Blood Hunters (Second Run) # 1

 By Mark Rodriguez

Vampire have gathered together all over the world, forming a cult called The Structure. They managed to make all of the Darkforce users in the world explode into portals to the Darkforce Dimension, blocking out the sun. With this happening worldwide, all of the Marvel superheroes have their hands full, and some of them decided to form a team.

The story opens on Broadway and Hewes Street in Brooklyn as a couple decide to check out an old movie theater that is still open. They want to hurry and get there before any film students show up looking for extra credit. Just then a bunch of vampires show up, telling them that they're not going to make it. The couple says they have never done anything to vampires, and don't even read those 'sparkly vampire books'. 

Suddenly the Blood Hunters arrive, composed of Hallow's Eve, Elsa Bloodstone, White Widow and Dagger. Dagger says they're not missing much from those sparkly vampire books, but she does have some sparkle for them, as she wields her energy daggers. The vampires decide to attack them. They really do hate those sparkly vampire books. 

The couple make a run for it, deciding that extra credit isn't worth it. Dagger tells the team to detain the vampires, not to kill them. Elsa says she makes no promises. Hallow's Eve pulls out a Wasp Mask, that gives her the same abilities as The Wasp. She puts it on and shrinks down to Wasp-size, saying she never knows what she'll get from limbo magic. Yelena fights the vampires and says that they're giving her a good workout.

Hallow's Eve is unaware of how the Wasp's powers work, as her hands start to sparkle with electricity. She fires lighting bolts at one of the vampire, but he is able to catch Hallow the way one would catch a bug. Elsa fires a shotgun and the vampire turns to dust. Dagger reminds them not to kill the vampires. Yelena kicks another one of the vampires towards Elsa who prepares to shoot it. Dagger tells them to try harder NOT to kill the vampires as she slices up the vampire's legs and surrounds him with daggers planted on the ground forming a circle. White Widow ties up another vampire, and Hallow, now back to normal size, socks out the last one. 

Elsa pulls out a knife, saying they got them all rounded up for the kill. Dagger stops her and says she's not listening. Elsa says she's not a team player. Dagger says they are a team now and they're here to help people, so they she should fall in line. Dagger uses her powers to turn the vampires back into regular people. At least one of them is angry and says he wanted to be a vampire and it wasn't their choice to make. He walks off angry complaining that now he'll start growing old. The other two, however are overjoyed that they've been restored. One of them even comments they probably wouldn't have been able to stand the taste of blood. 

Dagger says they cleared this block, so they can head towards the waterfront. Hallow asks if Dagger didn't have a friend that could teleport them. Dagger says her friend Cloak is currently laid up due to having the Darkforce energy inside him ripped out to form a portal. As the women walk off, Yelena says she feels that they've missed one. They figure he couldn't have gotten far and run off. The vampire waits until they leave and then runs away.

Elsewhere in Brooklyn, Boodstorm One is arguing with Smoke Eater. Smoke Eater is angry that she has a taste for enhanced blood and there are countless heroes that can make them stronger, but they're all stuck waiting around for his orders. Bloodstorm tells her to watch her tone, since he was created by Dracula himself. Smoke Eater says Bloodstorm aligns himself with whoever he thinks will make him look powerful, like Dracula or Varnae. She says he can't admit that he is just a clone.

Bloodstorm had enough and charges towards Smoke Eater. Cruel and Unusual cheer for Smoke Eater to make him suffer. Megrim agrees with Smoke Eater and says they can walk in the daylight now, so he wonders why the Bloodcoven is still hiding as if they were prey.

Bloodstorm tears a pillar from the building and tries to swing it into Smoke Eater, who turns into smoke and enters his lungs. Bloodstorm coughs and drops to his knees as Smoke Eater attacks him from the inside. Bloodstorm is able to breathe the mass of smoke back out. Smoke Eater rematerializes and Bloodstorm grabs her by the throat. Smoke Eater yields and Bloodstorm drops her on the floor. He asks the others if anyone else refuses to pledge their loyalty to him. A vampire says he will pledge his 'undead-ness' to him. Bloodstorm asks the person to step forward.

The vampire in question is a youngster named Avery, the same one that got away from the previous skirmish with the Blood Hunters. Bloodstorm One tells Smoke Eater to find out his true intentions. Smoke Eater turns into smoke and goes into Avery's nose. She sees something and tells him to tell Bloodstorm. Avery falls to the ground, regaining his breath and tells him that the Blood Hunters are coming and they're out to kill them all.

