Meet the vampires who have inhabited the Marvel Universe for years, whether it’s hunting down the innocent to feed on their blood, or defending others
The Marvel Universe not only has heroes, villains, mutants and the occasional mercenary, since in The House of Ideas vampires also play an important role.
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Blade, Morbius, Dracula, are just some of the best-known hematophagous in Marvel, but there are other vampires, who have also been protagonists in the eternal fight of good against evil.
Meet the vampires who have terrified and protected the Marvel Universe.
Blade
Marvel’s most famous vampire slayer, Blade, debuted in Marv Wolfman and Gene Colan’s Tomb of Dracula (1972) #10. During the birth of Eric Brooks in 1929, a vampire bit his mother. Blade was born a half vampire.
After Blade spent years hunting vampires like Dracula, Morbius transformed Blade into the Daywalker, a vampire with no weakness for normal sunlight. After working primarily with monster hunters like the Nightstalkers, Blade became an Avenger in Al Ewing and Greg Land’s Mighty Avengers (2013) #1 and briefly operated as the new Ronin.
Since joining the core team of the Avengers in 2019, Blade has played a pivotal role in keeping Dracula and his resurgent Nation of Vampires in line as the fledgling country’s sheriff. He also took the lead in the Heroes Reborn (2021) crossover event.
Bloodlines
Earlier this year, Blade and Safron Caulder’s daughter Bloodline debuted in Free Comic Book Day 2022: Avengers/X-Men (2022) #1. As that story revealed, Bloodline’s civil name is Brielle, and she lives a seemingly normal life with her mother.
In her first adventure, Brielle protected her friend Jayden from Eturnal, a vampire who lost a video game tournament. Thanks to her quick thinking, fighting skills, and a pair of silver bracelets, Brielle made quick work of the vampire before running home to her worried mother.
Crypt OF Shadows (2022) #1 will see the return of Bloodline in a new story from creators Danny Lore and Karen S. Darboe, before she launches into her own Bloodline: Daughter OF Blade series in February 2023.
dracula
Within the Marvel Universe, Dracula is the most powerful vampire on Earth and is currently the leader of the world’s vampires. Previously, he enjoyed a violent reign as the Transylvanian nobleman Vlad the Impaler; after being injured, he became a vampire and quickly increased his power and status among his kind.
Since making his modern Marvel debut in Gerry Conway and Gene Colan’s Tomb of Dracula (1972) #1, Dracula has faced off against dozens of monster hunters and superheroes.
After the “Vampire War” began in Avengers (2018) #14, Dracula united many of the world’s strongest vampires as the leader of the Vampire Nation. He too has gained new powers thanks to an infusion of Wolverine’s blood.
Victor Strange
Some time after Doctor Strange became Sorcerer Supreme, his brother Victor was fatally injured in a car accident. In his ill-fated efforts to save his brother, Strange inadvertently turned Victor into a vampire with the Vampire Verse.
After making his debut in Roy Thomas and Jackson Guice’s Doctor Strange, Sorcerer Supreme (1988) #10, Victor fell under the yoke of the witch Marie Laveau, taking on the identity of Baron Blood and struggling to contain his bloodlust before impaling himself on a wooden stake.
blood storm
In Chris Claremont and Bill Sienkiewicz’s Uncanny X-Men (1963) #159, Storm was turned into a vampire, but rejected Dracula’s enslavement and returned to normal. However, some variants of Ororo Munroe were not so lucky.
In the alternate reality of Mutant X (1998), Ororo became Bloodstorm, one of the mutant heroes of his chaotic world.
Another Bloodstorm debuted in Cullen Bunn and Giovanni Valletta’s X-Men: Blue (2017) #10. After killing Professor X and the Beast from his world, this Bloodstorm was stranded in the Marvel Universe, where he joined a time-displaced team of the original teenage X-Men. She briefly dated the young Cyclops, only to be killed by the time-traveling Ahab in the Extermination (2018) event.
Morbius
After learning he had a rare blood disease, Dr. Michael Morbius, who debuted in Gerry Conway and Gil Kane’s Amazing Spider-Man (1963) #101, attempted to treat himself with DNA from a vampire bat. However, this treatment gave him a monstrous appearance, superhuman abilities, and a lust for blood.
Although the scientific nature of his origins made Morbius a “living vampire”, he has always struggled to control his bloodlust and restore his humanity.
Outside of the occasional rampage, Morbius has become a frequent ally of heroes like Spider-Man and Blade. He also joined the supernatural antiheroes of the Midnight Sons and the Legion of Monsters, then battled the undead of the Multiversal in Marvel Zombies 3 (2008).
Baron Blood
Baron Blood has threatened Captain America and his allies with his vampire powers for decades. Created by Roy Thomas and Frank Robbins in INVADERS (1975) #7, Lord John Falsworth was turned into a vampire by Dracula shortly before World War I.
