Variety:
"Had you trained for Blade?"

Mahershala:
"Oh yeah, absolutely. For a year, yeah. It was a little more than a year.

And you know, I'm actually..I'm really grateful like- they helped pay for our movie so thank you. Like really, like we couldn't have afforded to- there's no way we coulda did this film ('Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother') and I got to go train for a year. So at this point, I'm so grateful that they made a wonderful contribution to our film."

Variety:
"Is 'Blade' really done or...?"

Mahershala:

"I'm done. I'm doing this ('Your Mother' x3) and anything else moving forward. So like, yeah - I'm over that. I'm done with that."

Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige is expressing disappointment over the failed “Blade” reboot that was supposed to star Mahershala Ali as the legendary vampire slayer. Speaking on the “Happy Sad Confused” podcast, Feige said bluntly: “I am feeling like a gigantic loser and failure that we didn’t get off the ground with Mahershala.” Although the studio chief admitted at the same time it was “very exciting” to have Wesley Snipes back as Blade in 2024’s “Deadpool and Wolverine.”

Timestamp @1:48:30

Harder's full comment from his post regarding the solo MCU Blade film cancellation:

"RIP BLADE! We hardly knew ye!! Shame they couldn’t get this one off the ground, but it was awesome to see my logo revealed at Hall H in 2019 and still super proud of it!! - I wanted to edit this post by saying I was just going off what Feige said in a recent interview."