Kevin Feige and Marvel Studios have constructed plans for the Marvel Cinematic Universe that are so famously meticulous, audiences can usually rest assured that no detail introduced in one superhero movie will be placed on the back burner later. Unfortunately, that has not always been the case, as fans are still waiting for a previous “cameo” by Blade to amount to something.
Academy Award-winning director Chloé Zhao’s 2021 film, Eternals, based on Jack Kirby’s Marvel comic following a team of immortal, super-powered warriors, concluded with a post-credits sequence in which Dane Whitman (Kit Harrington) is about to reach for the Ebony Blade, hoping to use it to rescue Sersi (Gemma Chan) from Arishem. However, he is interrupted by an unseen voice that was later confirmed to belong to the vampire hunter Blade, played by two-time Oscar winner Mahershala Ali.
This vocal appearance served as the MCU’s first introduction to its official iteration of the Daywalker, whose solo film, a reboot of the Wesley Snipes-led horror-action franchise, had been officially announced two years earlier during Marvel Studios’ panel at San Diego Comic-Con. However, more than four years have passed, and the cameo remains the only appearance by Ali’s Blade so far.
This is not the only time that a character has been teased in a Marvel movie to no avail, or at least to disappointing returns. In fact, Blade is not the only character introduced in the same film who has yet to make an appearance, let alone its entire main cast. An earlier mid-credits scene from Eternals showed pop musician-turned-actor Harry Styles in the role of Eros, otherwise known as Starfox, whose MCU debut probably should have come earlier anyway, given that his brother is Thanos.
The State Of Marvel’s Blade Reboot
Image via Rico Torres / Twentieth Century Fox Film Corp. /Courtesy Everett Collection
Of all the MCU characters whose futures are uncertain, Blade is the one whom fans have been most concerned about and for the longest time so far. As of Oct. 2024, the reboot has been removed from Disney’s schedule after going through multiple release date delays following several script rewrites, director replacements and casting shake-ups.
The most recent update to the production came from Mia Goth, a modern-day Scream Queen known for hit horror movies like Ti West’s X Trilogy and Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein adaptation for Netflix, who confirmed that she is still attached to the film in October 2025. In fact, the English actor, whose character still has yet to be announced, is the only other person still known to be a part of the Blade cast.
Meanwhile, as Mahershala Ali’s Blade (the second MCU role for the actor after starring in the first season of Luke Cage as Cornell “Cottonmouth” Stokes) remains in hibernation, the franchise has incorporated two other versions of the half-man, half-bloodsucker otherwise known as Eric Books already. Wesley Snipes, the first actor to portray the Marvel character in live-action, reprised the role in Deadpool & Wolverine, opposite his Blade Trinity co-star Ryan Reynolds, and Todd Williams voiced the character for Disney+’s hit miniseries, Marvel Zombies.
The only thing that Marvel fans and those eager to see this new version of the Daywalker slice up bloodsuckers on the big screen can do for now is to be patient and hope that the Blade reboot’s extensive delay is the best thing for the project. After all, the wait is a better alternative than watching the filmmakers trying to ice skate uphill rushing through the production.
Blade currently has no set release date.
- Release Date
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November 7, 2025
- Director
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Bassam Tariq
- Writers
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Eric Pearson
