Mahershala Ali has spoken out on Marvel’s scrapped Blade reboot once more, this time agreeing with past statements made by Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige that it was the “biggest failure” of his career.
Speaking during a new profile with GQ, Ali was asked once more why the film never came to fruition, with the star firmly replying that it was a question better answered by Feige himself.
“That’s a Kevin Feige question,” he explained. “They had, as you said, a two-time Oscar-winning actor under contract and you got billions of dollars. That’s a question for them. I don’t mean anything personal to you, but I don’t know why it didn’t. To this day, I don’t know why it didn’t happen. I just know that it was — Kevin, he said it was the biggest failure of his career and I agree.”
Of course, Ali’s comments referred to a previous statement made by Feige during his appearance on the Happy Sad Confused podcast, where he exclaimed that he felt “like a gigantic loser and failure that we didn’t get [the reboot] off the ground with Mahershala.”
“I agree with him one hundred percent… He should feel that way,” replied Ali when he was presented with the quote from Feige. “I trained so hard I blew my knee out. I was just waiting for them… I’m learning sword work. Name the martial art, I’m training in it. And I literally moved, uprooted my family, moved to Atlanta. We are there waiting to go. And they just keep pushing it back… It doesn’t happen. And then it’s a strike.”
Marvel’s Blade reboot was first announced at San Diego Comic-Con in 2019, but the project has since hit numerous hurdles, including losing two directors – first Bassam Tariq (Mogul Mowgli) and then his replacement, Yann Demange (Lovecraft Country) – alongside the film’s composer, Steven Ellison (better known as Flying Lotus or FlyLo). While the film hasn’t been explicitly cancelled, losing its lead hero will no doubt signal the final nail in the coffin, so the future of the project remains up in the air.
At least for Ali, it’s clear he is completely done with the project, as he has constantly reiterated in previous interviews on the matter, so perhaps it’s best for everyone to just move on.
Kevin is a reformed PC Master Race gamer with a penchant for franchise “duds” like Darksiders III and Dead Space 3. He has made it his life-long mission to play every single major game release – lest his wallet dies trying.
Natalie
