Tie-ins can be a tricky thing to pull off. Sometimes they interrupt the flow of an ongoing title and sometimes, to be honest, they can feel like they don’t matter. I’m happy to report that Blood Hunt: Marvel Universe is a tie-in collection that enriches the reading experience for Blood Hunt.
First up in this collection is Black Panther. After being turned by Blade in the pages of Blood Hunt, T’Challa is on a mission for his new vampire overlord. Although he’s been sent on a fetch quest to his homeland of Wakanda, the first of the three issues here focuses on how being turned is affecting T’Challa. He’s having to navigate the tricky balance of being Blade’s thrall, trying to find a way to get out from under his influence, and protecting his people from the vampiric plague.
Some narrative highlights in this side story are how Shuri is having to deal with Doctor Doom (and all the pompous pride that comes with him) to help protect her people. Another is that we get into T’Challa’s head about how this plague is affecting him. After being ousted as king, he feels like he has failed to be a protector to Wakanda. I also appreciated tying Blood Hunt to ancient Wakanda and Atlantis – anything exploring those two cultures is always something I can appreciate.
As far as the story goes, Cheryl Lynn Eaton provides an interesting adventure that shines when we get into T’Challa’s head. Although I loved seeing the Orisha pantheon and the history of Wakanda, Atlantis, and vampires, I could have used some more clarity as far as what it all meant to the event, etc. – I just felt a little lost on why Black Panther was doing what he was doing and what it all meant. On art is Farid Karami with Andrew Dalhouse on colors. Karami provides some amazing visuals but the thing that stood out most was the emotion that came through on T’Challa’s face. Dalhouse’s colors gave everything an appropriately ethereal feeling.
‘Strange Academy: Blood Hunt’ variant by Marc Aspinall
Our next tie-in story takes us down to New Orleans where the Strange Academy kids are going on an apt vampire tour. As expected, things quickly get very real for them. Our narrator in the first issue is a new character, Pia, who not only has a ghostly animal protector but a secret as well. In fact, she straight up says she’s lying to the other kids in the narration. The kids are quick to want to help Doctor Strange and travel to Madripoor in search of a piece of The Darkhold (big spooky bad magic book) – what they don’t realize is that helping Strange may put one of their own in danger.
Although I love seeing this cast of characters again, I think the standout for me was getting some POV narration from Germán Aguilar, the resident animage at Strange Academy. He has a history with vampires that we get some hint at but it’s clearly begging to be explored more.
Daniel José Older provides a tie-in tale full of vibrance and earnestness. Although I’m excited for the upcoming ‘Doom Academy’ book, I certainly wouldn’t mind an ongoing revival with Older at the helm. The one thing that tripped me up reading these tie-ins is that the first issue has two backup stories that flesh out the events in the tie-in. They’re not bad in any way, but I wasn’t sure if they could have been integrated more naturally into the story.
Art duties on this section of the book were handled by Luigi Zagaria, Eric Gapstur, and Scott Hanna. Each of them brought their own fun and energetic style to the art that captured the youthful feel this book should have. The colors by Edgar Delgado and Erick Arciniega do an amazing job of balancing the darker scary moment and the brightness of the magic to counteract it.
Cover art by Joshua Cassara and Marte Gracia
Did the other tie-ins have three issues each? Yes. Did the Hulk have only one? Yes, and it’s my favorite of the seven in this book.
I couldn’t be happier that Phillip Kennedy Johnson was the writer for the Hulk tie-in to Blood Hunt. It makes perfect sense as his current ongoing Hulk title is so focused on the monster side of the Marvel universe. Johnson provides a short and effective tale of Bruce coming across an old western town movie set and dealing with a vampire problem all his own. I appreciated that they found a way to give Hulk a tie-in to the event, but I am also curious as to why it wasn’t part of the ongoing run since it’s just another stop on Bruce’s horror tour.
Danny Earls’ art doesn’t skip a beat and clearly understood the assignment coming into this book. Bruce’s transformation into Hulk remains as cringe-inducing and gross as they are in the regular Hulk title. He also got to design some vampires all his own for Hulk to deal with. While I don’t want to describe everything that makes them creepy, I’ll say that they have a real mouth-within-a-mouth situation going on. Colorist Matthew Wilson boosts Earls’ art and does a great job at differentiating the time periods within this story.
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