Marvel's BLADE: Too difficult to reboot?

With Marvel Studios having acquired the rights to many of its marquee characters back from other film studios, Patrick believes that out of all of them BLADE is going to be the hardest for them to reclaim and make their own.

Wesley Snipes as Blade

In the past few years Marvel have managed to get back the rights to Daredevil, Ghost Rider, Punisher and Blade. This is a major accomplishment but is it also a hindrance to the studio as well. All of these movies or franchises have either produced dud movies or they are too much in the more adult sphere for the Disney/Marvel partnership to make anything out of them. The more family friendly heroes like Spider-Man, The Fantastic Four, and X-Men all lie with other studios. These characters as well have spawned relatively successful runs at the box office and there popularity has not seemed to have waned at all with a reboot of The Fantastic Four in the mix, as well as The Amazing Spider-Man and X-Men: Days of Future Past looking like they will do big business again in the summer of 2014, did Marvel really gain anything from getting these properties back? It’s hard to know really. On one hand some of the movies were so poorly received by fans that fixing them could lead to huge success of Marvel outside its Avenger cycle. When I look at the properties though there is one that sticks out like a sore thumb that could be very hard to reboot; that is Blade.

Blade is after a reasonably popular and successful trilogy. The character was fairly well explored in the three movies. Having watched all of them I think that the character was shown to an interesting lead character and that he could carry a movie fairly well. Perhaps by Blade: Trinity a great of the storyline was losing steam and new ideas will definitely be needed to rejuvenate the series if Marvel is to do anything with it. It may be a good time before any of this happens however and here are some of the reasons why.

Casting

Snipes Spot on Casting

Say what you will about Wesley Snipes, but he is Blade. When the first movie came out in 1998 he was a big enough star to headline the movie and he inhabits the role brilliantly. He has a charisma and draw to him on screen that helps the audience to enter this world of vampires and supernatural world of beasties. Snipes uses Blade in an interesting way. Blade is played as a very still, yet deadly character. He is a “Day Walker” (a vampire who can walk in the sunlight), who hunts the vampire kind with swords. Snipes somehow manages to show Blade as a conflicted character despite this stillness. He gives Blade depth by showing subtly how he struggles with his thirst for human blood. These are all things that would have to be dealt with if the franchise was to be resurrected. There is just no avoiding it. Despite the fact that by the third film, it seemed that Snipes had grown tired of the character, it’s still hard to imagine anyone else taking on the role.

Tyrese Gibson: Could he play Blade?

The problem is finding a young enough actor to take on the role that they can play the character in more than one movie. The actor has to be established in order to carry the movie and of course he has to African-American or of African descant. There are a number of wonderful actors of African descant that have the capabilities to play the character but none of them would be young enough to restart and carry a franchise. To me the whole action hero actor thing isn’t a concern. Actors make transformations of extraordinary kinds all the time so that wouldn’t be a worry. Unfortunately in Hollywood there are very few African-American actors in their late twenties or early thirties who are established enough for Marvel to risk trying to take on a Blade reboot and Marvel aren’t beyond taking risks, just look at Guardians of the Galaxy and Ant-Man as part of Phase 2 and 3. Heck Iron Man was a huge risk at the time of its release and luck allowed it to be the kick start that Marvel needed. Despite the fact that great actors like Michael B. Jordan (The Wire, Chronicle), Noel Clarke (Star Trek Into Darkness, Dr. Who) and Tyrese Gibson (Fast and The Furious, Transformers) have the talent to carry a film like this none of them have had a major lead role in a franchise movie so seeing Marvel put faith in one to carry an action franchise like this may be a stretch.   

Storyline and Direction

Blade had lots of blood

Everyone knows that vampires are very fashionable in Hollywood at the moment. Any television or movie that has a supernatural/horror element to it has a link to vampires. The problem is that vampires have been claimed by the tween demographic. These vampires are almost always vegetarian and don’t do much. Blade is different. He’s an anti-hero. He kills vampires because they kill people. That is another risk that Marvel would have to take. To tell Blade properly it would have to be rated R like the first two instalments of the franchise. You’d have to bring the franchise and vampires back to their horror roots. You’d also have to find a director whose willing to do this. Marvel are known for their left of field choices when it comes to their movies: Jon Faverau (Iron Man 1 &2), Joss Whedon(Avengers 1&2), Joe Jonston (Captain America: The First Avenger), Kenneth Branagh (Thor), Alan Taylor(Thor: The Dark World), Edgar Wright(Ant-Man), Shane Black (Iron Man 3), James Gunn (Guardians of the Galaxy) and the Russo Brothers (Captain America: The Winter Solider). Very few of these directors would be known for their action chops as directors but they have all worked well with the films they have helmed.

Justin Lin has the visual and action flair for a project like this

I think for a project like Blade you would have to have a strong sense of action and they would be willing to use the horror aspect to their advantage. Who would be able to do this is another question Marvel would have to answer. I think that someone like Justin Lin who is known for his stylised action and sense of fun could take the helm of this and give it the kick it needs. Having said that I doubt Lin would move away from the Fast and Furious franchise which is not only popular but doing really well at the box office too.

Blade in the comic book

I have to say that I am not an avid reader of the Blade comics so I’m not hugely familiar with any of his big or popular storylines. The one thing I do know that for a movie with a character like his an R rating is nearly a necessity. This is the case with other characters too like The Punisher, and Deadpool.  However studios aren’t risking it. Jeff Wadlow is trying to have an R-rated Deadpool, which has Ryan Reynolds attached, green lighted and Joe Carnahan’s passion project, a reboot of Daredevil, which he viewed as being R-rated weren’t given any chance by studios. It’s not like R-rated comic book movies aren’t successful. Kick Ass and Watchmen showed that it can be done. Heck the original Blade showed it can work. It seems that unlikely that a Disney owned company would push for this kind of thing though.

When looking at the properties that Marvel has at its disposal it’s hard to see them looking at projects that have movies out already. Marvel has established itself as fun and bright. Most of the properties returned to it have a darker edge to them. Marvel may feel that if they leave these properties and make good on others first that it will give them time to use them properly. I think that time will be needed on Blade more than any other franchise because they got it so right the first time round. After all I don’t think Marvel want to do to its superheroes what another studio did to one of its best loved characters! This is why I think Blade may be the hardest to reboot.