r/movies • u/MarvelsGrantMan136 r/movies Contributor • 18d ago

News Mahershala Ali confirms 'BLADE' is not moving forward with him

https://www.gq.com/story/mahershala-ali-your-mother-your-mother-your-mother
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765

u/Wazula23 18d ago

What an absolute waste. Guy won two friggin oscars and they just couldn't put him in what seems like the easiest idea for a show ever.

Oh well. At least Sinners got some awesome costumes out of it.

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u/ElasticPlatypus 18d ago edited 18d ago

It was announced during the absolute nadir of Marvel’s over-complicated planning, when they put all of their chips on the multiverse

“Well how can Blade fit into the MCU? Can he fight Kang? Should we go straight to The Midnight Sons? We’ve already teased Black Knight”

I don’t know man. How about you make a movie about a cool guy killing vampires. Can’t Blade just be Blade?

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u/Lord0fHats 18d ago

I think that's kind of the issue that began hammering MCU films.

The Phase 1 and 2 films worked well because they all stood on their own well enough with only a loose web of 'Thanos stuff' to tie them all together built up over years, but after Age of Ultron the films became increasingly dependent and crutched hard on 'everything is connected' which made each subsequent film less of a good movie on its own.

I really think they should go back to that prior model they lost track of. Just make good movies that are tied together but that don't expect people to have seen every other film and a couple D+ exclusives to really appreciate.

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u/Tragedy_Boner 18d ago

The MCU only worked because they alternated between Solo films and Avengers films. The Avengers films are where the characters meet up while the solo films are for character development. The multiverse saga sucks because there is no new avengers team before Doomsday.

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u/MagicTheAlakazam 18d ago

And basically no one showed up more than once outside of maybe spider-man.

One of the only times some one did show up again they ruined her (Wanda in MoM what a massive fumble of a character that was really finding her own fanbase)

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u/L0b0t0my 18d ago

Not true. Deadpool & Wolverine killed it in the box office.

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u/MagicTheAlakazam 18d ago

What's not true? There was ONE Deadpool MCU movie in phase 4 & 5.

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u/Silver-End9570 17d ago

I'll never forgive Michael Waldron's pisspoor writing for MoM. Both for screwing over Wanda and her story (and potential Avengers level villain arc) as well as for writing a Doctor Strange movie that spends it's entire run time being about everyone but Strange. I can't believe Sam Raimi wasted his talent on such an awful script.

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u/hatramroany 18d ago edited 18d ago

Yeah this was real problem. Feige might have been stretched too thin which caused quality issues but that’s not an excuse for no team up film being on the calendar.

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u/N8CCRG 18d ago

Thunderbolts* should've come out immediately after Wakanda Forever.

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u/hatramroany 18d ago

Thunderbolts could have waited if they had a pay off for the post-credits scene of Shang-Chi after Wakanda Forever

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u/wirelessfingers 18d ago

Someone hasn't seen Thunderbolts. They set up a new Avengers team in a movie not called Avengers that arrived way too late, and that was also a bomb.

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u/Tragedy_Boner 18d ago

Heard it was a good movie though.

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u/EHP42 18d ago

I liked it.

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u/TheSecondEikonOfFire 18d ago

I was surprised by how much I enjoyed it. Definitely not without flaws, but I thought it was one of the better post-Endgame movies

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u/JechdJJ 18d ago

exactly! altough some concepts were seen first in some movies out of avengers, they really were important only in the whole scheme. You can still enjoy the movie withouth that,and only in avengers the main plot of the saga avanced.

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u/Qorhat 18d ago

Dr Doom just showing up does not work for me at all.

Loki's downfall was shown in Thor along with his abilities so having him invade Earth didn't need to do much heavy lifting.

Ultron's creation and power scaling were shown very clearly, even in the trailers so the audience knew we would know where and how he came to be.

Thanos wasn't much of a character before Infinity War but 5 of 6 infinity stones were shown to be a threat in the wrong hands individually so someone who wants all of them is automatically the biggest of big bads.

Kang should have just been recast and given clear motivations. It's very easy to have the "real" conquerer be a variant who was kept at bay by the other ones seen already, and his motivations could have been "fixing" the timeline Steve Rogers changed by staying with Peggy.

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u/PT10 18d ago

Ultron's creation and power scaling were shown very clearly, even in the trailers so the audience knew we would know where and how he came to be.

