Mahershala Ali Reveals Marvel Funded His New Movie Through Blade Training

voice film logo squareArthur S. Poe
Mahershala Ali your mother your mother your mother
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Few Marvel projects have sparked as much ongoing frustration as the studio’s long-delayed ‘Blade’ reboot. The film went through numerous directors and writers, missed four different release dates, and never filmed a single scene, despite Mahershala Ali being announced for the role back in 2019 at San Diego Comic-Con.

Bassam Tariq, the original director for the reboot, left the project in 2022, leading Marvel to remove the film from its release calendar entirely without any production commencing. To ensure that the year-plus of sword and combat training Ali underwent for the role wasn’t wasted, he and Tariq found a new avenue for it.

This new outlet became ‘Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother,’ their action drama that recently premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival. During a press event at the festival, Ali noted an ironic twist in how the film came together, explaining that Marvel effectively funded the production by covering the extensive combat training he never got to utilize as Blade.

Ali shared that the physical preparation he undertook for a Marvel movie that ultimately fell through became the foundation for the smaller independent film’s action sequences. He suggested that without that year of training already financed, the production might not have been able to afford to stage the film’s combat scenes at the level it achieved.

In the film, Ali portrays Latif, a devoutly religious hitman who embarks on a desperate journey across Houston to protect his children after his wife’s passing. The supporting cast includes John Cho, Giancarlo Esposito, Tiffany Boone, Tramell Tillman, Abubakr Ali, and Laith Nakli, with Amazon MGM Studios’ Orion Pictures managing distribution.

The connection between the two projects runs deeper than just shared choreography. Tariq began crafting the script during the pandemic, drawing from a harrowing personal experience involving his wife’s medical emergency shortly after their first child’s birth. He reportedly named the lead character after Ali in early drafts, writing it with the actor already in mind.

By the time ‘Blade’ was officially scrapped, Tariq had the opportunity and creative space to complete the script and present it to Ali, whose schedule had opened up as the Marvel project continued to stall. The film is set for a limited theatrical release starting September 25, with a wider expansion in October.

Ali has been open about moving on from ‘Blade’ entirely. In a separate interview during the same press run, he made it clear that he considers the project dead regarding his involvement, viewing the years of delays as simply not meant to be his path forward, despite being under contract throughout.

Screenshot 2026 09 13 at 19 36 38 Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother Rotten Tomatoes

This larger context makes his appreciation for Marvel’s unintentional contribution to ‘Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother’ feel more bittersweet than resentful. What could have been a wasted year of preparation for a movie that never materialized instead became the backbone of a project Ali seems genuinely excited for audiences to see, allowing him to showcase physical skills that fans have been eager to witness on screen.

The timing also means Ali arrives at this press run with a notably clear narrative to share. Instead of facing endless inquiries about when ‘Blade’ might finally happen, he now has a completed, well-received film to point to as evidence that the training wasn’t in vain, even if it ultimately served a story unrelated to vampires or the broader Marvel Cinematic Universe.

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