The Blade movies are great. The first installment, along with X-Men, helped bring the credibility to comic book movies that lead to the boom we’re still enjoying. Even the weak third entry has some cool stuff in it with Blade’s new sidekicks (not so much the bodies in IV bags, ugh). But the rumor going around, as reported by the NY Daily News’ Confident@l column, that there’s another one coming is just… well… bullshit.
Confidenti@l has learned Wesley Snipes is set to reprise his lead role in Blade, the 1998 vampire thriller that made more than $130 million and generated two sequels.
Sources close to Snipes tells us the 52-year-old actor’s comeback after being released from prison in April 2013 (after serving two and a half years for tax evasion) is “looking good” and that he’ll make $3 million from this film, plus a cut of the profits. Let’s hope he remembers to pay Uncle Sam this time.
As much as we’d all love to see Snipes taking out vampires again, it’s really not likely to happen. Remember when the rights to characters like Blade and the Punisher reverted to Disney a couple of years ago? Great news, right? The problem is that a Blade movie would have to get shuffled into their very full schedule.
- The Avengers: Age of Ultron – May 1st, 2015
- Ant-Man – July 17th, 2015
- Captain America 3 – May 6th, 2016
- Untitled Marvel Film (Doctor Strange?) – July 8th, 2016
- Untitled Marvel Film – May 5th, 2017
- Guardians of the Galaxy 2 – July 28th, 2017
- Untitled Marvel Film – November 3rd, 2017
- Untitled Marvel Film (Avengers 3?) – May 4th, 2018
- Untitled Marvel Film – July 6th, 2018
- Untitled Marvel Film – November 2nd, 2018
- Untitled Marvel Film – May 3rd, 2019
By the time Blade 4 would come out it’ll be 20 years since the first movie and at 52 years old now, its star will be able to buy a senior ticket to see it. (And the vastly diminishing returns of the Expendables franchise might scare studios away from elderly action stars, or at least the ones that aren’t consistently bankable.)
I really want to be wrong, but I just do not see this movie getting made. But look at it this way, for one shining moment, you all thought that Snipes’ idiotic Blade/Twilight fanfic that he talked about a few weeks might actually come true. And for some of you, the ones who like beating really, really, really dead horses, isn’t that enough?