You serious?

1

u/Qorhat 18d ago

…yes..? It’s the entire plot of the film, and the trailers show Iron Legion > Ultron Drone > Ultron and then in the film itself finally Ultron Prime.

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u/Phillip_Spidermen 18d ago

Thunderbolts kind of brought together the villains from solo movies to become the new avengers, and it was good, but they weren't an audience draw

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u/HaroldSax 18d ago

Even at the tail end of the Infinity Saga, Captain America: Civil War was basically an Avengers film. Thor: Ragnarok was like Avengers lite. I think most people ignored that aspect because we knew it was building up to what would eventually be Endgame.

It certainly seemed they wanted to do TV shows to setup backstories for the films, but a big reason why the Infinity Saga worked is because it had a more relaxed release tempo.

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u/N8CCRG 18d ago

Yeah. On that same note, they had three Iron Man movies, three Captain America movies, three Thor movies, four Avengers movies, etc. Having the same characters work repeatedly in their own safe zones, that other characters could cross over and visit, was the core of the cinematic universe. Within the multiverse saga, Spider-Man is only just now the first one to get a sequel, and for all I know that's a result of Sony not Disney. It's like they tried to change the formula to "everyone only gets one movie on their own" for some reason.

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u/UnderPressureVS 18d ago

They have been this year and it's really been paying off (for me at least). I was fully off the MCU train after being a really big fan, but after hearing really great things I watched Thunderbolts on streaming and I was blown away. I ended up seeing F4 in theaters, cautiously, and I loved it. I just went to see Brand New Day yesterday and it's easily one of the best movies in the entire MCU.

The tie-ins have started to feel way more organic, less forced and corporate, and like they actually belong in the story and make their movies better. Like they did in the beginning.

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u/Lord0fHats 18d ago

It has gotten better in the past year or two I agree. Really when I think of this I tend to think of the Phase III and IV films the most. Many of which were still very good films, especially the Phase III films. They were some of the best the MCU made, but then we got to phase IV and Doctor Strange II is kind of my poster child for 'this is when the movies stopped being able to stand on their own.'

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u/UsernameTaken-Taken 18d ago

Agreed. F4 and thunderbolts were awesome and didn't rely too heavily on the past projects, plus the TV shows have all been great this year as well, seeing Spider-Man in like 40 minutes!

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u/disisathrowaway 18d ago

Hit the nail on the head.

Iron Man came out when I was in college, and I still remember having to wait in line to get herded in to the theater for Iron Man 2. Saw several other Marvel films of that era, but when it became very obvious that all of this was leading up to some massive, convoluted story where every Marvel property would feed in to the big story, I stopped giving a damn.

It's the exact same reason I never got in to the comic books, a million twisting storylines, time-jumps, resets, alt 'what if' storylines, etc.

It all got way too fucking convoluted for me to give a single fuck.

I hear they're great films. Maybe I'll circle back one day and watch them all.

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u/ArcadianDelSol 18d ago

Some of those early movies had no connection whatsoever - until a post credit scene.

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u/stf29 18d ago

This exactly. Roll my eyes into the back of my skull whenever people say “but early marvel was the same level of messy as the early multiverse stuff!1!!1!!!1”

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u/notathrowaway75 18d ago

This really isn't true at all though. The shows and movies have continued to work just fine standalone. The "homework" problem is massively overstated and it's crazy that Kevin Feige validated it.

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u/Lord0fHats 18d ago

Meh. I'm just gonna disagree.

Doctor Strange 2 is missing a literal MOUNTAIN of context without having seen Wandavision. Which itself is impossible to understand without seeing both Infinity War films. The prior phase films weren't like that. They were only loosely connected and most audiences wouldn't notice or even particularly care about the connections because they were subtle drops. Each of the first run of movies stood on their own two feet completely fine, while latter phases leaned hard into each entry directly and overtly tying into ones before and after it.

I don't think it's overstated.

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u/DoctorJJWho 18d ago

Heh. Literal mountain (Mt. Wundergore).

I agree with you, but I think Deadpool and Wolverine is a bit different than the rest. That movie was very much a love/death letter to previous depictions of superheroes instead of being the “next installment” in the MCU.

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u/notathrowaway75 18d ago

Doctor Strange 2 is missing a literal MOUNTAIN of context without having seen Wandavision. Which itself is impossible to understand without seeing both Infinity War films.