Elsewhere Miles Morales is swinging through the city. Having been recently turned into a vampire, he's worried about stacking that on top of being a superhero and a college student. Being a vampire isn't exactly something one can just talk about. He wonder if Peter has ever dealt with something like this.

Miles see some people in an alley picking on a kid and trying to take something from him. Miles webs up two of them to the wall and tells the others to just chill like them. It turns out that all of them, including the person they were trying to rob, are vampires. It seems one of them had a bag of blood and the others were trying to rob him.

Miles starts fighting with the vampires. One of them grabs him from behind, but Miles grabs onto him and electrifies him with his Venom Blast. The Blood Hunters aren't that far away as Elsa is eager to find more vampires. Dagger remarks that she just can't wait to kill someone. Elsa says that Dagger and her partner Cloak have killed people before so she shouldn't act high and mighty. One of the vampires is thrown into a car in front of them, which shows them that they found some action. Yelena tells Elsa and Dagger that they can argue among themselves afterwards and leads the team into battle.

As Miles fights the vampires, one of them notes there's something off with him. He says he has seen him fight before but he's different today. Miles jokes that he's been hitting the gym lately. Elsa fires a warning shot and asks Miles if he wants help. Hallow's Eve is surprised to see that there's another Spider-Man in town. Miles says he's always up for a team-up. One of the vampires that was webbed up against the wall breaks free.

Miles and the Blood Hunters start fighting the vampires. Elsa takes aim with her shotgun and tells Miles to get out of the way. The shotgun fires off a scattershot that hits multiple vampires and burns them. One of the bullets hits Miles on the shoulder and it burns him as well. Elsa notes that Miles is a vampire and starts running towards him. She says have Spider-Man with vampire abilities is too much power. 

The rest of the team hold Elsa back and tell her that Spider-Man is one of the good guys. Dagger offers to heal Miles. Dagger sets her palm upon his chest and uses her powers, however Miles doesn't feel any different. Elsa knocks Hallow and Yelena off her and says Dagger had her chance. She yells out that she's doing this for everyone as she open fires upon Miles!!!

My Thoughts-

Pretty good start so far. I would have liked to have seen exactly how this random group of Marvel women got together to form this team, but that might come up in a later issue or it could have been shown in one of the tie-ins. Likewise, while in Blood Hunt # 1 we saw Blade call Miles over, we didn't actually see him bite him, so this was probably shown in a Spider-Man tie-in issue. Another carry-over I see from Blood Hunt # 1 is Smoke Eater continuing to question Bloodstorm's authority.

The team is an interesting one, and of course the one to cause the most friction is Elsa Bloodstone who has a very 'shoot first, ask questions later' and 'the only good vampire is a dead(er) vampire' mentality. The rest of the team wants to help them, especially Dagger who not only seems to lead the team but also has the ability to cure vampires back into humans.

Hallow's Eve is an interesting character, and this is the first time I've seen her in action. It looks like her powers are the ability to conjure up masks at random that will give her abilities related to those masks. This time around she got a mask of the Wasp, which she didn't seem to know anything about. It was funny seeing her charge up for the Wasp's stingers and not know what was going on. I hope to see more examples of her mask powers in other issues.

Yelena, the White Widow was her kick-ass all-business self. I wasn't expecting a reference to whether or not she still lived in Idylhaven to be mentioned in such a busy book, but it would have been nice. I'm surprised she's as willing to help the vampires alongside Dagger since she also loves being an assassin and has a one-track mind when it comes to killing.

There were some good moments here, like Hallow's mishap with the unexpected Wasp powers. I liked the vampire reactions upon turning back human. One of them wanted to be a vampire to avoid aging, while another was happy since they wouldn't have enjoyed the taste of blood. With Miles being a vampire though, I do wonder how he'll handle his new cravings. 

So far it's a fun book and now we have the major issue of Elsa Bloodstone wanting to kill Miles while the rest of her team try to hold her back. As for Miles.. how long can he last before his vampire tendencies become too much to fight off? He's going to need to feed sometime.

Edit and Update- So it turns out there was a 4-issue Blood Hunters mini-series that took place during the Blood Hunt event... and this is a second run where it's now an on-going series. So I would assume in the first run we would see how this team got together. I guess I also spoiled myself with the fact that sometime during Blood Hunt, Miles becomes a vampire and also the fact that the Bloodcoven are still around, even with Smoke Eater still talking smack towards Bloodstorm One. 

I'll see if I can track down the first run.