Blade

Alter Ego: Eric Brooks

Notable Aliases: Blade: The Vampire Hunter, the Daywalker, Frank Blade, Switch Blade, Spider Hero, Ronin

First Appearance: Tomb of Dracula #10 (July, 1973)

A Vampire Hunter who debuted in The Tomb of Dracula #10 (July, 1973). Eric Brooks was born in the latter half of The Roaring '20s to a woman who was bitten by notorious vampire Deacon Frost while she was suffering labor complications. While his mother perished from the attack, Eric miraculously survived due to the bite inadvertently transforming the stillborn infant into a Dhampir: a Human/Vampire Hybrid who inherited the strengths of his undead "sire" without developing any of their major weaknesses. Determined to avenge his mother's death, Eric trained under various mentors around the world to become an unparalleled Hunter of His Own Kind.

Taking up the alias of "Blade" after his edged weapons of choice, Eric begrudgingly worked with the vampire detective Hannibal King against their common enemy, Deacon Frost and eventually joined up with the other surviving hunters in the book and Dracula himself, to defeat Doctor Sun. From there, Blade made appearances in similarly supernatural themed Marvel comics such as Doctor Strange, Ghost Rider and Morbius as well as team up with characters like Spider-Man on special occasion. While Hannibal King would gradually become one of Blade's closest acquaintances, Dracula still remains one of his most hated foes.

Blade made regular appearances again during the "Midnight Sons" story arc in the 1990s, which led to the character being featured on the then running Spider-Man cartoon. That inevitably led to a successful trilogy of movies, best known for building enough confidence for Marvel to launch live-action films of better known properties such as X-Men 1 and Spider-Man 1. While attempts to reproduce that success for Blade in the comics at the time failed, the live-action adaptations did permanently change how the character would be portrayed in terms of his design, personality, and abilities.

After Marvel's Civil War (2006) crossover event, the character has also been prone to show up in stories dealing with government organizations, such as the Vanguard in Marvel Comics Presents and MI13 that followed in the wake of Secret Invasion (2008). During The Avengers (Jason Aaron), Blade was recruited into King T'Challa's incarnation of the titular superhero team and liberated a adolescent offshoot of Man-Thing (fittingly dubbed Boy-Thing) who he befriended as both a partner and wielded as a shapeshifting Living Weapon.

In 2023, Blade would finally star in a new ongoing series written Bryan Hill, where the Daywalker is put on a collision course with his most powerful adversary yet in the form of The Adana, a Eldritch God of Evil with the power to bring about The End of the World as We Know It.

