Issue(s): Midnight Sons Unlimited #2
Cover Date: Jul 93

Morbius
Title: "Bloodbath"
Credits:
Mort Todd - Writer
Rurik Tyler - Penciler
Malcom Jones III - Inker

Darkhold
Title: "Skin"
Credits:
Chris Cooper - Writer
Dan Lawlis - Penciler
Mike Esposito - Inker

Blade
Title: "The lure"
Credits:
Gary Cohn - Writer
Kevin Kobasic - Penciler
Brian Garvey - Inker

Ghost Rider
Title: "The organ grinder"
Credits:
Mort Todd - Writer
Bart Sears - Penciler
Jimmy Palmiotti - Inker

James Felder - Assistant Editor
Bobbie Chase - Editor

Review/plot:
For the most part, the first wave of Unlimited books have managed to demonstrate a reason to exist. The first few X-Men books all featured events of some importance, and the Spider-Man issues bookended Maximum Carnage. The Fantastic Four books were all one off stories (with, ah, some unusual art) but at least felt like the equivalent of an annual on an off-year. By contrast, the Midnight Sons stories are basically Marvel Comics Presents fodder. I guess this is kind of by necessity, since unlike the other books there are multiple sets of characters to contend with. Marvel could have used the book for team-ups, but there's already a glut of team-ups and crossovers in the Midnight Sons corner this year. But that also defeats what would otherwise seem to be the main value of the book: exposing readers that were picking this up for Ghost Rider to see some of the other characters. There was already plenty of opportunity for that.

And, actually, next issue will be a single team-up story, and the one following that is a tie-in with a crossover. And after that the book starts doing one-off stories that seem to make more sense, with a combination of team-ups and features of characters that didn't already have books. So this is the last issue that i'll have to endure where it's just a bunch of random stories, only one of which is written by the characters' regular writer (Darkhold).

Actually, some of the credits are the most interesting part of this issue. Two of the stories are written by Mort Todd, former editor-in-chief of Cracked magazine. And his second story also has the debut of artist Bart Sears in my project. It's also worth noting the appearance of verteran inker Mike Esposito, who stopped inking regularly for Marvel in 1990 (he did do 1992's Spider-Man: Fear Itself, and he had been working at Archie).

The Morbius story has him pursued by some reporters that think that he's responsible for a series of subway vampire killings. The killings actually turn out to be thanks to the work of a former Soviet scientist, Dr. Emil Kovax, who had been trying to cure a Latverian-Transylvanian patient who had a blood disorder similar to vampirism. Kovax fell in love with his patient and they had a baby, Mordechai, who was even more of a vampire.

Despite Kovax's efforts, Mordechai grew up into a monster.

Mordechai wasn't amulatory until his dumb father built him an exoskeleton.

So now guess who's running around killing people?

Oh, not just an exoskeleton, by the way. An indestructible exoskeleton. Thanks dad!

Morbius manages to break the suit's helmet using one of Mordechai's - actually, when he's in the suit he's called Bloodbath - wrist spike. Then, rather than answer all the reporter's annoying questions, he brainwashes her into thinking that he's an angel.

Ok, well that was at least amusing, and Bloodbath had a cool design.

The Darkhold story uses police brutality as a theme.

But it turns out that one of the cops has read a Darkhold page, and so things get weird.

"But I never asked for any bugs".

It turns out that the cop has been "tenderizing" a lot of victims.

At first it seemed like the bugs were only bothering the cop, and i was like fuck this guy, no need to call in the Darkhold Redeemers. Let him suffer. But then it turns out that the prostitute that the cop was forcing to sleep with him can see the bugs, so he murders her.

But he does get his comeuppance. He gets into a car accident, and that activates a (queen) bug inside him. But it can't get out because his skin needs to be tenderized. So he's left begging a crowd to beat him. They refuse.

Ok, the "can't get past the skin" line is a bit much, but this was a good Twilight Zone-y story, exactly the sort of thing the Darkhold book should be doing when it's not wrapped up in crossovers.

The next story is a Blade solo story, so i guess that's a little different than it just being a Nightstalkers story. He fights some demons that are bothering Caribbean immigrants.

A woman that he rescues claims to be a slave to a Voodoo Wizard who has also enslaved her brother. Her brother turns out to be a demon, and this all turns out to be a set-up arranged by DOA (the Hydra occult group), who hired the Wizard to kill Blade.

Blade kills the Wizard and both siblings.

The Ghost Rider story follows up on a minor thread from the Spirits of Vengeance story in issue #1. At the beginning of that story, Ghost Rider gave the penance stare to a man that attacked a woman. In this story, that guy, Johnny Farmer, is approached by the Darkhold Dwarf.

The Darkhold page he is given turns him into a monster that rips out people's body parts to heal himself.

Too bad Terror was cancelled; they seem to have a lot in common. Although unlike Terror, the "Harvester" keeps a steady supply of living donors on hand.

Ghost Rider defeats Harvester by penance stare-ing him again. I agree with this bit at the end, where Ghost Rider notes that the Darkhold has has free rein for too long.

You'd think Ghost Rider and the other Midnight Sons would make finding the Darkhold pages an immediate priority instead of just leaving it to a bunch of humans who don't seem to be making a lot of progress.

Ok, let me reassess my contention that these stories are pointless. Just a bit. I think the Darkhold story is actually good and i would have liked to see more such stories in the regular Darkhold series. The other stories are definitely filler, but i think Bloodbath was a fun character. And i at least liked that the Blade story tried to very loosely tie in to the main Nightstalker's series by saying that the plot was orchestrated by DOA. Similar situation with the Ghost Rider story; i like him running into the occasional Darkhold page threat (i also want to give a small amount of credit for "tying in" to the first issue's story even though it's pretty random). I mean i'm still landing on them being mostly pointless and at best better placed in the appropriate regular series. But they aren't too awful.

Quality Rating: C+

Historical Significance Rating: 1

Chronological Placement Considerations: All context free (although it takes place after Jinx begins associating with the Darkhold Redeemers), and Blade being solo is especially helpful considering his being on the outs with the Nightstalkers around this time (but i've placed this before that begins).

References: N/A

Crossover: N/A

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: N/A