Wesley Snipes' Blade beats out Hugh Jackman's Wolverine for major Marvel superhero record

Wesley Snipes’ Blade has officially defeated Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine — but not in a superhero battle.

Thanks to his unexpected appearance as the day-walking vampire in Deadpool & Wolverine, Snipes has broken two Guinness World Records.

Because the 61-year-old actor’s role in the new prequel comes 25 years and 340 days after he first played the character in 1998’s Blade, Snipes has smashed the record for the longest career as a live-action Marvel character, reports Guinness World Records. In doing so, Snipes beat out Jackman, whose first appearance as Wolverine came 24 years ago in 2000’s X-Men.

Blade’s entry into the Marvel Cinematic Universe also broke the record for the longest gap between character appearances in Marvel films. According to Guinness’ tabulations, Snipes’ last appearance as the character was in Blade: Trinity (2004), which was 19 years and 231 days before the latest Deadpool movie hit theaters. For this record, Blade has surpassed Alfred Molina’s 17-year gap between playing Doc Ock in Spider-Man 2 and his return amidst the multiversal chaos of Spider-Man: No Way Home.

This news came as a happy shock to Snipes, who reacted in a Thursday X post, writing, "Whuuuut?!"

"Really?" he added. "Do I get a certificate too? Lordy Lordy Lordy… Thank you, @GWR. I'm your fan!"

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In Deadpool & Wolverine, Snipes returns as Blade, a.k.a. Eric Brooks, the fan-favorite Daywalker and vampire hunter inspired by the Marvel Comics that spawned an R-rated Blade film trilogy. Ahead of the Deadpool & Wolverine premiere, its A-list cameos were revealed during a classic Hall H moment at Comic-Con 2024 in San Diego. 

Snipes stepped out alongside Jennifer Garner, Channing Tatum, and Chris Evans to join stars Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman on stage with the film's director, Shawn Levy.

Afterwards, Snipes opened up to Entertainment Weekly about his Marvel homecoming, admitting that the invitation to step back into the daywalker’s boots came as a surprise.

"I did not think it was possible," Snipes told EW. "I didn't think we would be able to pull it off. I didn't think that Marvel was into it, Disney was into it — also because they had Mahershala [Ali] cast for the next upcoming version of it." 

But Snipes said that changed when he got a call from Reynolds. "He told me the idea... They said 'yes' and 'it's a go.' 'If you're in, we're in,'" he recalled the Deadpool star saying, 'Here we are."

Oscar winner Mahershala Ali has been attached to star in a Blade reboot set in the Marvel Cinematic Universe for years, but after a series of production issues the movie is still in development, with Thor: Ragnarok and Black Widow scribe Eric Pearson set to write the latest version. Pearson is also attached to write Marvel's forthcoming Thunderbolts and The Fantastic Four.