David Goyer takes over as director as two new vampire hunters join the Daywalker in Blade: Trinity 
SCIFI Weekly
by Patrick Lee

Ryan Reynolds, you did a lot of improvisation in this film, coming up with some of Hannibal King's jokes?

Reynolds: Yeah, well, David definitely imbued a sense of humor in Hannibal King, which is what attracted me to this in the first place.

You worked hard to get in shape for this movie?

Reynolds: I can never work out like that again. That was pretty intense, but ... it slowly goes away. I'm 10 pounds lighter [now] than I was in the movie, but you know, we put on a little over 20 pounds for the role specifically. David asked me when I first met him, he said, "Can you do that?" So I said, "Absolutely!" So full of s--t, I had no idea if I could do that.

You did a lot of weight-lifting?

Reynolds: Yeah, more weights than I could ever dream of. I can hear the clink of barbells in my head still. It was intense. We'd do two hours of weight-lifting a day, then an hour of fight training, and then you'd go shoot for 15 hours. The shooting was a workout, you know? You're getting tossed around like a midget with Triple H. You know, it looked like midget-tossing. ... I thought I was big. That guy ... .

You have a big fight scene with professional wrestler Triple H [Paul Michael Levesque], who plays a vampire henchman. How much of that is really you being thrown around?

Reynolds: All of it, because— [and] I mean this with some humility— ... we'd gotten in such shape that they couldn't find stuntmen who looked like us, Jessie or I, so we just did them. And that little space is so small that ... you're going to know it's a stuntman if you get somebody else.

So what's it like to be pounded by Triple H, then?

Reynolds: I recommend it for everyone. It's fantastic. Very character-building, for one. It's very painful, for another. These guys [pro wrestlers] don't know subtlety in the physical sense, so when he picks you up and throws you, he picks you up and throws you. And the floor was cement, because I had to slide every time he threw me, and we'd established that early on in another sequence we'd shot in there. So there was no way to put a rubber floor down, as much as we tried. We begged them to. We put one down; it just didn't look right. I'd bounce off the ground. So we'd go back to the cement floor. So it was hell. We shot it, I think, in four or five days, just that once sequence, and kept going at it. Two grown men wrestling around.

Did either Triple H or Wesley give you any advice?

Reynolds: I think they both said on the first day—I'll never forget it—"Stay the f--k out of my way."

Was Wesley's attitude helpful to you?

Reynolds: Oh, yeah, like, I mean, it's perfect. We are contentious to begin with, our characters. We're fighting on the same side against a common enemy, but we're adversaries as well, so it really helps. ... The less he gives me when I'm popping off, the more it feeds me, the more it inspires me. There's a [scene]—it was something I begged David to let me do—where he's just thrown some guy off of the roof, and I wanted to say to him—because I'd never actually seen Wesley blink— ... something about that to Wesley while we're walking away in this badass shot. And David was torn, because it was kind of one of those real trailer moments, where the three of us are all walking, looking all badass. ... Hannibal's like, "You ever think of sitting down with somebody, maybe having a little bit of share time? You know, working out some of these childhood demons? I see you were in a little bit of a shame spiral out here when you threw that guy off the roof. And also, you might want to try blinking once in a while. It's just a thought." And, you know, it's just when Wesley looks at you when you're saying that kind of stuff, it just feeds you. You're like, "He looks like he's just going to turn you into some kind of ... pulp in about two seconds."

Is this a character you'd like to play again if there's a Blade 4?

Reynolds: Well, there won't be a Blade 4, but I'm signed on to do a Nightstalker spinoff. ... Anyway, if there was a Blade 4 I would not be a part of it, but I am signed on to do this property that Marvel owns, which is the Nightstalker franchise.

Are you signed for one or two?

Reynolds: I'm signed for one.