Marvel is finally revealing some movement on their Blade reboot set to star Mahershala Ali as the human-vampire hybrid originally made famous on the big screen by Wesley Snipes. Stacy Osei-Kuffour, who wrote episodes of HBO’s Watchmen series and served as the show’s story editor, has been announced as the Blade reboot screenwriter, with a report revealing that Marvel has spent the last six months working with Ali to find the right writer for the project.
News of Stacy Osei-Kuffour landing the Blade reboot writer gig comes from The Hollywood Reporter, which reveals that Marvel and star Mahershala Ali have been working hard for the last few months to find the right scribe for the project. The report also adds that “only Black writers were seriously considered, a reflection of Marvel’s focus on diversity and making representation a key factor.” As a result, Osei-Kuffour is now the first Black female writer to tackle a Marvel film.
Osei-Kuffour is a writer and actress. She wrote and appeared on an episode of the Hulu series PEN15, and her other writing credits include HBO’s excellent Watchmen series, Amazon’s Hunters, and the HBO series Run, which was canceled after one season (even though I thought it was pretty damn good and deserved time to find an audience).
Blade was created by Marv Wolfman and Gene Colan and made his first appearance in the pages of the comic The Tomb of Dracula in 1973. Traditionally, Blade is a half-human/half-vampire who hunts other vampires. Because of his human blood, he’s able to move about during the day, thus earning him the monicker Daywalker.
The character was first brought to the screen in the 1998 movie Blade, starring Wesley Snipes. Snipes appeared as the character in two more films – Blade II and Blade: Trinity. By all accounts, Blade: Trinity was a troubled production, and its low box office returns effectively killed the franchise. Since then, there has been talk of Snipes possibly returning to the role, but those talks never went anywhere. There was also a live-action TV series based on the films starring Sticky Fingaz as the title character. It only lasted one season.
In July 2019, Marvel unexpectedly announced a Blade reboot at the very end of their 2019 San Diego Comic-Con presentation. Just as the presentation was wrapping up, actor Mahershala Ali came out on stage and put on a Blade hat. Since then we haven’t really heard much about the Blade movie, or where it might fit into the Marvel Cinematic Universe. However, the news that Marvel has found a writer indicates the project is beginning to pick up steam.