• '90s Anti-Hero: Blade was always uptight, ruthless and demeaning on the hunt, but in the 1970s he genuninely empathized with the people minding their own business, whose lives were intruded upon by vampires. His loss of empathy, abuse of his protectorates and all around unpleasantness came in the 1980s, but since this was the 80s, this shift in attitude and behavior was considered a bad thing. Blade was still an example during the 1990s, but he was less manic than he was in the 80s while also being less sociopathic and more self-aware than most other 90s antiheroes, and has become significantly more moderate in how he treats his work. Still, he's retained the general 90s appearance and attitude well into the following millennium.
• Abnormal Ammo: Hollow points filled with garlic. His arm cannon could shoot rubber bullets.
• Absurdly Sharp Blade: Puns aside in Captain Britain and MI13, he claims to sharpen his stakes to nanopoints to pierce light armor.
• Accidental Misnaming: Stacy Dolan always refers to Blade as "Wesley", even when he threatens her with bodily harm for it.
• Adaptational Nationality: Every incarnation of Blade outside of the comics is African-American as opposed to Black British in the original comics.
• Affirmative-Action Legacy: Blade was the most recent holder of the Ronin identity. He even used the same costume that Hawkeye wore during his tenure with the New Avengers. Hawkeye himself was an example, as the first Marvel Ronin was a Cheyenne woman, despite ronins being a specifically Japanese concept.(Marvel had Japanese ronin before her, but they weren't actually called Ronin, and she was specifically using the disguise to infiltrate and monitor Japenese criminal organizations). Blade dressed as Ronin specifically because he was trying to keep a low profile but to get Monica Rambeau's help he had to help her Avengers team.
• Afro Asskicker: What he started off with, though since the movies he's gone for shaved temples. A flashback in Mighty Avengers showing him in the 70s has him in his original outfit, 'fro and all.
• And Then What?: Blade gets a job and performs as a trumpeter on the side when all the vampires are killed in the comics. He asks this question to other people who don't seem to have an obtainable goal, such as The Punisher, or just haven't thought of what they'll do when they're done.
• Anti-Hero: Blade not only kills supernatural beings with extreme prejudice, but he is no less merciful towards humans who try to be vampires or side with them.
• Apocalypse Maiden/The Chosen One: Blade is believed to be by some by the sheer fact he is a day walking vampire. This was Cilla's motivation for sleeping with him for example, believing it would lead to the birth of the fabled Tryk King Zukajaa (further implications of the plot have not been revealed yet)
• Arbitrary Skepticism: When he first encounters Spider-Man his introduction is summed up as "vampires are real, hero, get over it" before anything else meaningful is said, suggesting he's run into this trope a lot. He was a blood drinker himself, but Morbius initially did not believe in supernatural vampires.
• Arm Cannon: He once resorted to biting off his own hand. While waiting for a replacement or a new one to grow back he hooked a gun where it used to be.
• The Assimilator: Blade was once absorbed into the body of one of Frost's creations when he tried to kill it. Daimon Hellstrom manages to exorcise him from it, then kill it properly.
• Badass Longcoat: The only difference he makes when he briefly takes on the identity of Ronin is wearing a trench coat over it. The badassness is mildly offset by the fact it apparently stinks.
  Blade: You dream of a coat so nasty.
• Badass Normal: Initially Blade had no powers and survived with his skills, before being bitten by Morbius. After the bite, he becomes an Empowered Badass Normal.
• Bed Trick: Cilla does this to Blade, then tries to eat him, because that's what Tryks do. They usually mate with other members of the colony who willingly become meals for their queen, Blade didn't even want to have sex before he knew he was being tricked, and Cilla fled when she realized she bit off more than she could chew, though she was still successfully impregnated, the implications there that yet to be revealed.
• Blessed with Suck: Blade's initial state of tainted but not turned made even dim sources of light irritating to his eyes, and others had it worse.
• Blood Knight: One of the few things Eric truly enjoys in this world is a good brawl, something that his profession as a Vampire Hunter is never short of.
• Body Surf: Blade had to hunt down a body surfing criminal named Yoosef while S.H.I.E.L.D. had forced him into the Vanguard program.
• Bond Creatures: Shadow Colonel created a minature copy of Man-Thing that he kept chained to his shoulder to use as an endless supply of wooden stakes to use on other vampires. After breaking free from the Colonel, "Boy-Thing" reached out to and attached himself to Blade, often refusing to let go even when Blade is under attack and suggesting Boy-Thing find somewhere safer. Boy-Thing has even saved Blade from a Celestial and restructured itself as armor to protect Blade from The Silver Surfer.
• Brainwashed and Crazy: After getting his new vampire powers, Blade is kidnapped by the Silver Eye division of S.H.I.E.L.D., who do use mind control in an attempt to turn him into a weapon for them.
• Breakout Character: Of The Tomb of Dracula, getting his own comic out of it, three movies and a live action series.
• Bringing in the Expert: He's THE premiere Vampire Hunter of the Marvel Universe for a reason. If any superhero finds themselves dealing with vamps or the Things That Go "Bump" in the Night, Eric is the first person everybody tries to reach out to for consultation. When Moon Knight found himself taking Reese, a 19 year old vampire who was recently turned, under his wing as a secretary, Marc recruited Eric to help show her the ropes of what she can do and how to properly manage her thirst for blood.
• Captain Ethnic: In his early appearances.
• Characterization Marches On: Blade is a character who's extended lifespan has been put to good use to demonstrate the changes he's been through in his career.
  • Classic Blade from his debut in the 70s had many blaxploitation elements about him, along with a hot headed and fierce demeanor in his pursuit of destroying vampires. But he did have his own "down time," as he was frequently shown with his then girlfriend, Saffron, and even sometimes performing as a jazz trumpeter. And even back then, he had a moderate side in allowing exceptions to his disdain for vampires, considering his Odd Friendship with Hannibal King.
  • In the 90s, Blade is undoubtedly at his worst and most fanatical in his pursuit of destroying the evil of the supernatural. He was in a leather biker outfit, constantly planning to murder a vampire/demon/evil spirit, and became dangerously uncompromising, to the point where he became dangerous to his own friends, especially as seen in the Midnight Massacre storyline where he accepted a deal from the pages of the Darkhold book to attempt to end all occult life on earth.
  • Post 2010s Blade is an Eric Brooks who is significantly more in control. Not only has he had a pretty healthy relationship with a vampire (Lady J is an artificial vampire, but still), but he's also much more willing to work with teams, supernatural-based ones and otherwise, when the need arises. But above all, his mission is, and always will be defending humanity's soul from the evil of the supernatural.
  • In the 2020s, Blade's Fantastic Racism against Vampires is deconstructed in solo titles by Bryan Hill, in which several characters confront Blade over this life-long prejudice and how it fuels his own self-hatred as a Dhampyr. This all culminates in Blade: Red Band, where Eric realizes that Pontius Van Helsing, a vampire he was sent to assassinate by The Spellguard, is actually the benevolent leader of an entire thriving community of nomadic Vampire Refugees who have chosen to embrace what they've become while stimulaniously researching and developing ways to break the curse that compels them to be predatory monsters. Since the Spellguard were determined annhilate every vampire in the encampment, which would include innocent women and children, Blade turned against the Spellguard to defend Pontius and his clan.
    Pontius Van Helsing: Dracula shared his powers with you. Varnae has left you with the embers of his will. I have shared my wisdom. It is time for you to forgive yourself, Eric. — You are not a monster. You are not the hunter of monsters. You are the enemy of Evil.
• Combat Pragmatist: Blade is a ruthlessly efficient fighter who will use whatever he can to gain an advantage in a fight. He has even been willing to blow up an entire building, with himself inside of it, just to get a hit in on Varnae, who was unaware that daylight had broken, outside.
• Comic-Book Fantasy Casting: In a very reasonable case, almost every appearance by Blade since the movie has him looking like his live-action portrayer Wesley Snipes.
• Cool Shades: Always wears a pair, because of his eyes being particularly sensitive to light. And because they make him look awesome.