Despite his English ancestry, Blood worked as a German agent in both world wars and fought against his brother. James, better known as the hero Union Jack, as well as the Raiders.
After the war, Baron Blood resurfaced to fight Steve Rogers multiple times. He also joined Baron Zemo’s Hydra to fight Sam Wilson’s Captain America.
When Falsworth was out of commission, Victor Strange briefly took up the mantle of Baron Blood and passed it on to Kenneth Crichton, Falsworth’s vampiric descendant.
Xarus
Although Dracula has several sons, his son Xarus has recently become one of his fiercest competitors and closest allies, but this was not always the case. In Death of Dracula (2010) #1 by Victor Gischler and Giuseppe Camuncoli, Xarus debuted as the leader of a vampire uprising that resulted in the death of his father.
After Xarus failed to get the X-Men on his side, the mutants resurrected Dracula, who killed Xarus.
More recently, Xarus reappeared as the heavily armed Shadow Colonel alongside the Unliving Legion. Xarus helped his father fight the Avengers and build the Vampire Nation by eliminating weak vampires during the “Vampire War”.
Jubilee
While many heroes have been temporarily transformed into vampires, few have spent as much time among the undead as X-Men’s Jubilee. During “Curse of the Mutants”, Jubilee was infected by vampire blood and completely transformed by Xarus in X-MEN (2010) #2 by Victor Gischler and Paco Medina.
With technology that allowed her to operate in indirect sunlight, Jubilee spent several years as a vampire, all the while befriending X-23, adopting the child Shogo, and serving on various X-Men teams.
Jubilee’s mutant powers were restored and her vampirism was removed by Quentin Quire’s last phoenix force power in Generation x (2017) #86 by Christina Strain and Amilcar Pinna.
Hannibal King
Although Hannibal King is a vampire, he has been one of Blade’s closest allies in his war against the creatures of the night.
Created by Gene Colan and Marv Wolfman, King is a private investigator who debuted in Tomb Of Dracula (1972) #25. After being bitten by a vampire, King swore never to feed on a living human, relying instead on blood banks and animals.
While fighting Dracula, King eventually met Blade, and the pair formed the Nightstalkers with vampire hunter Frank Drake. With the Nightsalkers and later the Midnight Sons, Hannibal battled supernatural threats while controlling his bloodlust.
After a tense encounter with Blade, Hannibal was finally given a serum that removed his need to consume blood.
spit fire
Jacqueline Falsworth debuted in Roy Thomas and Frank Robbins’s Invaders (1975) #7 as the daughter of the original Union Jack. After being kidnapped and bitten by Baron Blood, she was transformed into a vampire, but became the hero Spitfire thanks to a transfusion of the Human Torch android’s artificial blood.
With a range of abilities including his signature super speed, Spitfire joined the Invaders during World War II.
As Spitfire’s abilities began to decline, another blood transfusion from the Human Torch restored them and aged her dramatically. Beyond joining various incarnations of the Invaders, Spitfire briefly dated Blade when they both served in the British organization MI-13.
Deacon Frost
While searching for the key to immortality, Deacon Frost accidentally injected himself with a vampire’s blood, making him one of the most dangerous vampires in Marvel. As his debut in Marv Wolfman and Gene Colan’s Tomb of Dracula (1972) #13 revealed, he also had the unusual power to create doppelgängers from those he turned.
He bit Blade’s mother and Hannibal King before unsuccessfully trying to usurp Dracula as Lord of the Vampires.
After his apparent demise, Frost resurfaced as an agent of Mephisto and targeted Sam Wilson’s Falcon and Misty Knight before being killed by Redwing, Wilson’s partially vampiric bird.
The Forgiven
After years in the shadows, the vampire heroes of Forgiven are about to take some big steps into the broader Marvel Universe.
Subsisting primarily on animal blood, this team of vampires, under their leader Raizo Kodo, first came together in Fear Itself: Hulk vs. Dracula (2011) #1 by Victor Gischler and Ryan Stegman, where they helped Dracula turn the tide against a Hulk captivated by the Asgardians.
Later, the team briefly took Jubilee in and tried to help her control her bloodlust. Next year, the Forgiven will team up with Spider-Man, the X-Men, and the Avengers to take on a powerful new vampire threat, beginning with Tim Seeley and Sid Kotian’s Spider-Man: Unforgiven (2023) #1.
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Source: Marvel
Morbius The Living Vampire has arrived at SMASH and Marvel Comics Mexico
For years, Nobel Prize-winning biologist Dr. Michael Morbius has struggled to find a cure for his particular case of vampirism.
Now, for the first time in longer than he can remember, his salvation could be very close! However, the path to reclaim humanity is fraught with danger, and something even worse!
SMASH and Marvel Comics Mexico bring you Morbius The Living Vampire: Old Wounds, a volume that compiles the saga by Vita Ayala, as well as the first appearance of the villain in the pages of The Amazing Spider-Man #101
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