It's something of a sendoff that Wolfman gives the character with Blade's vendetta settled against the vampire who killed his mother, he's at a crossroads as to what to do with his life from this point on, and this may well be his last outing as a "vampire slayer."įinally, we arrive at our fifth story in our pentad of selected TOD tales, an issue which is the culmination of Dracula's association with his dark church as well as with his new family-the conclusion of a story plot which has played out for over a year. It's then on to an issue which throws the spotlight solely on Blade-whose surviving friend from his old pack of vampire hunters has asked his help regarding his wife, who's become a victim of a vampire exercising a psychic form of control over her. The simmering dispute that emerges between Dracula and Lupeski is that each of them disagrees on which one of the two should take precedence.įor now, at least, Dracula sees no further need to couch his words or his goals in Lupeski's presence-though in finally putting his cards on the table, he unknowingly creates a rift between himself and Lupeski, as the latter now sees Dracula as a danger to his own supreme position in the church as well as what stands to be gained by having the child as its figurehead.Ī narrow escape for our policeman-but not so for Smith, who by the end of the story has finally crossed paths with Dracula and fearfully realizes, for reasons he doesn't understand, that his days of perpetual existence are numbered. In time, a ritual of mysticism was invoked to implant a child of the two within Domini, a child which has now been born and is the heir apparent of either Dracula or of the church. To bring you up to speed, Dracula has become involved with a cult of Satanists brought together by Lupeski and has used them to establish a "dark church" for his own ends, while also becoming involved with a woman named Domini who had fallen into the church's fold and who eventually became his bride. You'll see Dracula basking in the role of proud (if still arrogant) father and husband, certainly a new approach for such a sadistic and evil character there's also the change of pace of the humorous adaptations that Harold makes to past TOD stories for the sake of his (hopefully) best-seller and then we have the tale of the "Forever Man," reincarnated from centuries past until fated to meet "the dead man" (and guess who that is?) followed by Blade, the so-called vampire-slayer, who encounters an old friend whose wife has been victimized by a symbiotic vampire, which, during the day, leaves her as one of the undead while he sleeps.Īnd finally, you'll come to the deadly endgame by cult leader Anton Lupeski, which brings tragedy in its wake and serves as another turning point for Dracula. By this point Tomb of Dracula had developed a successful formula of keeping the vampire lord interesting by not only shifting his plans periodically, but also by supplementing his ongoing story with the mystery and suspense brought by his involvement with other characters who had in some way crossed his path, and you'll find these issues offer excellent examples. Harold, based on the author's many entanglements with Dracula. In these issues you'll find a mixture of tales that are in one way or another joined by the thread of Dracula's involvement with his "dark church"-with the exception perhaps being the exaggerated events of the "novel" written by the bumbling Harold H. This post will hopefully provide you with a good idea of what these issues have to offer-but you'll be well served in gathering them in one sitting and reading them in their entirety, as, together, they make for an excellent page-turner. The talents of writer Marv Wolfman and artists Gene Colan and Tom Palmer are arguably at their peak during this time, as Dracula's affairs in the States move closer toward his goals and the book's influx of new characters are put to good use.
BOOKSHELF 2 COMIC TALLAHASSEE SERIES
Following the night of violence which led up to the birth of Dracula's child, there were five issues of The Tomb of Dracula published in 1977 that served as an interlude to the denouement of that event-stories which could easily be bound into one TPB and placed on your bookshelf, to be reached for on a snowy night when you're in the mood for sinking into your favorite chair and reading some of the most entertaining and diverse tales that this series had to offer.
0 kommentar(er)
