Michael B. Jordan is back in action with his “Black Panther” writer/director Ryan Coogler.
The trailer for “Sinners,” the highly-anticipated vampire movie from the MCU duo, is officially out years before the long-awaited “Blade” remake. “Sinners” has been positioned as the non-MCU-sanctioned take on the “Blade” comics. While Coogler has made two Marvel films (the “Black Panther” features), “Sinners” is entirely separate from the franchise — and probably for the best.
Marvel’s “Blade” starring Mahershala Ali was first announced in 2019. Since then, it’s had a rotating door of writers and directors.
Coogler and Jordan first collaborated on “Fruitvale Station,” and then moved on to “Creed.” Jordan later made his directorial debut with “Creed III.”
“Sinners,” again written and directed by Coogler, centers on twin brothers — both played by Jordan — who return to their New Orleans hometown to start again, only to discover that an even greater evil is waiting to welcome them back. The feature takes place during the Jim Crow-era.
“You keep dancing with the devil, one day he’s gonna follow you home,” the tagline reads.
Hailee Steinfeld, Delroy Lindo, and Jack O’Connell co-star.
The film is produced by Coogler and frequent collaborators Sev Ohanian and Zinzi Coogler. The executive producers are Ludwig Göransson, Will Greenfield, and Rebecca Cho.
Coogler’s behind-the-camera “Sinners” team include his “Black Panther” franchise collaborators: Director of photography Autumn Durald Arkapaw, Oscar-winning production designer Hannah Beachler, editor Michael P. Shawver, Oscar-winning composer Ludwig Göransson, and Oscar-winning costume designer Ruth E. Carter.
The Hollywood Reporter previously reported that WB won in a bidding war for “Sinners.” One term of the deal is that that some of the movie’s rights will revert Coogler over the course of several decades.
The vampire trend has risen this year, with Robert Eggers’ epic “Nosferatu” set for a December 25 release. Bill Skarsgård leads the reimagining of the F. W. Murnau 1922 film, which was later remade by Werner Herzog in 1979. Lily-Rose Depp, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Nicholas Hoult, and Willem Dafoe also star.
Meanwhile, the hype around “Blade” has dulled.
Original “Blade” actor Wesley Snipes even told Entertainment Weekly that the stalled project is “not the actor’s fault,” citing Ali. “There’s a lot more that goes on with pulling this ‘Blade’ stuff off. You need a lot of secret sauce to do the ‘Blade’ thing, man. Good luck,” Snipes said. “You’re my man, though.”
Snipes led the franchise beginning with the 1998 tentpole film “Blade,” followed by 2002’s ”Blade II” and 2004’s ”Blade: Trinity.” He later reprised the role for a surprise cameo in 2024’s “Deadpool & Wolverine.” There have been rumblings of other “Blade” iterations in the past 20 years.
“Over the years, we’ve had very interesting conversations, some of them very substantive and some of them not,” Snipes said. “So I kind of resided that I was moving on from them, which is okay. I did three of them, and I thought they turned out pretty good. Not so bad…So we move on to other things, and bigger and better things, as well.”
“Sinners” premieres March 7, 2025 in theaters. Check out the trailer below.
