In July, Kevin Feige took responsibility for the cancellation of Marvel Studios’ Blade reboot starring two-time Oscar-winner Mahershala Ali (Moonlight, Green Book) as vampire-hunting Daywalker Eric Brooks.
“I’m feeling…like a gigantic loser and failure,” admitted Feige, “that we didn’t get off the ground with Mahershala.”
Ali wholeheartedly agrees with that self-assessment, recently telling GQ, “I agree with him. I agree with him one hundred percent. One hundred percent. He should feel that way. I agree.”
Mahershala Ali Reacts To Marvel Studios Canceling His Blade Movie
As for why the movie got canned, the acclaimed actor didn’t have an answer, but suggested fans direct the query at Marvel, a Disney-owned juggernaut that should have been able to pull off the project with ease.
“They had, as you said, a two-time Oscar winning actor under contract and you got billions of dollars,” Ali explained. “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.”
While news of the film’s cancellation was certainly disappointing for audiences, no one took it harder than Ali, who had trained for a year to play the action-oriented character.
“I trained so hard I blew my knee out,” he shared. “I was just waiting for them. [They were] pushing it back, pushing it back, pushing. I’m still training. I’m training. 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, pushing it back, pushing it. It doesn’t happen. And then it’s a strike.”
Thankfully, none of that hard work went to waste when director Bassam Tariq—who was originally set to helm Blade before exiting over creative differences—approached him for the lead role in Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother (now playing).
Tariq also wrote the script, which centers on a religious hitman (Ali) struggling to balance work, faith and fatherhood after the death of his wife sends him on a dangerous journey across Houston.
“The first time he was doing sword practice on Blade, the stuff coming back was incredible,” Tariq said in the official production notes. “Then, here, it was exceptional to see the way Mahershala rose to that occasion; he was able to anchor it all.”
Added Ali: “I picked back up where I left off. I started to get my body familiar with the movements again, the physical demand.”
