Blade 3: Trinity
Now while there is no disputing the fact that The Blade Franchise DEFINITELY got the ball rolling with the whole Marvel Universe Franchise and that Blade will always remain Wesley Snipesâ most iconic signature role (much like Reeve with Superman although Snipes certainly made more quality movies than he did), the level of controversy and near career ending bad publicity that Snipes received for this third film of the series that resulted in many claiming that it was just a bad movie (itâs not) was in many ways unfair considering that many of Snipesâ alleged onset antics (if true) were possibly justified. This third film saw screenwriter David Goyer (who started off writing corny horror scripts for Full Moon Entertainment before being the primary screenwriter for The Blade Trilogy and then moving on to writing or having a hand in writing the most recent Batman and Superman films) being promoted to director here and reportedly he and Snipes did NOT hit it off, never talking on set as apparently Goyer was using this film as an opportunity to âretireâ Blade and pass the torch on to a group of characters known as The Nightstalkers, human vampire hunters led by Ryan Reynolds as Hannibal King, a major comic book character in his own right who had been a vampire detective of some sort, albeit one who was a good guy and used his abilities to solve cases, but in this movie he was an EX vampire (one who had been given the vampire cure that had been used in previous Blade movies) and now was more of an ultra badass vampire hunter with enhanced strength and skill due to his former status and in the hands of Reynolds, the character appears to be almost a loose template of what would later be his wisecracking Deadpool character as Reynoldsâ King lets the one liners fly, some of which are quite funny and some of which are a bit forced, which subsequently betray the fact that director Goyer was undermining Snipes by compelling Reynolds to try and steal the movie outright (including allowing him to do a lot of improvisation) so that the audience would feel more comfortable in âacceptingâ Reynolds and the Hannibal King character as being the ânewâ face of the franchise. In response, Snipes would allegedly spend inordinate amounts of time in his trailer and not come out which would cause certain scenes to be shot with a double who would then have Snipesâ face digitized on through the magic of CGI and (even more interestingly) whenever he WAS on set, he would stay in character as Blade at all times (even preferring to be addressed as such) leading Reynolds to later on remark when asked what it was like to work with Wesley Snipes, his honest answer was that he ânever met himâ.  Some called it a mental breakdown while others would say that it was just in response to Snipes being in working conditions that he was far from happy with as his only ally on set was Kris Kristofferson (who had forged a close friendship with Snipes from working together on the series) as Abraham Whistler, himself forcibly retired from the franchise in favor of The Nightstalkers and the character of his daughter Abigail played by Jessica Biel (a welcome presence actually since itâs explained that even though Whistlerâs family had been killed by vampires which started him on his mission in life, Abigail had come from another relationship out of wedlock). However, the film benefits awesomely from a fine group of villains with the top selling point for the film turning out to be âBlade vs Draculaâ. Thatâs right, the biggest name vampire character of them all headlines the rogueâs gallery here with Bram Stokerâs book said to be just a fraction of the real legend and enough interesting (and original) backstory to suggest that Dracula (on top of being the first ever vampire) may very well be the true Devil himself. As played by Dominic Purcell, the character adopts a calm, soft spoken demeanor that only adds to his aura with his general contempt for humanity and disappointment in the theatrics of his own kind. Most importantly, Purcell plays him in such a quietly imposing way that (like the best villains), it actually feels like it MEANS something when heâs defeated. But the other villains (while a bit over the top) arenât too bad either, starting with Parker Posey as the vampire seductress Danica Talos, using the nature of her role here to literally vamp it up and even more interestingly, being the one to have had an extremely personal connection with Reynoldsâ Hannibal King, having been the one (so we are told) to turn him into a vampire and then keep him as a sex pet for the next 5 years before he was rescued and the idea that the two of them still seem to have a love / hate relationship with each other despite being on opposite sides is a fresh angle to both the series and vampire films in general (and helps enhance Reynoldsâ character). We also have pro wrestling star Triple H going way overboard with the foul language (not that Reynolds doesnât either) as Poseyâs muscle bound henchman with steel fangs and John Michael Higgins (best remembered for his pitch perfect impersonation of David Letterman in the HBO movie The Late Shift) as a famous psychiatrist who goes on TV to declare that Blade is merely a murderous sociopath in order to turn the public against him (belying the fact that Higgins himself is a corrupt human in league with the vampires i.e. a familiar).  The news media factor also underscores the idea that Blade is now on The FBIâs most wanted list with the agent leading the pursuit (James Remar) shown as being not so much a corrupt human per se but rather as someone who winds up getting in the way of both Blade and his enemies.  As for the other Nightstalkers, most of them are a rather blasĂ© bunch save for Natasha Lyonne as the blind yet still brilliant Sommerfield, having experimented with vampire genetic codes in order to invent a virus that will kill all vampires immediately upon exposure but first must be injected into Dracula to work (since his blood is the purest of all vampire blood) which is considerably easier said than done. But the film hits its best dynamic on the idea that Purcellâs Dracula being the first of his particular kind is on a direct collision course with Blade who has always been the âfirstâ of his kind as well (a hybrid) and while the past films always toyed with the idea that the vampire ranks wanted just as much to âbeâ Blade (due to his ability to walk in the daylight) as they desired to kill him, here the idea that in many ways Dracula and Blade are really one and the same, cut from the same cloth in such a way that it elevates them (and only them) above both humans and all other vampires is a potent theme that works here which turns their final battle into one where the winning breed will be the one that carries on for better or worse. Blade of course, will have none of that bullshit, facing down the literal Prince Of Darkness whom we are told is at least 6000 years old and telling him that he is nothing more to Blade than just another dead vampire even as some of these theories do seem to haunt him quite a bit to the very end. So the film does work for having obviously better villains than Part 2 did (except for the sadly misused Ron Perlman) and having the revised âreal lifeâ Dracula angle be done right including a fun scene where he wanders into a âvampire merchandiseâ gift shop and encounters two goth employees (a guy and a girl) who get smart mouths with him because they literally donât realize WHO has just walked into their little store and dearly paying the price. As far as Biel goes, she makes a nice addition to the mythos as she leaves the wisecracks to Reynolds and instead offers a more subdued, soulful performance while still taking on the role of a vampire fighting machine pretty successfully. But the obvious onscreen battle of wills between Snipes and Reynolds over just who is the coolest action hero is one that Snipes would ultimately lose (albeit in a rigged contest) as since Reynoldsâ King talks shit almost constantly here, Blade is more the cool, quiet type for whom when itâs time to talk shit, itâs certainly going to have more meaning and impact, meaning that Reynolds as Hannibal King had no cinematic future (unlike Deadpool) but at least Snipes gets to step down from his mantle as Blade here (even though he could have easily kept going) while still maintaining a measure of dignity and respect despite the negative remarks made by people who failed to realize that the star of a superhero franchise really is the most important person in the roomâŠ
8/10