Despite chicken little claims about superhero fatigue, superhero projects remain king in the 21st century. Advancements in technology have allowed studios to tell stories, through films and streaming series, that 80s and 90s kids always dreamt of seeing. However, even as Hollywood continues to seek to advance and elevate the genre, the first modern superhero film still sets the standard in at least one aspect.
Released in 1998 (yes, the previous century), Stephen Norrington‘s Blade, starring Wesley Snipes, jumpstarted the superhero craze, making way for Sony to bring Sam Raimi‘s Spider-Man franchise to live and allowing for Fox to dream big with the X-Men. But despite the dozens of comic book movies that have followed it into theater’s, Blade continues to hold the championship belt for having THE best opening scene. Unmatched nearly 30 years later, the iconic “Blood Rave” blitzed unsuspecting audiences with a raw and visceral introduction to Blade’s world. Replete with hard-pumping music and harder-pumping action, the “Blood Rave” left its mark on fans and film makers alike.
Though it’s never been said outright, one of the last decade’s most beloved action franchises often feels as though it could have drawn inspiration from Blade‘s opening scene. Three of the four films in Keanu Reeves‘ John Wick franchise has featured an action-packed scene set in some sort of club that, like Blade’s “Blood Rave”, feels like it was crafted with the intention to overload the audience’s senses. And now, a karmic circle moment may be right around the corner.
According to Jeff “The In” Sneider, Marvel Studios May have lielned up John Wick franchise director Chad Stahelski to inject some life into its (un)dead Blade reboot.
A series of events that seems to long and painful to relive again here has resulted in Marvel Studios’ Blade remaining in development hell after first being announced in 2019. It’s enough to know that after years of stops and starts, the film was removed from the studio’s 2025 slate and never given a new release date. As director after director have left the project, fans have often called for Marvel to being in Stahelski, who has plenty of experience in both the superhero genre and with vampire projects and went on record in 2022 calling Blade “the one interesting thing” he would like to do at Marvel Studios, under one condition.
And he [Kevin Feige] actually asked me, ‘What could we ever do?’ I was like, ‘Look, I’m not going to lie to you. I don’t know if I fit that kind of studio mold, but Blade would be the one interesting thing I’d like to do. I don’t know if I would’ve been the best choice for that in the direction they wanted to go. If you want to do the edgy rated R version, yeah, give me a call. If you want to be non-apologetic, yeah. That’s me. But I think they’re protecting their brand, they’re doing their thing. The individual they selected, I think is a very good director, and I think will do a great job in the direction that I think they want to take the property.
-Chad Stahelski
With the studio now in the business of making R-rated content and having granted previous director Yann Demange‘s version of the film the R-rating in an effort to help “unleash” the ferocity of film’s star, Mahershala Ali, it sounds as though Stahelski‘s one and only request has been met. Whether or not Stahelski, or anyone else, ever actually makes the film is, of course, an entirely different matter.
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