Story Title: “His Name Is… Blade!”
Published: 17 April 1973 (cover date: July 1973)
Writer: Marv Wolfman
Artist: Gene Colan

The Background:
Eric Brooks/Blade was the creation of Marv Wolfman and Gene Colan; inspired by numerous black actors and sporting a 1970s “Blaxploitation” appearance, Blade was only able to come about after comic creators were finally allowed to publish stories involving Vampires and other supernatural creatures. One of the first ways Marvel took advantage of this was with the Tomb of Dracula series, in which vampire hunters like Blade would battle against the titular Count and other supernatural creatures. Although heavily inspired by classic Hammer Horror films, The Tomb of Dracula initially struggled with its creative direction as different writers and artists came and went from the book, until Wolfman and Colan joined the publication and turned things around with their close collaboration. Initially a jive talking, very human vampire hunter, Blade was little more than a bit-player in the grand Marvel tapestry, although he did have associations with groups like the Nightstalkers and the Midnight Sons. Despite this, the rights to the character were bought by New World Pictures in 1992, and the later success and popularity of Blade (Norrington, 1998) saw the character transformed into a stoic, bad-ass dhampir to match his live-action counterpart, and the character has gone on to be an integral part of many supernatural and horror stories within Marvel Comics due to this surge of interest.

The Review:
“His Name Is…Blade!” opens on the dark, quiet docks in what I assume is London (or, at least, somewhere in England judging by the dialogue of the characters) where two youths are planning to stow away aboard a ship and elope to the United States when they’re suddenly attacked by three bloodthirsty vampires! These fanged, bat-like creatures exhibit many of the common tropes we associated with nosferatu: they can freely shift between a bat and a humanoid appearance, have monstrous faces, and are driven to suck the blood from their prey. In this case, however, the three aren’t there to feed; instead, they seek to turn the terrified youths into two more of Dracula’s cursed minions, implying a level of mysticism and possession from the process of being bitten. Although their victims haven’t the strength or hope of fighting off their attacks, these dark intentions are interrupted by the arrival of Blade – the Vampire Killer! Now, this isn’t the trenchcoat-clad, armour-wearing, sword-wielding half-human bad-ass you may be familiar with from the movie. Instead, Blade is garbed in a garish green coat similar to an Army jacket, an outrageous yellow visor, sports a maroon bandolier filled with stakes, and is rocking a suitably stereotypical afro hairdo. To say he cuts an intimidating figure would be a lie, frankly; instead, he just looks like a hobo with a vision problem, and yet his reputation as a vampire slayer proceeds him and the vampires state that Dracula has given them orders to kill him. Blade strikes with a speed, precision, and brutal efficiency that comes not from sporting the physical strength of his hated foe but from years of hunting and killing vampires, easily staking two of his foes with a specially carved teak-bladed knife with minimal effort. The third vampire, startled by the vampire killer’s proficiency, tries to flee in his man-bat form, only for Blade to leap onto him and end his vile undead life.

Upon death, the vampires slowly return to their human form, betraying this particular victim as a youth unwittingly transformed against his will; Blade cares little for this, however, and simply coldly remarks that the only good vampire is a dead vampire. His callous attitude earns him the ire of Quincy Harker, a wheelchair-bound old man and one of the world’s foremost experts on vampires. Harker admonishes Blade’s lack of vision; his crusade to simply slaughter every vampire he comes across is interfering with the bigger picture of tracking down and executing Dracula, thus making his undead minions “easy prey”. Blade, however, is unimpressed; he gives Harker the brush off and vows to continue hunting vampires without the old man’s aid, throwing some jive his way for good measure because…you know, the seventies! The story then jumps over to the ocean liner Michele where wealthy socialite Gabriel Trulaine is throwing a lavish party for his similarly decadent friends and absolutely wows his guests by having the Count Dracula himself unveiled as a special attraction for the soiree. Although Dracula (or “Vlad” as he insists Gabriel’s beautiful companion calls him) downplays the stories and rumours of his gruesome ways, assuring the awestruck guests that vampirism is a “disease” like “blood poisoning” and not the affliction popularised in the media, it’s all merely a ruse to gain power over, and favour with, the wealthy and influential and thus extend his reach into industrial, politics, and society. He’s easily able to charm Gabriel’s bimbo with a few choice words and feed upon her blood, before swatting the Michele’s captain and seizing control of the vessel. Dracula then reveals the true extent of his awesome power, which allows him to turn to smoke and control the wills of others; when one of the guests tries to fight back, Dracula simply laughs in the face of his pistol and tosses him overboard before turning on the others and preparing to work his evil magic.

