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My sister and I finally got around to seeing this tonight. She'd been getting a crash course in Bladeology, having finally come around to it through her love of most things goth, which brought her to Underworld, which brought her to Blade.
We both liked it a lot, but neither of us thought it was nearly as good as either of its predecessors. The difference, I would agree, is allowing Goyer, who to the best of my knowledge has limited if any directorial experience, and it shows. The film reeked of material left on the cutting room floor, and of course Snipes' general disillusionment is definitely a factor. I agree that Ryan Reynolds was the saving grace of this film, and an underused one at that. Two of the better bits of dialogue from the film:
Blade: "Nightstalkers"? Sounds like rejects from a Saturday morning cartoon.
King: We were going to go with The Care Bears but that was taken.
Police chief: I can't tell you anything; they'll kill me!
Blade: THEY'LL kill you? Motherfucker, I'LL kill you!
SPOILER SPACE
Ah, now we are alone.
Whistler's death was predictable and unsatisfying; shit, we already saw him die once, and this time allowed the viewer no more closure than the first time. Abigail Whistler (who, if my memory unschooled in Tomb of Dracula lore is correct, was originally Abby van Helsing, yes?) has no demonstrated connection with her father beyond a "flashback" voiceover cribbed from a monologue of his from the first film, nor, for that matter, much of a demonstrated personality. The whole iPod during a battle thing? Yeah, fucking stupid. You'd think that it might be important for her to be able to hear opponents, wouldn't you? Big contrivance to product place Apple and the soundtrack; the GMV SUV glamor shot also was jarring. And where exactly did she stash Zoe in the climactic siege on vampire HQ after she rescued her? I sure as hell wouldn't leave her alone in vampire central with vampiric pomeranians running around. And if in dying "Drake" somehow made himself look like Blade (which I don't see how he could or would have any reason to), why did he still look like himself when the police showed up... or did I imagine that?
Anyone else notice Patton Oswalt wearing a Fantastic Four t-shirt? I'm wondering, simply from an academic point of view, mind, since they have a Tomb of Dracula comic (which many of these characters appear in), whether the Blade movies can be said to take place within the Marvel Universe or in the 'real world.' Utterly rhetorical and unimportant, I grant you, but still of interest.
Loved Parker Posey's character; she always has a knack for portraying the uberbitch. Certainly off the trail of her indie oeuvre, but so was the first one for Stephen Dorff. Triple H was amusing but ultimately a non-entity, though not as much as Posey's brother. But surely they could have found someone just a skosh more intimidating to play "Drake" aka Dracula, who seemed to me like Adrian Paul on steroids. And can somebody explain to me why Eric Bogosian was even in this movie as the Larry King/Charlie Rose-type host, much less why he was only in it for all of 30 seconds? Utter waste of talent.
So, glad I saw it, glad my sister paid for it, wish it had lived up to the overall quality of the series but I acknowledge it could have been far worse. Faint praise, sure, but it's not as though I expected art, just fun, and I got that.
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