Marvel Action: Chillers by Jeremy Whitley, Bill Underwood, et al. / The Death of Doctor Strange: Bloodstone by Tini Howard and Ig Guara

from Marvel Action: Chillers #2
(art by Bill Underwood)

I cap off my run of Elsa Bloodstone comics with two one-off stories that are part of larger events, but read pretty much fine on their own. First, Marvel Action: Chillers #2 has a frame story about Riri Williams (I think she is the girl Iron Man?) and Doctor Strange investigating... something, I already forget. What really matters is that they come across evidence of a magical battle between Elsa Bloodstone and werewolves—one of whom is Captain America! The bulk of the story is a flashback to that battle.

In this story, Elsa is a teenage monster hunter, not the full-grown woman we've seen elsewhere, but otherwise she's recognizably the same character, perhaps a bit less over-the-top violent than she was in, say, Nextwave (see entry #3 below). (It would be hard not to be, admittedly.) She's a bit of an eager beaver, keen to team up with Captain America. Overall, it's a pretty simple story: she fights Captain America, figures out what's wrong with him, the two work together to defeat the werewolves, the end. But once you subtract the frame, there are only about fifteen pages to work with, so how complicated can it get? 

I know Jeremy Whitley's writing from IDW's My Little Pony comics, which is generally solid, and Bill Underwood is new-to-me as an artist but someone I'd like to see more of. Fun enough, and does exactly what it says on the tin, as Elsa might say. Had anyone putting together the Bloodstone & the Legion of Monsters trade (see #1 below) thought about updating its contents for its 2022 rerelease, it would have fit well in there, sans frame.

from The Death of Doctor Strange: Bloodstone #1

So too would have The Death of Doctor Strange: Bloodstone #1. Part of the problem with reading through Elsa Bloodstone comics is that many significant things have happened to the character in comics where she is not the main character. Sure, I was happy to read Nextwave, where she's part of an ensemble cast, or Monsters Unleashed! (see #5 below), where she was a secondary lead for part of the run. But if you look at her entry on the Marvel Chronology Project, you will see that she pops up all over the place: four issues of Wolverine vol. 2, then four issues of Fearless Defenders, two issues of Avengers World, three issues of A-Force, three issues of Doctor Strange: Damnation, two issues of Ben Reilly: Scarlet Spider, and so on. Did I really want to pick up a bunch of storylines where Elsa was a mere side character? I decided no. But this does mean that things get imparted about her that I didn't get to read. Most significantly... she got a brother? Her mom was pregnant at the end of the original Bloodstone miniseries (see #2 below), but Cullen Bloodstone is a fully grown man, part monster, so not the same guy. Actually, digging into the MCP further, he mostly appears in Avengers Arena and Avengers Undercover, but not actually very many stories that also feature Elsa! So even if I had read all of those stories, Cullen still might have been a surprise to me.

Anyway, this story has Elsa and Cullen living together in Bloodstone Manor, which in this story seems to be outside London, not in Boston, on a night where monsters are running amok because Doctor Strange is dead, negating many of the spells he used to keep the monsters tied up. What Elsa and Cullen soon discover is that they are not the only Bloodstone children, there's also Lyra, a child Ulysses had ten thousand years ago, before he became immortal, and she's been in suspended animation since. The three siblings must learn to work together and tame their own demons, literal and metaphorical. (Cullen turns into a deadly monster when he's not careful.)

from The Death of Doctor Strange: Bloodstone #1

The result here is a very solid piece of comics from writer Tini Howard and artist Ig Guara, both creators whose work (on Death's Head and The Omega Men respectively) I have enjoyed in the past. Howard, in particular, knows how to balance the inherent goofiness of superhero-adjacent comics with strong character work. I hope to keep reading more by her. Guara does some good action (and this story has a lot of that) and also is strong enough with faces to carry the conversations in the art. I feel reasonably certain that like most event comics, The Death of Doctor Strange was probably pointless (I am sure he got better), but also like many event comics, some of the tie-ins are interesting enough on their own. I wonder if any future writers will do anything with the set-up this story ends with, because it's a good one for Elsa and her weird family.

"Little Red Fighting Hood" originally appeared in issue #2 of Marvel Action: Chillers (Oct. 2020). The story was written by Jeremy Whitley, illustrated by Gretel Lusky and Bill Underwood, colored by Nahael Ruiz and Heather Breckel, lettered by Valeria Lopez, and edited by Elizabeth Brei. 

The Death of Doctor Strange: Bloodstone was originally published in one issue (Mar. 2022). The story was written by Tini Howard, illustrated by Ig Guara, colored by Dijjo Lima, lettered by Joe Caramagna, and edited by Tom Groneman. It was reprinted in The Death of Doctor Strange Companion (2022).

This is the penultimate post in a series about Elsa Bloodstone. The next installment covers Elsa Bloodstone: Bequest. Previous installments are listed below:

1. Bloodstone & the Legion of Monsters (1975-2012)
2. Bloodstone (2001-06) 
3. Nextwave, Agents of H.A.T.E. (2006-07)
4. Marvel Zombies: Battleworld (2006-15)
5. Monsters Unleashed! (2017-18)