• Costume Copycat: Briefly, during Infinity, he took to the streets as the "Splendiferous Spiderhero" (no hyphen), a cheap green-and-purple knock-off of Spider-Man's outfit he borrowed from a costume store, mainly because it was what there was, and it covered his face.
• Cultured Badass: Blade is a jazz schooled trumpet player.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: In his own book Blade used Union Jack as target practice for his new Arm Cannon and less than lethal rounds. When they fought in a neutral book it was a more even fight with no clear victor before being broken up.
• Dating Cat Woman:
  • Downplayed with his relationship with Spitfire, who while a vampire, is also a hero.
  • Played straight with his relationship with Tulip Hamato, who is an amoral arms dealer with ties to the Yakuza.
• Daywalking Vampire: He's even referred to as the "daywalker" by other vampires. Blade's physiology means he is completely immune to vampire weaknesses and, other than his eyes being very light sensitive necessitating his glasses, is completely unaffected by sunlight.
• Demonic Possession: Famously battles a demon who had possessed a mall Santa. It considers possessing Blade but decides it wants nothing to do with a vampire. The spirit of Varnae tries to possess Blade but he resists it, so it instead takes over Night Terror.Thanks to Adana, Blade's ability to resist future possession attempts by Varnae becomes diminished.
• Detect Evil: Similarly to how his sire Deacon Frost has the unique ability to create doppelgangers of himself, Blade was born with a supernatural sixth sense, enabling him to perceive the presence of supernatural beings and uses it to hunt down evil, even if they aren't visible to his normal five senses.He's thrown for a loop when the demon god Adana is able to mask herself from this.
• Determinator: The people who know him personally will attest that Blade is overwhelmingly stubborn when it comes to his mission to protect humanity from the evil of the supernatural. He's been doing it for well over half a century, if not more, and he has no plans on stopping anytime soon.
• Dhampyr: Easily the most famous example in Comic-Book History. Blade's mother was bitten a vampire while he was in utero, resulting in him being born a Half-Human Hybrid with all of vampire's strengths but none of their weaknesses beyond a ever-present craving for blood. Blade wasn't this originally though (he debuted as just a regular human who was immune to vampirism), but the success of a certain movie led to him getting a bit of a power up with the draw back of blood thirst, thanks to his most influential adaptation.
• Disappeared Dad: Lucas Cross claims to be Blade's father, as he was Tara Brook's lover. Given what her profession is though, there is a good chance he isn't. His excuse for not being around is being locked up in Latveria for a crime he did not commit.
• The Dreaded: He is near-universally feared by vampires, werewolves, and other supernatural horrors across the globe.
• Driving Up a Wall: In some incarnations, Blade's motorcycle was equipped to scale walls.
• Dual Wielding: Two teakwood daggers were his preferred vampire-killing weapons in the beginning, as he was impressed by Orji Jones, who used them as his weapon of choice before him. Blade didn't limit himself to them though, also carrying things like crossbows. While working with the Nightstalkers, Frank Drake gets him some more dangerous weaponry and his arsenal continued to expand with S.H.I.E.L.D. and when he met the twins Mikado and Mosha. But in MI-13 onward, Blade is will be rocking twin katanas as his primary weapons of choice.
• Empowered Badass Normal: Before gaining vampire powers, he initially got by solely on his skills in martial arts and various weapons.
• Expy: Blade in the original comics was an admitted Expy of Blaxploitation characters, particularly John Shaft right down to the afro and brown leather jacket. He picked up the AAVE from Americans later, though—he's native to Britain.
• Fast Tunneling: One of Blade's best feats is defying this trope when The Reaper tries to burrow to avoid the rising dawn.
• Full-Frontal Assault: Blade's been forced to do this twice. Once after fist getting his powers and once again in his Max series when a group of vampires busts in on him as he's sleeping in the nude.
• Genius Bruiser: He's an outstanding combatant with all the physical abilities of a vampire and also a highly skilled tactician and planner who is well versed in supernatural lore and sorcery.
• Give Her a Normal Life: Blade fathered a daughter, Brielle, with an old flame, Safron Caulder. Though Blade considered giving up his life of fighting the occult for them, both he and Safron knew that Blade had accumulated too many enemies over the years. And unlike many other heroes, there is no mutual respect or unspoken agreement between Blade and his foes to not make things personal. Both parents agreed that it was for the best for him to keep his distance, but Blade commissioned Dr Strange to perform a powerful anti detection spell on Brielle, making it nigh impossible for supernatural beings to perceive her existence, thus giving Brielle the freedom to grow up a normal person in the way Blade himself did not.
• Gotta Kill 'Em All: It used to be all vampires, now its just every vampire who has given into their curse, disease or whatever and started killing multiple people or spreading their condition around. Vampires who aren't spreading it around and not murdering people are usually left alone, provided they can convince Blade.
• Healing Factor: Not as good as it could be, as he doesn't drink much blood, so Blade has to will himself to heal and manually kick-starting it is very painful but it gets the job done all the same, allowing him to heal from serious wounds within hours and which overcomes wounds from silver as easily as regular ones. He teaches Spitfire how to do it too.
• Hell-Bent for Leather: His signature look, as popularized by the movies, includes a black leather trenchcoat.
• Hellfire: Has a natural resistance to it as a benefit of being a partially undead vampire. Dukes of Hell like Plokta and Spirits of Vengeance like Ghost Rider can still burn him with it, lesser entities are out of luck though.
• Heroic Bastard: As in the "born out of wedlock" type of bastard, but plenty think he's the other kind of bastard too, due to not always being the nicest guy around.
• Hidden Depths: Besides being a badass vampire hunter, he's also a talented jazz trumpeter on the side.
• Hope Spot: Doctor Doom manipulated Blade into fulfilling a prophecy that was supposed to restore the souls of all vampires, and even gave Blade treatment that was supposed to permanently rid Blade of his blood thirst as a sort of apology. Unfortunately the result actually just resulted in the mass resurrection of vampires that eventually allowed them to overrun Earth, and it required Blade to unwillingly drink blood, slowly bringing back his thirst for it. Blade still shared the medicine with Hannibal King, hoping he'd have better luck.
• Hybrid Power: Blade, a classic dhampyr, has all the strengths of vampires, but none of the weaknesses, barring a much weaker desire for blood which he treats with a serum.
• I Hate You, Vampire Dad: Well, Blade doesn't care for Lucas, who claims to be Blade's dad, and Lucas becoming a vampire to escape imprisonment did not improve their relationship. Blade doesn't like Deacon Frost or Morbius, the ones responsible for his own vampire state, either. He hates the latter least of the three and the middle the most. This trope also technically comes into play with his 2023 run, where Blade's vampire powers increase after drinking Dracula's offered blood, making his oldest enemy yet another Vampire Dad he loathes.
• Improbable Weapon User: While he teamed with Captain Britain and MI13 he cut up a spell book he found and made a papier-mâché sword out of it.
• Inept Mage: He has a very high level of knowledge in regards to mysticism and the occult, however, in the past, his attempts to use magic usually go wrong. One case involved a spell that was supposed to give a vampire its soul back but instead returned vampires he killed back to life. To be fair he was tricked by Lucas Cross, who also thought it would work.
  • These days, Blade is a bit more proficient with spellcasting, having instructed Power Man on the fly how to access his chi abilities to help beat back Shuma-Gorath, and was even able to teach Brielle an incantation to seal away a n energy draining vampire, and even enchant Miles Morales' gear with anti vampire properties.
• It's Personal: Deacon Frost killed Blade's mother and is the reason he was tainted by vampire blood. Dracula killed his mentor Jamal. Vampires killed the street gang he rolled with as a kid so he has it out for them in general.
• Jazz: Blade is a very talented jazz player and it is his favorite music. Which makes sense considering he was around when jazz first got popular.
• Jive Turkey: Is from the UK but uses slang he picked up from Americans, particularly from Boston and New Orleans. Saffron, who is also from the UK, used to complain about it before moving to both cities herself to be around him more.
