Since first being announced at San Diego Comic-Con in the summer of 2019, the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s Blade reboot has taken its sweet time in crawling towards the start line. Even when it got there, director Bassam Tariq dropped out weeks before production was due to start, raising plenty of questions about what it could mean moving forward.
Well, we finally got our answer, and it’s not an encouraging one. As per The Hollywood Reporter, Marvel Studios has temporarily placed the Daywalker’s return on ice as the search for a new director continues. While it hasn’t been confirmed, it now seems incredibly unlikely that the rudderless ship will be ready to arrive in theaters on November 3 of next year.
The start date has been pushed back to the beginning of 2023, which is something we’d been expecting to hear based on the timeline of events that saw Tariq exit the project, but it’s another high-profile setback for two-time Academy Award winner Mahershala Ali’s long-awaited debut as the vampire-slaying leather aficionado.
Werewolf by Night only just whetted the appetite for more MCU horror escapades, too, so this news couldn’t have come at a worse time. Maybe director Michael Giacchino should have shoehorned in that cameo appearance after all, seeing as we’ve got no idea when we’ll be able to see Blade on the big screen for ourselves.
Marvel tends to move quickly when these bumps in the road crop up out of nowhere, so let’s hope a director doesn’t take too long to fall into place.
