It has been announced that Marvel has two dates slated for film releases in 2014, and of course there is a lot of speculation surrounding exactly what these movies will be. Kind of lost in the mix of this bit of news was an interesting bit:
Marvel has apparently reacquired/bought back the rights to The Punisher and Blade.
This should come as exciting news to fans of these characters as the Marvel in-house productions have been mostly the best stuff to hit the big screen out of all Marvel character films, so we may be seeing some (more) solid films featuring these characters.
Of course, the Blade franchise was pretty successful and helped to pave the way for R-rated superhero flicks but The Punisher seemed to struggle to find an audience over the course of two films. I personally didn’t mind the Thomas Jane version of the character and thought the first movie was a good build up to a darker and more gritty sequel but instead we got Punisher: War Zone.
It will be interesting to see what Marvel does with these characters in the future. My guess is we will most likely see reboots of both franchises as opposed to direct sequels, but the question will be whether or not we get appropriate R-rated versions or watered down PG-13 films. In either case it could be a while before we see or hear anything with Marvel busy with all of the Avengers heroes and a handful of films supposedly in the pipeline for a bunch of other characters including Dr. Strange and Iron Fist. While I’m not a huge fan of The Punisher and Blade, I enjoyed their films just fine and would definitely hit the theaters for another go around with them.
What would you like to see in future Punisher and Blade movies knowing now they would be produced in-house at Marvel? Sound off in the comments below!