• Katana Superiority: Blade originally got his name from a pair of teak wood daggers he used in his comics debut. But from the Nightstalkers onward, they have been phased out by the badass Japanese sword he uses to kill the undead. He's also wielded katanas forged out of both Adamantium and Atlantean steel for its Anti-Magic properties.
• Known Only by Their Nickname: For a long time Blade was, since the closest he ever was to being a main character was sharing the honor with two other guys until the 90s.
• Kung-Fu Wizard: It doesn't come up much but Blade is quite well versed in magic and sorcery as well as his martial arts skills, which even include Kung Fu.
• Let's You and Him Fight: Double Subverted in the nine issue Strikeforce arc, where Blade steps in to ruin an Evil Plan to frame an assembled group of oblivious superheroes to fight with and weaken The Avengers. While finding something for them to do and place for them to stay he and Winter Soldier still end up duped into a fist fight with Spider-Woman (Jessica Drew), that they lose handily.
• Lightning Bruiser: He's extremely fast and agile, even able to run circles around other vampires.
• Love Interests: In spite of his history of being a anti-social loner, Blade has met three women over the course of his long life that he has grown to love.
  • The first is Safron Caulder, a woman he met back when he used to perform as a jazz trumpeter at a London nightclub. After the two became romantically involved, Safron chose to move with Eric to the United States where they tried to have a normal life and even had a kid together. But due to Eric earning over a century's worth of enemies over the course of his career as a slayer, he had no choice but to leave them both behind for their own safety.
  • The second is Lady Jacqueline Falsworth AKA Spitfire, a WW2-era speedster (and daughter of the original Union Jack) who manifested vampiric abilities that made her into The Ageless. When Eric was recruited into MI13, he actually tried to kill her on the day they first met for no other reason other than the fact that she was a vamp; but thankfully mellowed out once Jac proved that she was in control of her bloodlust. Thanks to the titanic amount of Belligerent Sexual Tension building between the two heroes as they worked together to stop a crisis involving demonic forces, Jac kissed Eric after he profusely apologized for his behavior, which led to the two becoming a steadfast Battle Couple for the rest of the series.
  • The third is Tamlyn "Tulip" Hamato, a Japanese clairvoyant Dark Action Girl who made a name for herself in the criminal underworld by selling powerful supernatural weapons on the Black Market. Tulip served as Eric's personal armorer and eventually grew close to him as a lover, but their relationship became strained after a messy breakup over a Noodle Incident. While Tulip loves to sardonically roast Eric over his screw-ups, they still have sex and greatly care about each other's well-being in spite of their mutual bickering.
• Master Swordsman: It's in his name; he's really skilled with those swords of his, filleting and carving up Vampires with both savagery and grace.
• Mistaken Identity: A young Blade kills a man suffering from porphyria by mistake. Jamal sends him out of the country despite Blade believing he deserved prison for it. He ends up joining a gang in New York not long after.
• Morality Chain: Bible John helped him in his goal to become less obsessed and hate filled.
• Multi-Martial Master: To become a better vampire hunter, Blade has mastered a multitude of styles, including boxing, capoeira, escrima, and ninjutsu, among others. Combined with his Dhampyr agility and senses, this makes him a deadly opponent.
• The Musketeer: He's got UV grenades and cutting boomerangs too post Nightstalkers, but the sword and gun have remained his most used weapons.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero!
  • A group of vampires, including his supposed father Lucas Cross, were trying to perform a resurrection spell that required a specific day walker, Blade, to drink virgin blood. They tried to force him to eat a little girl and it didn't end well for them. Another group of vampires had created their own day walker named Draconis, to kill Blade. Draconis proves too tough for Blade to beat, so Blade decides to drink him of all his blood, so he won't regenerate. Draconis dies... a virgin...
  • In his 2023 solo series he gets a lot of this for falling for the Adana's tricks, despite her targeting him, and her just being well outside of his normal weight class in general.
• The Nose Knows: Of his super senses, his sense of smell is the most notable, as that's how his ability to detect supernatural activity manifests.
• Not So Similar: He gets compared to Wolverine, both being really old guys who look younger than they are, and Luke Cage, thanks to his relationship with Hannibal King (to Luke's with Iron Fist), but he doesn't have much in common with either of them. Blade himself thought he was just like The Punisher but found out he was mistaken when he finally met him.
• Older Than They Look: He was born in the 1920s and Jazz is still his favorite form of music. This is due to his slowed aging.
• One Hero, Hold the Weaksauce: For the most part, Blade has all the strengths of a vampire but is immune to the traditional weaknesses, mainly daylight. And while he isn't immortal, he ages at a much slower rate than humans, evening the playing field with vampires considerably. However, he still struggles greatly with the blood lust vampires have.
• One-Steve Limit: Blade also shares his first name with the vampire Eric Guy.
• Our Vampires Are Different:
  • Blade originally debuted in the comics as a human who was immune to vampire bites. However, he was bitten by Morbius (a scientifically-created vampire) and got turned into a half-vampire similar to his movie counterpart. Then that got cast aside so Blade was always a Dhampyr just like his movie counterpart, likely for the sake of simplicity, though it's often been restated as it creates a Plot Hole about his lack of fangs and blood lust.
  • The original 70s version still had superhumanly acute night vision, sensitivity to light (hence the goggles being part of his standard attire) and extremely slow aging (his backstory mentioned him being born in the late 19th century). The 90s version got upgraded with an intuitive ability to Detect Evil. Some view this as adaption induced Level Grinding.
    • Possibly Lampshaded by Deadpool, who claims Blade is stronger than the trading cards say he is. After all, they do say vampires get stronger with age.
  • In 2023, Blade Took a Level in Badass after drinking Dracula's blood during his quest to live up to his true potential by embracing his Vampiric Heritage. This resulted in Eric gaining the more classical and esoteric Vampire abilities such as Shapeshifting and Telepathy while still maintaining his immunity to the sun courtesy of his human half.
• Parental Substitute:
  • In addition to Jamal, Blade also had Madame Vanity, who owned the brothel his mother worked at.
  • Blade himself would become this to Rotha in his 2023 run, ironically right after he had killed her father.
• Pet the Dog
  • The nine issue Strikeforce arc sees Blade step in to sabotage a plot to frame a hodgepodge group of oblivious and innocent superheroes, then give them direction and lodging until The Avengers can take them off of his hands.
  • Blade doesn't particularly like taking Boy-Thing into fights and is sometimes able to convince him to seek shelter, despite the tremendous advantages Boy-Thing brings and Blade's usual pramatic attitude.
• Power Copying: In the Midnight Sons crossover Midnight Massacre, Blade in his obsessive quest against all occult reads a certain page from Darkhold and turns into Switchblade the Demogorge, a being who obtains powers of anyone he kills. This power proves to be his undoing when kills Ghost Rider, and feels the power of his Penance Stare as he obtains it, buying enough time for Prof. Hastings of the Darkhold Redeemers to fix things up.
• Pro-Human Transhuman: Not that he is fond of many of his fellow humans, but he will do what he can to rid them of their vampire problems regardless.
• Proportional Aging: While he isn't immortal like vampires, Blade's physiology means he ages at a much slower rate than humans. He was born in the 1920's but still has the look and abilities of a man in his physical prime. This is no longer the case once he became desperate enough to drink the blood of Dracula, as now it's just no aging, appear how old he wants to, to an extent.
• Red Baron: Is universally known and feared by Things That Go "Bump" in the Night as "The Daywalker", due to his immunity to sunlight in spite of his Vampiric heritage.
• Ret-Canon:
  • Due to the success of the Blade Trilogy, the origins of the titular vampire slayer have been completely overhauled in the comics to match what is largely seen by pop culture as his definitive interpretation. So instead of a Jive Turkey Badass Normal who simply had an immunity to vampirism and fought primarily with wooden daggers, writers from the 90's onward have firmly established Blade to be a Deadpan Snarker Dhampyr born with superhuman physicality, a Healing Factor, and an ever-present Bloodlust; who fights with a mix of Japanese swords and modern firearms loaded with specialized ammunition.
  • This also extends to Eric's Iconic Outfit, as you will rarely find a modern version of the character who isn't rocking the Badass Longcoat + Sunglasses at Night combo.
• Retcon:
  • The nineties saw Blade growing up in Brooklyn, when before he had been British. The UK has been slotted back into his origins over time, however..
  • The Guggenheim run made a few changes to his backstory, many of which were incredibly unpopular and tend to not be acknowledged by later writers.
• The Rival: Joseph Chapman, aka Union Jack (not that Union Jack), another vampire hunter who believes Blade is a "foreign amateur" and goes as far as to blame him for the continued existence of vampires (see Nice Job Breaking It, Hero! and Inept Mage for his Blaming the Victim reasoning).
• Scary Black Man: Blade himself qualifies, especially towards the supernatural.
• Selective Obliviousness: Blade refuses to admit Morbius's bite did anything to him and insists he was always the way he is when S.H.I.E.L.D. sends the latter to bring him in. In fact, Blade denies it whenever it comes up so much a reader could be forgiven for believing him. A look at an older comic where he lacks fangs and an urge to drink blood or a peep in a Marvel handbook will set them straight. Subverted by the time The New '10s rolled around, where later writers did ultimately decide that Blade was always a Dhampyr and rewrote Eric's history to fit the new narrative, but runs that more extensively use his past usually show him initially without fangs and blood lust.
• Significant Wardrobe Shift: In The Bronze Age of Comic Books he was a Badass Longcoat, but very much of an intellectual looking type. (The aviator glasses helped the effect.) In The Modern Age of Comic Books his briefer, Hell-Bent for Leather look reflects a more aggressive approach.
• Sole Survivor: Blade is the only one to survive in a few groups, Orji Jones's vampire hunters in particular. In the original telling Blade survived when Dracula killed everyone else because of his immunity to vampire bites but this may or may not have been retconned as Dracula leaving him alive for a future favor.
• Son of a Whore: Blade's mother was drained by a vampire as she gave birth but the other prostitutes eventually drove it off and took care of him.
• Sticky Fingers: Jamal encourages Blade to loot the vampires he fights, as many Vampires Are Rich.
• Strong and Skilled: Blade has both the physical abilities of a vampire, granting him enhanced strength, speed and agility, and years of training and experience in various martial arts such as Karate, Krav Maga, Boxing, Hapkido, Jeet Kune Do, Kali, Capoeira, Kickboxing, Wrestling and Brazilian Jiujitsu. His ability to use his powers to enhance his already deadly combat skills makes him incredibly dangerous in a fight and let him defeat full blown vampires with ease.
• Sunglasses at Night: Blade wears them because of light sensitivity. He can also see just fine in the dark, so his vision isn't hindered.
• Super Registration Act: After this one is passed in Marvel USA, S.H.I.E.L.D. wastes little time in legally forcing Blade to work for them. Maria Hill isn't quite as bad as the Silver Eye divison was, though.
• Super-Speed: After getting his powers, its noted that's he's uncannily quick, even among other vampires. He's not as fast as Draconis and Spitfire, though.
• Super-Strength: On the lower end of the scale, but still there. He can lift about one ton at his peak according to Marvel's official handbook and website. This actually makes him weaker than his movie counterpart, who can at least double his strength by guzzling blood. It is also really Depending on the Writer though, as some feats of his are well above that (Pulling The Reaper out from underground and hoisting above his head so it could not avoid the rising sun) while other struggles suggest it is even lower than that (such as when he had to trick S.H.I.E.L.D. agents into shooting at him to break a pair of handcuffs).
• Teeth-Clenched Teamwork
  • Blade respects Spider-Man enough to distinguish him as a "hero" on a planet full of them. That doesn't mean he likes Spider-man, since ol' Webhead tends to annoy the Daywalker with his nonstop preaching about his Thou Shalt Not Kill rule while trying to get Blade to abide by it every time they work together, especially if the target is Morbius.
  • With Monica Rambeau, any time they've worked together after a team-up against vampires in a post-Katrina New Orleans. On that same campaign he butted heads with Luke Cage but Brother Voodoo was indifferent to Blade and Black Panther was amused by Blade's abrasive personality.
• Terror Hero: Type 3 and 5. Vampires whisper his name in the same way as Dracula's. Blade's mere presence, even among massive gangs of vampires is enough to send half running. The unintelligent other half usually die.
• That Man Is Dead: During his time as The Demogorge Switchblade.
• There Are No Therapists: Not so. When he develops an obsessive hatred and detachment from the world in general over Dracula's inability to stay dead, Blade is committed to receive treatment. He's let out early by Dr. Strange but it does lead to him mellowing out a little.
  • Recently, however, it appears that Blade has been visiting a Japanese woman named Yumi who serves as a yearly spiritual advisor for him. The two of them have a positive rapport and Yumi provides advice to Blade when he approaches her with his internal struggles.
• Time Dissonance: When Black Panther was in possession of the Black Knight's Ebony Blade, our hero Blade asks him to give it to him in his will. Luke Cage tries to explain to him why that's rude but he doesn't care. Also, anyone who claims Blade can't kill all the vampires will be intimately corrected, he really doesn't care how long it takes.
• Took a Level in Badass: Blade's origin, with his mother dying of a vampire's bite while she was in labor with him, was established early on, but there was no hint this had any effect on him. Later on, it was realized that he had been rendered immune to vampirism, and later still, a strange reaction to a bite from Morbius resulted in him acquiring vampiric powers (but not their weaknesses). Then writers such as Marc Guggenheim, Jason Aaron, and Bryan Hill decided to cut out the middle man entirely and rewrote the origin again so that Eric was born a Dhampyr as a result of the vampire attack that claimed his mother and has been using his Hybrid Power to hunt the Things That Go "Bump" in the Night long before he ever met Morbius.
• Transhuman Treachery: Not the case for the most part, feeding on humans just comes naturally to vampires. Because of this, the sunwalker formula which can give them resistance to sunlight, is not very popular among them because it also brings back their sense of humanity and brings the severe Horror Hunger that comes from eating your own kind alive and not being able to stop yourself. Using it drove Henry Sage to Suicide ByBlade in Marvel team-up #7.
• Vampire Detective: He was a part of Borderline Investigations, but was really more involved in the Nightstalkers, what the same group was known as when hunting vampires and other occult elements.
• Vampires Hate Garlic: Blade once poisoned some vampires by putting garlic in gumdrops.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: He has this kind of relationship with Hannibal King. Their association started out begrudgingly (mostly from Blade's end), but even once Blade finally trusted him, there still remains tension and personality clashes between them. That being said, they have each other's backs, enjoy working together, and Blade has referred to King as his best friend even showing concern for him when they worked with Dr Strange in a plan to use the Darkhold to erase all vampires off the face of the Earth.
• Willfully Weak: Blade noticeably lacks some of the more mystical powers of a vampire, such as transforming his own body into mist or into a swarm of bats, etc. However, Dracula has implied that Blade has deliberately blocked himself from developing these abilities due to sheer force of will holding back his vampiric side. In an extremely desperate situation against an Evil God, Blade is forced to consume Dracula's blood, awakening the evil powers within himself to better confront this new enemy on an evil to evil playing field.
• Wrecked Weapon: Blade's blades tend not to be as durable as he is, as seen in his battle with Plokta, or in the case of his battle with the Taker Of Heads, can't repair themselves after being broken like he can. After a sword gets broken by Spitfire he is seen with an adamantium weapon.
• You Kill It, You Bought It: While in New York, Blade killed a gang leader named Cyrus Cutter in a knife fight. This caused Cyrus's gang, the Bloodshadows, to see Blade as their new leader, to the point of following him back to the Britain.