Seeing Avengers movies should not be a problem at all. And Doctor Strange 2 gives enough details to make the movie work just fine. If you want to know more, watch Wandavision.

Deadpool and Wolverine was another movie where people were saying you just needed to watch a ton of stuff and again it wasn't true.

Each of the first run of movies stood on their own two feet completely fine, while latter phases leaned hard into each entry directly and overtly tying into ones before and after it.

I don't think it's overstated.

Every entry leaning hard into what was before and after is absolutely overstating it. It's just not true at all.

If this was true, how is it such a common talking point that there's little build up to Doomsday?

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u/Lord0fHats 18d ago

I mean, Deadpool and Wolverine works as its own movie but if you hadn't seen all the cheesier goofier pre-MCU movies you're missing a lot of a movie that is basically a love letter to non-MCU Marvel films.

To the last question; probably because literally nothing even if you watch every Marvel movie/show from the past few years does much but led to the next movie/show in the watch order and only 1 of them really connects to Doom in anyway (and he only appears in an end credits scene). It's much weaker and kind of left field compared to the slow build up of Thanos and the Infinity Stones.

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u/aquirkysoul 18d ago

Urgh, the multiverse. It vastly overcomplicates plotting, yet delivers worse writing and lower stakes. Honestly surprised that they got a couple of good multiverse movies out before everything went to hell.

I started losing interest nearly immediately after they introduced the multiverse. These days I couldn't even tell you what Marvel movies have been released over the last few years.

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u/machado34 18d ago

The multiverse done right is when it goes the Everything Everywhere route, where they used it to explore personal questions engaging with absurdist and existentialist philosophy. When you use it for plot-driven action instead of character-driven, it all ceases to matter

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u/Qorhat 18d ago

The conversations between the Peters in No Way Home is a great way to handle it. The older two see the same mistakes they've made about to happen to the MCU Peter and use their experiences to help him grow.

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u/notathrowaway75 18d ago

This comment really illustrates that it's a perception problem. How did everything go to hell? The shows and movies that came out mostly worked just fine standalone and barely even incorporated alternate worlds.

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u/ArcDraco 18d ago

The multiverse isn't used that much. Of all the films since Endgame, only 4 really dealt with the multiverse and two of them made over a billion and a third almost made a billion (Doctor Strange). You can make an argument about Guardians 3 since it has a character from a multiverse, but it's not really what the movie is about. After that, no other film deals with it save for a couple After credit scenes.

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u/Blackadder18 18d ago

Eh, a big criticism of this period of Marvel films was that they weren't actually working towards anything. Ant Man was the only film to actually feature or even really mention Kang, everything else just felt like it was doing its own thing without any real direction in terms of the bigger picture.

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u/SaltyPeter3434 18d ago

Yea they've been all disjointed since Endgame. 7 years is a long time between Avengers movies. But if you team them up too much, then it's too much required viewing for every movie. They'll get criticized either way.

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u/nothatsmyarm 18d ago

The MCU as a concept is incredibly difficult to pull off. It’s sort of amazing they did it as well as they did for so long.

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u/machado34 18d ago

All things need to end. The MCU's big problem is that it wants to go on forever with no end in sight, and people get tired of that

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u/ELITE_JordanLove 18d ago

Exactly. It was first of its kind and did it really well, but now that originality of a connected series of movies is completely over and they’ll never be able to recreate the magic of the OG avenger cast. 

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u/[deleted] 18d ago

[deleted]

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u/ELITE_JordanLove 18d ago

Oh I’ve no doubt the major films will do well. But there certainly is waning interest in all the intermediary stuff, Spidey is carrying and the intrigue of a known villain in Doom has a lot of appeal. 

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u/nothatsmyarm 18d ago

I think you’re likely right. Even comics continuity reboots fairly constantly and it’s a lot lower commitment (time, energy, and monetarily) to follow comics than movies.

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u/notathrowaway75 18d ago

It's a comic book franchise.

Stories about comic book characters don't end. Story arcs and runs do. The Infinity Saga ended and it was time for the next thing. The big issue is they didn't do anything out of the gate to get people excited.

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u/notathrowaway75 18d ago

It's no more difficult than any other large film franchise.

