Before ‘Blade,’ Marvel Nearly Produced a ‘Black Panther’ and ‘Luke Cage’ Film

As previously mentioned, Wesley Snipes, the original Blade, made a surprise cameo in Deadpool & Wolverine, reprising one of his most iconic roles. Fans are understandably excited to see Snipes back in action. His return has fueled speculation about a potential new film, though no official confirmation has been made.

Currently, Blade is one of the most talked-about characters online, as fans can’t contain their excitement over Snipes’ return to this iconic role. With that in mind, we took a trip down memory lane and uncovered an older interview that suggests we might have never seen this movie at all.

In a comprehensive interview with Entertainment Weekly, producer Peter Frankfurt, writer David S. Goyer, and Wesley Snipes shared numerous fascinating behind-the-scenes details about the original Blade movie and trilogy.

In the interview, Frankfurt, Goyer, and Snipes touched on various production-related topics, sharing intriguing insights about the superhero classic we all know and love today. One surprising revelation was that New Line originally had no interest in a Blade movie—this was actually the third project pitched to the studio. We ultimately have Goyer to thank for bringing the film to life.

WESLEY SNIPES [PRODUCER AND STAR]: It was kind of serendipitous you know? We were talking about doing Black Panther. But that didn’t come to be, and we never lost the appetite to play in that world. So Blade seemed like a pretty good replacement. Fairly good, I mean — I don’t know if you can take vampires and replace Wakanda. But at the time it was a cool thing. [Laughs]

DAVID GOYER [SCREENWRITER]: I’d been kicking around doing Van Damme movies, that kind of stuff. I had heard that New Line wanted to make a lower-budget black superhero film. At the time Marvel was in bankruptcy, and they’d already sold the rights to X-Men and Spider-Man and a few other things, and I knew they were thinking about Luke Cage, Black Panther.

FRANKFURT: The idea was we would come up with a script for an under-10-million-dollar movie that would be tough and street like Juice — kind of a hip-hop Marvel movie.

GOYER: I suggested Blade, as a trilogy. I remember I came in and said “I’m going to pitch you the Star Wars of black vampire films.” So I pitched it as this racial animosity between the purebloods and the turned vampires, the young Turks like Deacon Frost. And at the same time I wanted to talk about race in a subversive way, and it played into this half-breed idea, if you will — to have one foot in each world and not be accepted by either one.

Source: Entertainment Weekly

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