Hannibal King

Alter Ego: Hannibal King

Notable Aliases: Henry Kagle, "Horrified Hannibal"

First Appearance: Tomb of Dracula #25 (October, 1974)

Hannibal King was an ordinary Private investigator until a vampire named Deacon Frost killed him and turned him into a vampire. He was a member of the Nightstalkers along with Blade and Frank Drake.

Frank Drake

Alter Ego: Frank Drake

Notable Aliases: "Franky", "Frankie Boy"

First Appearance: Tomb of Dracula #1 (April, 1972)

Frank Drake was once a millionaire playboy until he wasted his inherited fortune. All he had left was his charm and a castle that had been in the service of his family for many generations. Before deciding to sell the place, he, his friend Clifton Graves, and fiance Jeanie went to Transylvania to investigate the ancient castle which was the resting place of Count Dracula. During his search, him and another stumbled upon the remains of the lord of vampires and accidentally revived him. Dracula instantly attacked Frank and his friends throughout the castle, Frank escaped with his life due to Dracula finding that Frank was his descendant.

Rotha

First Appearance: Blade #1 (July, 2023)

A young Cambodian Hunter of Monsters raised by a militant sect of Warrior Monks dedicated to stopping the coming of The Adana. When Blade mistakenly killed the champion of her Order before he could slay the Adana, her people imprisoned Blade to be tortured in their dungeons as punishment while they grimly awaited The End of the World as We Know It. Vehemently refusing to sit down and accept this fate, Rotha decided to defect from her Order and freed Blade so he can help her save the world from The Adana's apocalyptic machinations.

