I had high hopes for Blade Trinity; introducing the Nightstalkers, and pitting Blade against Dracula himself, brought the character even closer to his comic roots. Having written all three films, the idea of David Goyer directing seemed to make a lot of sense. But apparently, problems arose from day one. Wesley Snipes, being something of an egomaniac, allegedly butted heads with Goyer at almost every turn over the course of the production. The spotlight being given to newcomers Ryan Reynolds and Jessica Biel was a major point of contention. And to an extent, Snipes was right to be upset. Regardless of Goyer writing the scripts, Snipes, along with the previous directors, proved to be the driving talent in making the other two Blade films as great as they were. As a director, Goyer just had no real vision. He had no real flair for visual storytelling and no real sense of how to shoot action. While I’ll admit to enjoying particular momentsin the film, for the most part, it was a mess.

If I did Blade Trinity?

I actually liked the idea of the media and the feds going after Blade. The problem was that it was barely in the movie. Once the Nighstalkers freed him, the FBI characters were gone, only to conveniently show up at the end after all the fighting was done! You mean the whole time that Blade and the Nightstalkers were going around town in broad daylight, with all manner of weaponry visibly dangling from their persons, no one called the cops?!? I’d have scaled it down to one agent, though, with a small subplot of him pursuing Blade for a majority of the film. Every wrongly-accused superhero needs their own “Jack McGee”. Furthermore, most of the action should happen at night, and Blade would have to change his look. Yep, the signature hairdo would have to go, especially considering how bad Snipes’ hairpiece looked the third time around, anyway. Aside from some concealed body armor, I’d have Blade’s attire be as inconspicuous as possible. If anything, it’d be a justifiable reason for Blade having a shaved head in the television series. (sidenote: the show was actually better than I thought it would be.)

The Nightstalkers, while a nice inclusion given their comic book origins, were just a collection of really bad characters. A lot of this had to do with Goyer’s casting, which included Patton Oswalt as the weapons expert Hedges, and Natasha Lyonne as Sommerfield, the blind geneticist! Her character in particular was part of a major beef I had with Goyer when watching Blade Trinity, aside from the utter pointlessness of making her blind; the fact that he seemed to ignore his own continuity. Did he completely forget about Dr. Karen Jensen, the hematologist, from the first film?!? The one who figured out a way to cure herself from vampirism, and improved upon Blade’s serum? I don’t know if there was a valid reason for her not being used in Blade Trinity (probably having something to do with Snipes not liking black chicks?), but I’d have fought like hell to include her. This would make for some great moments between her and Blade. I’d have had her essentially be the leader of this specific “cell” of Nightstalkers, having never gone back to her normal life after the events of the first film. Rather than have her cure work on full-blown vampires, Hannibal would either have to be a former familiar, or just keep him as a vampire who decided to do good. If the cure could work on all vampires, it’d just be a simple matter of injecting any vamp they encountered with the cure, and that would be no fun! While we’re at it, cut about half of Hannibal’s one-liners. Most of them were very forced, and the fact that Blade never just knocked the snot out of him one time always got on my nerves. The Trinity screenplay actually has Blade punching Hannibal for calling him “Blakula”! As for Abigail, she would NOT be Whistler’s daughter! It proved to be a throwaway character point, to say nothing of the fact that Goyer cheaply used footage from the first film and tried to pass it off as a conversation between Whistler and Abigail. No, I’d establish her either as a former cop or ex-military. She’d have been a little more like Vasquez from Aliens. And I’d make sure there was significant interaction between her and Karen. In Trinity, when Abigail was crying over the fact that Somerfield had been killed, it just fell flat for me. She doesn’t shed any tears for Hedges or the wheelman Dex, but she goes all Niagara Falls for someone she exchanges zero dialogue with?! I’m serious, her and Sommerfield didn’t talk to each other throughout that entire film!

When it came to the villains, Blade Trinity’s might as well have been the Three Stooges. While Parker Posey had her moments, on the whole, Danica Talos was more annoying than threatening. Then you’ve got WWE wrestler HHH as one of her henchmen. Ultimately, he’s about as useful as an expired contraceptive. Worst of all had to be Dracula himself. Whereas Nomak had no trouble taking on Blade in a fight, early in Blade II, Dracula decided to run from Blade during their first encounter of Trinity, and used any human he could get his hands on as a shield! As much as he’s built up as “The Father of All Vampires”, like the great white shark that never needed to evolve, Dracula was a monumental pussy. First of all, I wouldn’t call him “Drake”. That’s just plain stupid. He’s DRACULA! Own it! And I would have had him killing and turning folks into vamps left and right. You have to figure, if we’re playing on the idea of Dracula, genetically speaking, being a “perfect vampire”, and the current vampires being so far removed from his bloodline that he considers them so inferior, what if he starts turning people? It stands to reason that he could create a nice little army of vampires that would be about as close to perfect as he is. Bearing all this in mind, I’d have Dracula just slaughter Danica and her crew just before the third act starts, as they’d have outlived their usefulness to him.

So how does it all go down? Now if Blade, Hannibal and Abigail are up against more powerful vampires, reinforcements are a must. Some last-minute Nightstalkers from multiple cells would be good; think: GI Joe greenshirt soldiers. Just about six or so no-names to balance things out for the good guys. They also need more protection. The costume design for Hannibal and Abigail was very much style over substance, and Trinity’s climactic battle had both of them pretty sparsely covered from the waist up. Even the vampires who teamed up with Blade in the second film had body armor. And as much as flashy martial arts action has been a staple of the Blade films, I’d have the final battle in Trinity be much more about just taking out the enemies as quickly and brutally as possible. Big weapons, explosive shells, whatever it took to at least take the vampires down temporarily, but long enough for Blade to get to Dracula, and interfuse the plague with his blood. The swordfight would probably remain the same, as would Dracula turning into a super demon-vamp, Abigail missing with the plague arrow, and Blade ultimately retrieving it to stab Dracula. The spread of the plague will still be localized to the vampires in the building, with the Nightstalkers taking Dracula’s body to harvest the plague. As an alternate ending was filmed where Blade, being half-vampire, was temporarily affected and thought dead, I’d have Trinity end the same way, with him angrily waking up just before an autopsy was to be performed on him.

Castings and Re-Castings:

Hannibal King: Ryan Reynolds is actually a good actor, and as much physical training as he did for Blade Trinity, I would have kept him around for my version. I’d have just toned down the humor.

Abigail: Going back to my “Abigail-as-Vasquez from Aliens” version, I’d probably go with Michelle Rodriguez. No offense to “The Biel”. She knows I still love her!

Hedges: I think being a weapons expert, you have to look believably like someone who’s handled a weapon, and that definitely wasn’t the case for Patton Oswalt. Hedges should have been a little closer in age to Whistler as well, your typical elder statesman who’s happy to just be backup for the young turks. Imagine Keith David, and tell me that wouldn’t be cool.

Dex: Let’s make him a fighter and not just a chauffer. I think it’d be a fun bit of casting to have Kevin Grevioux, co-writer and one of the stars of the first Underworld film.

Karen Jensen: Ideally, I’d want N’Bushe Wright back.

Dracula: Given Trinity’s take on his origins, you’d think they’d have been a little more imaginative than just casting some average Joe white guy. Put Oded Fehr in the gym, give him some fight training, and there you go.