A Blade & Punisher Team

Blade and Punisher's respective missions have a lot in common, and a team-up between the two would bring a bit of bite to the Marvel roster.

One of Marvel's most lethal vigilantes in a trench coat wearing badass who takes no questions and never backs down. He watched his family murdered before his very own eyes and became a master of hundreds of weapons. His mission is to tackle the darkness that thinks it owns the streets. The Punisher fits this bill, but so does Blade, and it's long past time these two behemoths of blood and violence got together to see what punishment they could dish out after the sun goes down.

Superhero team-ups are part and parcel of the superhero game. When paths cross or a hero just isn’t enough for the task at hand, it's a perfect excuse to get two fan favorites on the page together. While some work team-ups work because the heroes in question go together like ninjas and throwing stars, others work because they clash right down to the bone. There is, however, another camp: heroes so similar they can’t help but clash. The vampire hunting Daywalker, Blade, and the crime-killing Punisher are just such a matchup.

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A Blade and Punisher team-up would make for an excellent adventure because of the contrasting and similar elements between the two characters. They both share several surface level and deeper similarities, yet still end up feeling as though they are on totally different ends of a spectrum. For a start, the pair both live in a world outside that of the Marvel mainstream. Blade and the Punisher both occupy the margins of society, the dark places where civilized society fears to tread. Despite this, they both live their lives on the opposite ends of these margins.

While the Punisher and Blade stalk and hunt their prey away from the prying eyes of regular men and women, they both fulfill a very similar role, both within the canon and for the Marvel Comics Universe. From a canon perspective, the two clean up the streets. In this regard, their respective missions line up. In a more literal sense, Blade's pursuit to hunt the spawn of Dracula and the Punisher’s long-standing vendetta against the mob seems even more similar. They hunt down the low level punks who prey upon the public, working their way up the chains with the eventual aim of slaughtering old world European pseudo aristocracies. While the pair act similarly within their universe, they both fulfill a more important role for the Marvel Comics Universe. The pair represents Marvel’s teeth and claws. Blade and the Punisher's mutual presence in the world acts becomes a necessary counterbalance to the uptempo and jovial adventures of the likes of Spider-Man. Bringing them together then would focus this dark presence and give the Marvel Comics Universe a truly raw underbelly for them to sink their teeth into.

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Blade and the Punisher have been windows into the hidden corners of the Marvel Comics Universe for a long time. A team-up would make for a fantastic opportunity to add depth to these corners by exploring the intersection between the two. Given the thematic similarities between the pair’s usual foes, a story that brought the Punisher and Blade together would prosper by doing the same with their villains.

Aging mob bosses seeking ancient vampires for the cure to mortality, street toughs finding out they aren’t the most dangerous thing to stalk the alleyways after dark, and a general investigation into the midnight ecology of gangs and covens is a natural fit for the two heroes. This exploration would capitalize on the synergy of their characters and motives while also breeding conflict with which to start their partnership with a bang.

Depending on when in their respective careers such a team-up takes place, it seems only logical that the Punisher might mistake Blade’s slaying of men and women with no criminal background as crimes. So while a team-up between the two would be the name of the game, fans would certainly get the pleasure of watching the Blade and the Punisher try to take a chunk out of each other first.

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Beyond seeing the Blade and the Punisher split their time between fighting each other and fighting their combined enemies, a team-up has the potential to get the pair out of their comfort zones. The two are no strangers to high concept superhero antics, but watching them take on their buddy’s typical foes would generate some fantastic character building opportunities.

The Punisher hunting vampires while Blade hunts down the mob would give them both a new perspective on evil. For Blade to get to grips with those who commit acts of terror and destruction not because of their supernaturally evil nature, but because of their desire for wealth and power, while the Punisher does the reverse would broaden their horizons and ultimately help them to understand their own missions even better.

It is no secret Blade and the Punisher like to work alone. Of course, both of them have had teammates over the years, but they are usually at their best when they are the lone wolf leading their packs of one. Bringing the two together and forcing Blade and the Punisher to fight towards a common goal would be entertaining and would help shape them into better heroes. For Blade or the Punisher to look into the mirror and see their own dark reflections in each other would give them a new perspective on themselves. Seeing the positives and the negatives of their own approaches could help them develop their tactics for the better. It could even make them more capable of working with others in the future.

For now, Blade and the Punisher remain in their own separate worlds, but one can only hope that the future brings them together. After all, the darkness of the Marvel Comics Universe is never going away, and it will always have need of its punishers, whether they stalk the night or walk in the day. Fortunately, the world has Frank Castle and Eric Brooks watching its back.

Part-time writer and party-time connoisseur, Thomas Panter is an enthusiastic purveyor of cryptic wisdom and comic book knowledge. Between attempts to write the next great epic fantasy novel, he can be found running games, running game, and running classes for writers on the autism spectrum.Find him on wattpad at,