Blade’s arrival in the MCU will take longer than expected as the upcoming Mahershala Ali-led reboot has seen its start date delayed by 3 months.
The filming start date for the MCU’s Blade reboot has reportedly been pushed back by three months. Wesley Snipes famously brought the dark Marvel comic book anti-hero Blade to screens for the first time in 1998. But when the vampire hunter finally arrives in the MCU, the character will be played by Oscar-winner Mahershala Ali instead of Snipes.
The original Blade movie of course came along years before Marvel movies took over the world. But when Blade comes back, there’s a good chance the main character won’t have his full R-rated comic book edge, given the family-friendly tone of the MCU. Details about this Blade reboot are naturally being kept under wraps, but fans were given their first taste of the MCU’s Blade via a voice-only cameo appearance by Ali in 2021’s The Eternals. In addition to Ali, Blade will feature the acting talents of Delroy Lindo and Aaron Pierre in as-yet-undisclosed roles, with Bassam Tariq taking the directorial reins.
Unfortunately it seems Ali and his co-stars and director won’t get to start rolling on Blade as soon as was hoped. Initial reports had Blade going before cameras as early as July 2022, but now it’s been revealed by Production Weekly (via CBR) that filming won’t actually begin until October. No reason is known for the decision to delay the start of Blade by three months.
Of course shooting schedules for major movies are always fluid and nothing is ever truly set in stone until cameras actually begin rolling. The question now is how the three-month Blade delay might affect the movie’s ultimate release date. Currently, three MCU movies are on the slate for 2023 (all of them sequels). A July 2022 start date for Blade might have put the movie in line to become the fourth 2023 MCU release and the only non-sequel, but now that filming has been pushed back until October, it seems 2024 is a more likely landing spot for Blade.
News of Blade’s start date being delayed by a few months no doubt comes as a disappointing development for fans who’ve long waited to see the Daywalker make his MCU debut. But of course at one point it seemed unlikely Blade would ever join the MCU at all, so perhaps in light of this, having to wait a little longer for the film doesn’t seem like that big a deal. It remains to be seen of course what kind of Blade will be offered up when the character makes his first true MCU appearance. Given Marvel’s history so far, it seems likely that some of Blade’s darkness will be dialed back to make him more compatible with the MCU in general. But then again, maybe the MCU is finally ready to embrace its dark side. Fans will begin to get some clue about what Blade will look and feel like after the movie finally begins shooting – a little later than expected.
Source: Production Weekly (via CBR)
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