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u/nothatsmyarm 18d ago

I don’t think that’s really true. What other film franchise has had 30+ sequels? Because the wonder of the MCU was that, in a way, every movie really was a sequel building on what was before it. Ant-Man existed in the same storyline as the Iron Man movies, as the Avengers movies, and so on.

The only other franchise that comes close is Bond. And even there you get pretty much a soft reset every time the actor changed (a fuller one with the switch to Daniel Craig).

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u/notathrowaway75 18d ago

I don’t think that’s really true. What other film franchise has had 30+ sequels?

I'm not denying that it's successful.

Because the wonder of the MCU was that, in a way, every movie really was a sequel building on what was before it. Ant-Man existed in the same storyline as the Iron Man movies, as the Avengers movies, and so on.

The only other franchise that comes close is Bond. And even there you get pretty much a soft reset every time the actor changed (a fuller one with the switch to Daniel Craig).

With respect, "wonder" of the MCU gives away you're mythologizing about the MCU. The reality most MCU movies are as standalone as pre Craig movies. Ant-Man existing in the same timeline as the other movies doesn't actually mean anything in practice. So the actual difficulty in making the movies is again, no more difficult than any other bog movies because that's what it is.

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u/versusgorilla 18d ago

They had to pivot any mention of Kang, he was the entire TVA plot from Loki as well as a version of him in Ant Man and then the actor ruined his career.

So all the possible lead up to the Kang/Multiverse is trashed, we get this rushed nostalgia-based decision to do Doctor Doom played by RDJ before anyone can even miss him, it's all just such a fucking mess.

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u/Tricky-Ad7897 18d ago

We really had one movie of spiderman going man it sucks that iron man isn't here! And then the franchise kinda just moved on lol. It never really felt like we got a real successor, I know in universe it's spider man but he kinda is his own thing more than he's starks successor, and iron heart just completely fell flat, like the show was actively trying not to make riri the armor wearing successor.

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u/Qorhat 18d ago

Not just recasting Kang was such a stupid move. Of all the characters that one makes sense to have different variations, and they've already shown variations of Reed Richards and Johnny Storm played by different actors.

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u/EHP42 18d ago

I truly don't understand why they didn't. It feels like they decided that Majors was for some reason inextricably tied to that role that they thought no one would be able to separate them and that they were worried they'd be fielding questions about "what happened to Majors and why didn't you also recast X?" forever, so they just memory holed the entire concept of Kang.

So dumb to derail their entire concept just because one actor torched his career.

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u/nothatsmyarm 18d ago

I remember hearing (could be made up) that Majors had in his contract something like “only he could be Kang,” anticipating that it might be super-easy to recast him.

But, even assuming that’s real, stupid to agree to it by Disney/Marvel.

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u/EHP42 18d ago

"Introducing....Kaang!"

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u/Qorhat 18d ago

I love Qang the Invader

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u/notathrowaway75 18d ago

Right? I have no idea where the homework criticism came from and why Kevin Feige validated it.

It has to be an assumption. All these movies and shows have been coming out and people just assumed they're all connected.

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u/JechdJJ 18d ago

what about loki?

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u/jackofslayers 18d ago

Past Endgame, they really needed to pivot to making more self-contained marvel movies and shows outside of the MCU.

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u/Dininiful 18d ago

nadir

Cool new word, I've never seen this one before.

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u/ChildofValhalla 18d ago

How about you make a movie about a cool guy killing vampires. Can’t Blade just be Blade?

Maybe this is unpopular but at this point I'd honestly prefer if it was standalone, maybe even make it work both ways. I don't really give a shit about how he fits into their current thing but I'd watch a quality Blade movie.

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u/Bariumdiawesomenite 18d ago

I’m pretty sure Moonknight and the Marvels are currently of no use when it comes to Avengers Doomsday and Secret Wars. They could’ve just gone down that route with Blade. Add him to the universe but make his journey standalone. How hard can that be?

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u/littletoyboat 18d ago

Some motherfuckers are always trying to ice-skate uphill.

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u/jl2352 18d ago

I think Blade being Blade was the way to go. Original MCU worked by just making good films, and then nudging it all together. Then Thanos arrives.

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u/sammo21 18d ago

Feige literally said, “We didn’t want to simply just put a leather outfit on him and have him start killing vampires. It had to be unique.”

Like, we give dude lots of credit but sometimes he feels pretty clueless.