• Action Girl: She was groomed from birth to be a soldier in a war against a Primordial God of Evil and her army of supernatural horrors, and proves herself to be an excellent partner to Blade over the course of his adventures in the 2023 run.
• Badass and Child Duo: Blade and Rotha are a Downplayed example of this trope by virtue of the latter being a young teenage girl who is also the farthest thing from helpless.
• Defector from Decadence: Rotha slayed her own brothers-in-arms to enlist Blade's help because she refused to give up and let the world burn at Adana's hands just because her Order refused to do anything else to stop the God of Evil now that their Chosen One is dead. When her former colleagues return to try and assassinate Rotha for her betrayal, she has no qualms about Blade and Tulip killing them all in her defense.
  Tulip: Your people. You cool with me killing them?
  Rotha: They are lost, Miss Tulip. You may.
• Like a Son to Me: Both Tulip and Doctor Strange have noted that Rotha has taken a shine to Blade as a parental figure while working together to stop Adana from ending the world. An observation that Rotha initially tries to deny, but inevtiably confirms in Issue #8. Blade himself is heavily implied to see her as a surrogate daughter as well, especially since she's the first person he seeks out to act as his spiritual tether to bring him back from Hell.
• Master Archer: Rotha's primary weapon of choice is a simple longbow but is skilled enough as a markswoman with it to give Hawkeye a run for his money. Such as being able to dispatch an entire squad of heavily armed Yakuza goons and Vampires within milliseconds of each other, all with perfect headshots at that.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero!: Downplayed. She firmly hold's Blade responsible for The Adana's rise to power since Eric was ultimately the one who killed their Order's champion before he could finish the Eldritch Abomination off. That said, she respects Eric's commitment to rectifying this mistake and admires his desire to do good in spite of his nature.
• Ninja: Rotha is Cambodian but has enough of the associated traits (her militiant upbringing, her martial prowess, her adeptness at stealth and infiltration, etc.) to fit the bill. Even her white outfit resembles that of a archetypal shinobi garb at a glance.
• Suspiciously Similar Substitute: In a way, Rotha is this to Brielle Brooks AKA Bloodline, Blade's biological daughter who he also took under his wing as a Kid Sidekick prior to the 2023 run by Bryan Hill. But whereas Brielle was a Ordinary High-School Student prior to becoming an aspiring Vampire Hunter and still maintains a civilian life that prevents her from accompaning Eric on his international escapades, Rotha is a full-blown Monster Hunting Ninja who has known no normal life beyond preparing to fight The Adana and the monstrosities she commands.

Tamlyn "Tulip" Hamato

First Appearance: Blade #2 (August, 2023)

A clairvoyant Japanese Arms Dealer who made a name for herself in the criminal underworld by selling powerful supernatural weapons on the Black Market. Tulip was once Blade's personal armorer and eventually grew close to him as a lover, but their relationship became strained after a unexplained incident resulted in them breaking up. With The Adana on the loose and the fate of the world at stake, Blade and Rotha traveled to Japan to enlist her help in securing a weapon capable of slaying a God.

• The Armorer: She supplied Blade with many of the instruments of death he readily uses to slay the creatures of the night.
• Arms Dealer: Of the supernatural variety. Tulip specializes in selling Evil Weapons on the black market to the lowest and highest bidders. This includes everything from Demon-Powered Assault Rifles to Trick Bullets that can raise the corpses of those killed with them as Undead Thralls.
• Con Man: Has a history of screwing over her more villainous clients while swindling them out of every dime they've got.
• Dark Action Girl: She's an amoral Arms Dealer who is mainly concerned with lining her own pockets rather than saving the world, and can more than hold her own in a brawl as a gunslinger.
• Dating Catwoman: While she used to date Blade while doubling as his Armorer, she also has no qualms about running guns for the likes of Lord Daido, who is the exact type of villainous Humanoid Abomination that the Daywalker would slay in a heartbeat.
• Deadpan Snarker: Has a rather sardonic wit, with much of her more antagonizing quips being directed at Blade himself.
• Even Evil Has Standards:
  • Tulip might be an opportunistic career criminal at heart, but even she knows that supplying zombie-creating bullets to a guy like Lord Daido is a really bad idea.
  Daido: You promised me bullets that could kill people and raise their bodies to form my army. Then you sold me bullets any fool can find.
  Tulip: Perhaps I considered you having an undead army wasn't good for the rest of us.
  Daido: BUT YOU TOOK MY MONEY!!!
  Tulip: You have five hundred years of money, Lord Daido.
  • For all of her insistance that she has no interest in helping Blade save the world and threatens to leave the second she provided enough intel to call it even for saving her life, Tulip still decides to back him up for the Train Job to steal Lightbringer and even decided to fight alongside him and Rotha against the Adana.
• Femme Fatale: She's an attractive Japanese woman with a curvaceous figure who works in the arms trade as a living.
• Guns Akimbo: Mainly fights with a twin set of semi-automatic pistols as her primary weapons of choice.
• Love Interest: She's one of the rare few people in the Marvel Universe that Blade has had an intimate relationship with. But unlike Safron (a civilian) and Spitfire (a superhero), Tulip is a career criminal.
• Seers: She's a clairvoyant capable of Dreaming of Things to Come, and foresaw Adana's rise to power days prior to Blade showing up to enlist her help against the Eldritch Abomination.
• Sex with the Ex: While she claims to still hate Blade, Tulip isn't above having Glad-to-Be-Alive Sex with Eric immediately after he had saved her life from a pissed-off client. Its also clear that they greatly care about each other's well-being in spite of their bickering, to the point where even Doctor Strange calls out the Belligerent Sexual Tension between the two.
• Wild Card: She'll do business with anybody who can afford her services, regardless if they're a hero or a villain. This also means that she has more than enough enemies to her name that the threat of death is a constant hazard.

Deacon Frost

Alter Ego: Deacon Frost

Notable Aliases: Dark One, Whitehair

First Appearance: Tomb of Dracula #13 (October, 1973)

A 19th century scientist whose experiments with vampire blood resulted in him becoming an unusual type of vampire, Frost was the one who vampirized Blade's mother decades ago, leaving Blade a dhampir. While lacking the powers of a Varnae or Dracula, Frost has the unique ability to transform his victims into doppelgangers of himself and used this power to challenge Dracula for the title of Lord of the Vampires.

