Cover to Blade #4
© Marvel

Mania Grade: B
Issue: 4
Authors: Marc Guggenheim, Howard Chaykin, Edgar Delgado
Publisher: Marvel
Price: $2.99

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"Blade: #4"

Marvel gives us another bleak, single-issue Christmas romp.  This time, Blade fights a department store Santa Claus possessed by a body-jumping demon that won’t stay put long enough for Blade to kill him.  In the course of their fisticuffs, the demon possesses a little girl -- a nod to an old Blade story from the 1970s -- and drives a security guard to kill himself before returning to Santa.  Yes, this issue has Christmas cheer aplenty.  Marc Guggenheim also presents the usual parallel flashback, showing the younger Blade’s foray into a vampire crime family and his subsequent conflict with the gang’s leader.  And, though this issue stands on its own, Guggenheim opens with a brief scene suggesting an emerging, broader story.  As much as I like the single-issue, accessibly quality of this series, I’d like to see a long-form narrative emerge at some point.   

Besides the exceptionally dark tone of this book -- or perhaps because of it -- this issue of Blade continues the book’s steady upswing in quality.  The first couple of issues sputtered, but the last couple have managed to entertain and impress.  Granted, a battle to the death between Blade and Santa Claus hardly makes a bold statement about the commerciality of Christmas or whatever, but it’s entertaining enough.  The gradual revelation of the character’s past also adds some historical resonance that would otherwise be absent from the series. 

Though I think Chaykin’s art still suffers a bit, his depiction of an older, slightly fatter Blade imbues the character with a warmth absent from some depictions.  The character often feels like a one-note, vampire-killing machine and the “fat Blade” that so many letters in the back of the issue complain about lends a rarely seen humanity.  Still, Chaykin’s art relies heavily on computer touch-ups and still retains a rough, unpolished look to it.  I don’t know what the problem is, but I know he’s done better. 

I found this issue entertaining enough.  Given the exceptionally bleak ending, it simply reminds the reader that true evil knows no holidays.