The news broke last night that Mahershala Ali is in talks to star in Universal Pictures' upcoming Jurassic World reboot, seemingly leaving the status of Marvel Studios' long-planned Blade reboot up in the air.
Though we haven't had any official updates on the project, Jurassic World 4 is said to be gearing up for a mid-June shoot, which is also around the time Blade is (or was) expected to begin filming. So, it seems highly unlikely that Ali would be lining up this JW role if he was still planning to play the Daywalker unless the MCU project has been hit with yet another delay - or has been cancelled altogether?
Blade has been plagued by production woes ever since it was first announced over four years ago, going through a number of directors and writers. The project finally seemed to be back on track after a recent Production Weekly update claimed that shooting was set to commence this Fall, but we recently learned that the movie had hit yet another bump in the road, with a new writer being sought to give the script yet another major overhaul.
Now, John Campea has weighed in on the situation during the latest episode of his YouTube show. According to his sources, "Blade's production has completely restarted" because key players involved with the reboot are dissatisfied with the script.
This suggests that Marvel Studios is still planning to forge ahead with the movie, but a complete restart obviously indicates that they'll be starting from scratch and tossing out (or at the very least significantly overhauling) the previous story ideas.
As for who these "key players" might be, we'd be very surprised if Ali wasn't one of them.
Though we had been led to believe that everything has been sorted since, a recent expose claimed that the Luke Cage star threatened to depart the movie at one point due to frustrations with the script.
Some early drafts reportedly saw Ali's new take on the Daywalker "relegated to third or fourth lead" in his own movie, and while this has been disputed by a writer who worked on a draft prior to the strikes (more here), some of these issues (or all-new ones) could still be giving the actor pause.
It's worth noting that Ali's last update during an interview with EW was a positive one.
“We’re working on it. That’s the best I could tell you. I’m really encouraged with the direction of the project. I think we’ll be back at it relatively soon.”
“I’m sincerely encouraged in terms of where things are at and who’s on board and who’s leading the way as far as the writing of the script and the directing and all that,” he added. “So that’s the extent of what I can tell you.”
Director Yann Demange (who stepped in to replace Bassam Tariq) has also spoken positively about the reboot, and previously confirmed that the movie will indeed be rated R.
"I'm excited to show a kind of ruthlessness, a roughness he has, that allows him to walk the earth in a particular way. I love him for that," said the filmmaker. "He’s got a dignity and integrity, but there is a ferocity there that he usually keeps under the surface. I want to unleash that and put it on the screen."
Blade is currently set to hit theaters on November 7, 2025, but we wouldn't be surprised if a major delay is imminent, so be sure to keep an eye out for updates.