• Actually a Doombot: Deacon Frost has the power to create clones of himself, this is why Blade, Hannibal King and the rest of his enemies have failed to kill him over the years.
• Ambition Is Evil: Frost is defined by his status as a social climber, after being turned into a vampire he sought to sway the title of Lord of the Vampires away from Dracula.
• Arch-Enemy: To Blade. He might have more powerful enemies, but there's none he hates more than Frost. Hannibal King is not too fond of him either.
• Big Red Devil: Deacon Frost's "god" form resembled the trope only green. It had horns and wings but no tail.
• Evil Old Folks: Appeared to be an older man with snowy white hair and beard.
• Faux Affably Evil: Zigg-Zagged. Frost, like most vampires, knows how to act charming and innocent to lure people into a false sense of security. However, Depending on the Writer he also sees himself as a gentleman and use the proper vocabulary and cordial tone associated with that status. It's played straight in his tenure in the 2017 run of Falcon where he refers to his vampires and Blade as his "children" and adresses everyone around him in a more polite tone.
• Foil: He is one to Morbius. Like Morbius he was a scientist who experimented with blood in order to extend his lifespan which resulted in turning himself into a unique kind of vampire. But while Morbius is an altruistic individual who did it to save himself from dying young, only ever involved himself in his experiments and deeply resents his status as the "Living Vampire", Frost is a selfish sociopath who did it to gain immortality, used an innocent person as a human subject and embraced his new life as a creature of the night and preys on others with no remorse whatsoever.
  • He is also one that Dracula, himself. Whereas Dracula is a centuries-old vampire warlord who styled himself as the aristocrat that he is, Frost, on the other hand, represents a modern take on the vampire existence, often times being more interested in evolving the vampire race by artificial means.
• Food Chain of Evil: One of his doppelgangers attempts to turn himself into a god beyond vampires, but after a couple of failed attempts the real thing takes notice and eats him.
• Godhood Seeker: Deacon Frost (or rather a clone), uses magic to become something he claims to be greater than a vampire but his new powers weren't anything Blade couldn't handle and he's only saved by the fact that Blade is more concerned with Bible John's safety at the moment. Frost's later eaten by the real thing in his second attempt for more power.
• I Hate You, Vampire Dad: On the receiving end of this from Blade and Hannibal King.
• Immortality Immorality: Was conducting human experiments in order to try and unlock the key to immortality. He ultimately hit upon the idea of using vampire blood and the rest is history.
• It's Personal: With Blade, something they both acknowledge.
• Lack of Empathy: To the point of thinking that Blade should be grateful to him for ruining his life.
• Mad Scientist: No one who experiments with vampire blood can be up to anything good.
• Manipulative Bastard: Attempted to manipulate Blade and Dracula towards mutual destruction so he could claim the title of Lord of the Vampires.
• Me's a Crowd: What separates Frost from other vampires was his power to create doppelgangers out of his victims.
• Morally Ambiguous Doctorate: He was a chemist in his human life and already a selfish man, willing to use an innocent woman as a guinea pig in order to invent a serum of immortality.
• Near-Villain Victory: Frost successfully creates a monster that absorbs Blade into itself the moment Blade deals it a mortal wound. The Deacon didn't account for Daimon Hellstrom's demonic powers being able to release Blade, however, and waited too long to try again until Blade himself had vampire powers.
• Politically Incorrect Villain: Holds decidedly racist views about black people, insisting that without him Blade would be dead in the ghetto of drug addiction or rotting in jail. One of his doppelgangers even favoured a Confederate Army uniform just to drive the point home.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: Glowing red eyes, like most vampires.
• Related in the Adaptation: In the 90s Spiderman show a character who is a dead ringer for Frost (but never named or identified as such) appears in the flashback of Blade's origins, where it's revealed that the character is the biological father of Blade.
• Smug Snake: While clever and a good planner, Frost was never quite as smart as he thought he was, and he was never really a match for Dracula.
• The Sociopath: Frost was a psychopath before he was vampirized, and the process did nothing to improve him.
• White Hair, Black Heart: He's an evil vampire and his white hair is one of his most notable traits and the main feature used to identify him in Tomb of Dracula.

The Adana

Notable Aliases: Dana Smith, 'Great Mother of the Dark"

First Appearance: Blade #1 (July, 2023)

• Affably Evil: The Adana is a God of Evil hellbent on restarting the world so that all of the Things That Go "Bump" in the Night are free to run rampant as they see fit without "The Light" standing in their way. But because she likes Blade, seeing him as another monster she is here to liberate by virtue of being a Dhampyr, she decides to keep Blade alive just so he can witness what she is about to do and even welcomes him to try and stop her.
• Arch-Enemy: She is, bar none, the most dangerous personal adversary Blade has ever encountered in his entire life. While he greatly despises longtime foes such as Deacon Frost and Dracula, Adana is an existential threat to everything Blade knows and loves, driving him to resort to methods he would normally never consider just to have a fighting chance at ending her.
• Big Bad: Of Blade (2023).
• Eldritch Abomination: Of the Nyarlathotep variety. She's a primordial entity strong enough to casually create her own plane of Hell from scratch and has unleashed horrors that even Doctor Strange is blindsided by, yet she has taken a personal interest in a single Vampire Hunter who she enjoys toying with for her own amusement.
• Humanoid Abomination: Her physical avatar is that of a skinless young woman with Black Eyes of Evil, shrouded in living darkness.
• Knight of Cerebus: Before Adana's debut, Blade primarily fought vampires of varying types and power levels who rarely could pose an actual threat to the notorious Hunter of His Own Kind that is Eric Brooks. That all changes the moment she steps into the picture, as her status as an Ancient God of Evil means that she is WAY out of Eric's league, even while armed with a MacGuffin that could theoretically harm her. She also does the most damage to Blade's morale by terrorizing his loved ones, unleashing untold amounts of death onto the world, and crippling the Daywalker's self-esteem to the point where he bends the knee to Dracula in a desprate bid to gain any insight that can help him stop her.
• Mother of a Thousand Young: Is the progenitor of many of the monsters that lurk within the shadows of the Marvel Universe, and created many more supernatural abominations after getting her hands on Lucifer's sword.
• Primordial Chaos: She predates the creation of the universe and claims to have witnessed the Big Bang first hand.
• Spell My Name with a "The": It's not just Adana, it's The Adana.