalists gathered in Marvel studios on Friday about the project, who would see the double winner of the Oscars assume the role on the screen by Wesley Snipes, who played the role of the late 90s and 2000, as well as in “Deadpool & Wolverine” of 2024 “.” And said: “We would like costumes for” Sinners “”, he joked, referring to the costumes created by Ruth E. Carter for an abandoned “Blade” film that Marvel commanded, then sold to Carter for the Vampire film to coogle. “And we said:” Take “Man, no problem” – it’s a good friend – “Take our costumes. We hold back on the film”.
According to the seriousness, Feige explained, prolonged delays on “blade” were a symptom of Marvel’s “over -expansion” – how the executive characterizes the studio’s response to Disney’s mandate to produce more content at the start of the Disney +streaming service. Feige hesitated to use a “dramatic” term as “Fallout” to characterize the resulting situation, but “for the very first time, the quality of the quantity has won quality,” he said, echoing similar comments made recently by Disney CEO, Bob Iger.
“We had spent 12 years working on the Infinity saga, saying:” It will never happen to us, “said Feige. “We always had more characters than people asked that we could not do, because we were not going to make a film per month – it’s crazy. Suddenly, there is a mandate to do more, and we are going:” Well, we have more “… But maybe that’s what we fell.”
Thus, while Marvel was starting to reassess its development process, the film “Blade” – which was announced in 2019 and initially intended to go out in theaters in November 2023 – was one of the projects that was at neutral.
“We didn’t just want to put a leather outfit and make him start killing vampires. It had to be unique,” said Feige. “He fell in the time when we started to withdraw and to say:” Accept only very well “. And it was not “incredibly brilliant” at the time. »»
He continued: “We did not have the impression, as we do often, you can have a good script and make it an excellent script thanks to the production. We did not feel confident that we could do it on” Blade “, and we did not want to do this in Mahershala and do not want to do this.”
“Blade” was originally starting to shoot in 2022, but director Bassam Tariq (“Mogul Mowgli”) left the project in September, about two months before the cameras were supposed to roll. Yann Demange (“White Boy Rick”) then connected to Direct, only to leave the film in June 2024. There is currently no director. Ali insists that he is always a game.
“Call Marvel,” said Ali Variety Last month during the first of his new film “Jurassic World Rebirth”. When asked when the “Blade” production could start, he replied: “I’m ready. Let them know that I am ready. “
Several writers have also been announced over the years, from the scribe “Watchmen” Stacy Osei-Kuffour to Michael Starrbury. Feige said Variety There have been “three or four” iterations in the history “blade”, two of which were vintage pieces. “We landed to the present day,” said Feige. “This is why we could restore these costumes to Ruth, and that’s what we are focusing on.”
Speaking of “sinners”, despite the desire for the internet to see it, Feige said that Coogler was not in the running to direct the image (and seemed surprised that anyone pushed for it to happen). The filmmaker “Black Panther 3” on which to concentrate, what Feige confirmed is in progress, although no date has been revealed. “We know (when he is in the chronology), and if he tells you that he does not do it, it’s perfect,” said Feige with a smile heard.
So, after all this, does Feige regret to announce the project during the Hall H presentation of Marvel Studios in San Diego Comic-Con in 2019?
“Only with hindsight, I do it,” said Feige. “But I don’t do it. Because this is how we had announced everything before, like that and we did not have not book.”
Feige then underlined “the huge amount of curve balls” which the studio was confronted between 2019 and today; There were the obstacles that affected the whole industry, such as the pandemic and the delays in strike COVID-19, as well as tribulations specific to Marvel, such as “friends and dying stars; And scenarios changing people because people did not answer them as we wanted;
