Writer: Bryan Edward Hill / Pencillers: Elena Casagrande, Valentina Pinti / Inkers: Casagrande, Pinti, Roberto Poggi / Colour Artists: Jordie Bellaire, KJ Diaz / Letterers: VC’s Joe Sabino, VC’s Cory Petit / Collects: Blade (2023) #1-#5 / TP / Marvel
15th May 2024 (Released: 21st February 2024)
Review by Paul Dunne
The Pitch: Blade, the vampire-hunting vampire, returns for a brand new era of thrilling action!
True evil is patient. A dark, ancient power has been simmering quietly for centuries. And, when Blade himself is the one to unknowingly unleash it, Marvel's entire supernatural underworld will come out of hiding to demand he handle it - or pay a pound of flesh for his mistakes! Bloodbaths, blackmail and Blade - you won't want to miss this one!
“Catch you fuckers at a bad time?” - Blade.
How do you like your heroes? If the love showered on Wolverine and latterly, Blade is anything to go by, the answer is ‘Angry’. Blade is a fascinating character. He seems at home with his anger, managing it with a taciturn sneering tone that suits his status, that of and outsider even among outsiders, a pariah even among monsters, Blade has proved to be an interesting variant of the anti-hero trope, something Marvel excels at. Half-human, half-vampire. All of their strengths, none of their... Well, you know it by now, right? But he's also interesting because until the last year or so, he was used very sparingly. Like all good Vampire or Vampire-adjacent characters he strikes - and then sinks back into the night. The mythos of Blade remains a mystery to me, having had little exposure to him, apart from two excellent movies and one bad one. Now though, Bryan Edward Hill gets to put him front and center, with the first volume of this book and an event, Blood Hunt, coming later this year. Now, the last time I saw Blade in comics, in the Vampire Nation special, he seemed to be working for, or at the very least with, The Vampires. Meaning I obviously missed quite a lot. But here, Hill plants the book, mood, and action-wise, in the movies, so if your only notion of Blade is Wesley Snipes magnificently growling his way through dialogue and all enemies, you're OK.
Blade fucks up!
Hill seems to have a lot of fun taking badass characters and putting them on the back foot. Although the comic is full of cool AF moments that serve the lead character, by and large, this is a book where the tough guy loses. It's an interesting thing to see in modern comics. In this opening act alone, Blade is duped into releasing an apocalyptic demon, possessed by a supernatural overlord and used as his vessel, pisses off the Sorcerer Supreme, unwittingly oversees a slaughter, and indirectly puts his on-off girlfriend in a psychic coma. It's safe to say he screws up. Even for a medium that requires obstacles thrown in the way of it’s heroes, this might just be taking the piss. It's a little different from what we've come to expect from most comics. Also worth noting in the wider structure of the story is that rather than giving us a near-fully resolved storyline, the trade is left on a tantalising cliffhanger. This seems to be a new trend in comics designed for the book market, pushing you (rightly) to make sure you buy Volume 2.
Action framed in expansive spaces.
It's not a bad thing, but does further hammer home the losing streak for Blade in this storyline. There's a slightly softer edge to this Blade, who even gets saddled with a teen sidekick, although this sidekick is an expert in combat and up until Blade entered her life, part of some kind of cult. Hill and Casagrande frame the action in the expansive, imaginative space familiar from both modern, Asian-influenced action movies and the traditional mise-en-scene of actual Asian popular martial arts cinema. And that also follows the traditions and trajectory of Blade himself in the cultural space. Starting as cash-in on black, urban entertainment, which also crossed over nicely into the rise of martial arts in the US. Hill’s Blade – the book, not the character – is always aware that genres are stronger together. Hill patches in a heist on a movie train in the book’s closing issues, along with a visit from a familiar Marvel face, with more to come, keeping us centered in situations we’ve seen executed in ways we haven’t.
Blade, lover of short sentences.
Hill keeps his Blade taciturn, his sentences short, his manner gruff. He knows the value of letting other characters reactions do the heavy lifting on the exposition, even if that gives the book’s villain more to say. Blade isn’t a talker. Blade does. He is the embodiment of action over conversation. There’s no waste in the book. It’s a lean, angry five issues that are very well machined. Casagrande, whose work on Black Widow helped win the series an Eisner Award in 2021, is working on full blast here. She and co-penciller Valenina Pinti shift from the distinctly American environs to the Asian-influenced sprawl and temples. There’s a cinematic feel to their panels. Like Hill, Casagrande and Pinti know the underlining genre their artistic radar should ping off is horror and they keep it satisfyingly bloody. Casagrande and Pinti ink themselves and each other, aided by Roberto Poggi for a couple of issues, with all doing a great job of embellishment and adding to the sense of controlled movement through the panels. Jordie Bellaire tag teams the book’s colours with KJ Diaz and they create a look of diffused light, shot through an iPhone. The look is modern and present, even when Casagrande situates them in ancient places. Letterers Joe Sabino and (the man who has lettered more comics than anyone in recent years) Cory Petit bring the noise up to a suitable level, putting the bass in Blade’s voice and sound of breaking glass in his opponent’s as well as laying on the sound effects nicely to match the movement of the characters or environments. Blade is off to a great start in these hands, even if his opening move is to begin the chain of events that will end the world. After all, it wouldn’t be Marvel without that, would it?
Blade Vol. 1 TP: Mother of Evil is available now. Buy the original issues that comprise this trade here or browse all our Marvel comics here.
