Wesley Snipes Nabs Guinness Records for Blade Reappearance

There’s a Guinness World Record for just about anything you can think of, and it’s always interesting when you see it mixed with geek culture. A few years ago, a man in Florida took home his record sighting Spider-Man: No Way Home in theaters about 300 times, and now Deadpool and Wolverine that went on and set a record—two of them, in fact.

Blade’s surprise appearance in the third film means that Wesley Snipes now holds the world record for longest tenure of any Marvel character. At 25 years and 340 days, the actor defeated Hugh Jackman, who was expected to take the title from Patrick Stewart. The last time we saw Snipes play Blade was way back in 2007 with. Blade: Trinity, giving him another time-related record. At 19 years and 231 days, he now has the longest gap between character appearances in Marvel films. His own Deadpool and Wolverine appearance beats Alfred Molina’s 17-year gap between playing Doc Ock in Spider-Man 2 (2004, film) and No Way Home.

Like Deadpool & Wolverine’s other guest characters, seeing Blade come out of many shocks. Aside from the whole Mahershala Ali thing (or the unfortunate lack thereof), it seems that Snipes has put the superhero life behind him, to say nothing of the allegedly strained relationship he had with Ryan Reynolds while filming. The Trinity. But in an interview with Entertainment Weekly ahead of the film’s release, he revealed a script from Reynolds that got the ball rolling.

“It was a no-brainer for me,” he recalled, “but when you get a call from Ryan out of the blue after 20 years, he says, ‘Okay, I’ve got to take this call.’ […] He told me the idea… They said ‘yes’ and ‘it goes.’ ‘If you’re in, we’re in.’” It was difficult to close the news, even to prepare for whatever was about to happen. But he was happy to do it again, and remains hopeful to see what Ali eventually brings to the table. “You need a secret sauce to do the Blade thing, man. I wish you luck. He’s my man, though.”

Looking for more io9 news? Check out when you can expect the latest Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases, what’s next for the DC Universe in film and TV, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who.