The following contains major spoilers for Blade #2, on sale now from Marvel Comics.
Ever since Eric Brooks, better known as Blade, set foot in the Marvel Universe, he has been synonymous with nearly everything there that goes bump in the night. While it took years for Blade to step out of the shadows and establish himself as a proper superhero, the past few years have seen him do just that to resounding success. In fact, Blade’s world continues to expand at a rate that seems blistering compared to his previous trajectory, and as bad as that might be for the rest of the world, it is the best thing that fans of the Daywalker could ask for.
After unwittingly releasing an ancient evil into the world and taking the one person who could have stopped the threat out of it, the titular hero of Blade #2 (by Bryan Hill, Elena Casagrande, Roberto Poggi, Jordie Bellaire, and VC’s Joe Sabino) is forced to look to others in the hopes of saving the world. To that end, Blade calls on his old acquaintance and supernatural weapons dealer, Tulip. Though their relationship is rocky, to say the least, they both want to do the right thing and that’s enough to temporarily heal any old wounds.
Unfortunately, none of that matters to the clients Tulip spurned, nor to their heavily armed soldiers who come to take her away to face punishment for deceiving them. Of course, this sends Blade racing to her rescue, letting him face villains unlike any he has seen before, and this is the uncharted territory that lets fans see him at his best.
Blade’s Roots Are In His Own Private Corner Of Marvel’s Reality
Although the current Blade series is a sort of return to the Daywalker’s roots as it’s a self-contained story, it still takes place in a far wider arena than the one he started out in. When Blade was introduced in the pages of 1973’s Tomb of Dracula #13 (by Marv Wolfman and Gene Colan), he was a vampire hunter and a perfect fit for the title. In the years that followed, Blade traveled back and forth across Europe, joining heroes like Frank Drake and Rachel Van Helsing in their shared pursuit of Dracula. Eventually, this gave way to Blade’s hunt for Deacon Frost, the vampire responsible for his mother’s death and his own existence as a half-vampiric dhampir.
These stories were certainly exciting, even if they frequently veered into absurd territory with stories featuring Deacon Frost’s doppelgänger army of clones of Blade and Hannibal King. For all they had to offer, however, it was exceedingly rare for Blade to cross paths with other Marvel heroes despite the fact that they technically inhabited the same world. Apart from a few early crossovers with the likes of Doctor Strange and the X-Men, it took years before Blade really stepped into the Marvel Universe, though he quickly became one of its most recognizable figures when he did.
How Blade’s World Expanded In Marvel Comics
By helping found teams like the Nightstalkers and the original Midnight Sons, Blade gave himself numerous opportunities to work with nearly every dark and demonic hero the Marvel Universe had to offer. This also put him in close proximity to the likes of Spider-Man, the Punisher, and S.H.I.E.L.D., each of which found ways to leave an indelible mark on Blade’s life. The vampiric threat Blade had sworn to fight so long ago may have never left his sight, but that didn’t mean Blade couldn’t also focus his efforts elsewhere when needed. In turn, the rest of the world’s heroes came to Blade’s aid whenever they could, cementing his place among them and connecting him with their literary reality. As a result of these incidental relationships being organically cultivated rather than forced, Blade fit neatly onto line-ups that had nothing to do with the supernatural, ranging from the Mighty Avengers to their more mainstream counterparts in the primary line-up of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes.
Though Blade almost always found his way back to fighting vampires in one way or another, these stories established the precedent that Blade doesn’t actually need a specific vampiric threat to call him into action. This was made more apparent than ever when he led the charge against the Squadron Supreme and the rest of Mephisto’s twisted version of reality during the events of 2021’s Heroes Reborn (by Jason Aaron and Ed McGuinnes). Putting Blade in the center of a reality-warping conspiracy may have seemed strange at the time, but his part in Heroes Reborn left no doubt that he had long since shed any need for supernatural threats. It also proved just how much better the rest of the Marvel Universe is when Blade sets foot in it, especially when it’s where fans least expect to see him.
Why Blade Needs A Bigger Stage
No matter how much time Blade has spent battling various murderous monstrosities, he has never really only had them to worry about. Realistically, Blade has always had to concern himself with other threats besides vampires, it’s just that vampires defined him for such a long time. That said, his undeniable experience with vampires has made him every other hero’s go-to ally when they’re facing undead menaces, which in turn forms a web of connections between Blade and the rest of the Marvel Universe, and connects their subgenres and stories as well.
Thanks to Blade’s stories, the X-Men have had more than a few harrowing experiences with vampires, while Blade has been forced to fight through time and across dimensions on multiple occasions. Instead of breaking any suspension of disbelief that the audience might have, these kinds of crossovers only make the Marvel Universe seem more relatable by setting up events that are merely the most logical conclusions of objectively absurd situations. In a world where mutants exist alongside undead cyborgs and literal gods, it would be ludicrous to think that these figures wouldn’t cross each other’s paths as well as the Daywalker’s.