Marvel Studios has announced that pre-production on Blade will be put on hold due to the writers’ strike, pushing back other MCU projects.
Blade, the vampire thriller starring Mahershala Ali as the titular character, will not begin pre-production as expected due to the writers’ strike. Marvel Studios has halted all work on the film, which was scheduled to begin shooting in Atlanta in June. However, other MCU projects will continue shooting.
The cast and crew of Blade were notified on Friday afternoon, May 5. The production recently revealed that it had hired True Detective creator Nic Pizzolatto to work on the Marvel film’s script, but according to an insider, “time just ran out. Work on the movie is expected to resume once the strike is over.
Marvel initially planned to have three movies and two series filming at the same time. Captain America: New World Order is currently filming in Atlanta, while TV shows Agatha: Coven of Chaos and Wonder Man are also shooting in Atlanta and Los Angeles, respectively.
Fortunately for Deadpool fans, Deadpool 3 is still on track to begin shooting in London later this month. The Thunderbolts movie has also been confirmed to begin shooting in Atlanta in June. The new Fantastic Four film set in the MCU is currently scheduled to begin filming in London in January 2024, but could be delayed if the ongoing strike continues for six months or longer.
The 2020 Writers Guild of America (WGA) contract reportedly provides some flexibility for minor script adjustments to be made by non-writers. This may be irrelevant in the case of Marvel, where the writers are known to be on set and make many changes during filming. An unnamed production executive told The Hollywood Reporter, “[Marvel] will shoot what they can and then wait for the reshoots.
The last major strike affected major productions, including Star Trek (2009), Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra and Quantum of Solace. Star Trek was probably the luckiest of the bunch, as it did really well with critics and audiences. Unfortunately, the other three, which had similar script problems, were not as fortunate – they received a lot of backlash.
The first Iron Man nearly faced its own production woes when it wrapped in June 2007, five months before the strike. Now, Marvel Studios is dealing not only with script challenges, but also with picketers. Last Thursday, a WGA member tweeted for people to join them in picketing a Marvel production in the heart of Hollywood – targeting Wonder Man.
The tweet has since been deleted, but it showed just how much the strike could affect Marvel Studios’ upcoming projects. Time will tell, and updates on the ongoing production status of the new Captain America movie will also tell us a lot about how things are going at Marvel. As for Blade, fans will likely see another significant delay if the strike is not resolved soon.