Fortunately, Blade intercepts the vessel; considering Harker made such a song and dance about Blade’s actions costing them another lead on Dracula, it’s a bit odd and completely unexplained how he was able to track the Michele, but he easily boards the craft and prepares to battle with Dracula. Amusingly, Gabriel’s guests do a lot of the work for him; Dracula demands that they submit to his requests willingly lest he turn them into the living dead and one devote Christian amongst them leads the charge against the Lord of Vampires, stunning him with a Holy Cross and allowing the others to pin him down. Of course, Dracula’s not so easily bested, evaporating into mist and easily escaping harm, but he flies into a rage when Blade arrives as the Count wishes to avenge the vampires lost at the slayer’s hands. Naturally, Dracula is the physically superior of the two, but Blade is tenacious and full of spunk and only enrages the Vampire King with his mocking quips. Still, as wily and nimble as Blade is, Dracula’s shape-shifting abilities and superhuman strength soon see him gain the upper hand; however, right as he’s about to bite into Blade’s neck, Gabriel’s woman, entranced by Dracula’s bite, interrupts him. This is apparently enough to wreck Dracula’s entire plan and he decides to just fly away in his bat form and leave them all to die from the explosives he had the captain place on the ship, despite the fact he could easily massacre them all with his superior strength. With only seconds left, Blade forces everyone off the Michele and into the cold waters below and is left drifting in the sea with Dracula’s mocking laughter in his ears and the promise of a further confrontation later down the line.

The Summary:
Well, this was…certainly something. I’ve never read The Tomb of Dracula or anything with either him or Blade in it before (not even Stoker’s original novel), so I went into this without any real expectations and still came out of it quite disappointed. The art work is pretty good, at times; Blade and Dracula fare the best out of anyone, with the Lord of Vampires appearing just like he does in all the classic Dracula films and popular depictions, though I can’t say I care for Blade’s appearance here one bit. I don’t really get it; like, what’s with the weird goggles? Why’s his jacket so plain and dull? Later, he dons a wetsuit of sorts to board the Michele, which is a far better look, but he quickly changes into his shitty jacket and glasses and I just don’t really get how he was supposed to look cool or interesting in the slightest in this getup. The other vampires we see come off pretty well; I liked how they shifted from bats to man-bats to monstrous humans and to mist and such, though there’s an understandable lack of blood and the vampires are disappointingly easy to kill, dying from a simply stab from Blade’s special knife that isn’t even in their hearts half the time.

The dialogue leaves a lot to be desired, too. This is yet another instance where the story is dated by the misconceptions and stereotypes of the time, with Blade talking in hip jive slang and acting like he just walked off the set of Shaft (Parks, 1971) and Dracula endlessly monologuing and referring to himself in the third person, as was the style of many Marvel villains. This is an odd choice considering he has an underling present, Clifford Graves, to converse with, but Graves is merely a pawn of the Lord of Vampires, one for Dracula to chastise at every opportunity and leave for dead at the story’s end. I’m not sure I really get the premise of The Tomb of Dracula; were readers really just following a sadistic and bloodthirsty vampire on a serious of adventures as he preyed on the innocent and lusted for power? Seems an odd concept to me, one without much legs, and I can’t say that I’m interested in reading other stories from the comic after this one. Hell, I’m not even interested in Blade all that much after this; there’s some intrigue introduced here, with Harker despairing of Blade’s methods (despite how effective he is at killing vampires) and the suggestion that he’s this rogue element in the vampire slaying community, but he just looks and sounds and acts so corny and ridiculous that it’s hard to take him seriously. He’s tenacious, I’ll give him that, and dedicated to killing all vampires without hesitation or remorse, and exhibits some physical prowess, but it’s a pretty weak debut story, if you ask me. Dracula’s plot to manipulate the wealthy and the powerful was completely nonsensical (why didn’t he just turn them with his powers? Why go through all that charade? Why’d he fuckin’ leave when he could’ve killed them all?!) and hardly inspires me to see what else he got up to, and overall I have to say that I’m glad that the movies changed Blade’s character so much if this is what we had to deal with.

My Rating:

Terrible

What did you think to Blade’s debut story? Did the character interest you at the time or, like me, were you introduced to him through the movies? Did you ever read The Tomb of Dracula books and, if so, what did you think to them? What are some of your favourite Blade moments from the comics? Have you ever read Stoker’s novel, and what are some of your favourite vampire stories? No matter what you think, good or bad, feel free to share your thoughts below and be sure to check out my review of Blade’s game-changing movie!