With very few exceptions, it wouldn’t be a stretch to suggest that the 1990s was hardly a banner decade for the superhero genre, but things ended with a bang when Blade came along to set out its stall as one of the most important and influential comic book adaptations ever made.
Tim Burton’s first two Batman blockbusters, The Crow, Men in Black, and a couple of others found plenty of favor, but the rest of the ’90s were littered with a litany of disappointments and flops that included The Shadow, The Phantom, Judge Dredd, Spawn, Steel, Barb Wire, and of course, Batman & Robin.
Many were forecasting the end of costumed crimefighters as a viable source of cinematic inspiration, until Wesley Snipes’ Daywalker made one of the most iconic introductions audiences had seen in a long time. By the end of Blade‘s very first scene, the actor and action star had made superheroes cool again, with the “Blood Rave” still one of the best opening sequences in the genre’s history.
Just like that, comics were cool again, and it can’t be a coincidence that a slew of titles following leather-clad badasses and/or Marvel favorites began making their way through development. Sure, Bryan Singer’s X-Men and Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man took things to a whole new level, but Blade was the one that laid down the marker.
With the MCU’s reboot gearing up to shoot, streaming subscribers have opted to revisit the OG in their numbers, with Stephen Norrington’s gloriously violent vampiric adventure currently making a serious splash on the iTunes most-watched charts, per FlixPatrol. Mahershala Ali might have two Oscars under his belt, but he’s still got big shoes to fill.
