Blade: Trinity (2004)

Blade is back, and this time he has to deal with something much bigger: the media. When he kills a vampire, the ash leaves no evidence; this is not the case when he kills a human, though, and someone has set him up and videotaped him. He is wanted by the police and FBI; he and Whistler have no choice but to defend themselves from the world. Things take a turn for the worse when Whistler is killed and Blade is apprehended. It looks like Blade is all alone and helpless.....until help arrives!

Two is a company; three is a crowd. But in Blade II Blade already had more than three in his group. Blade finds it very difficult having Abigail Whistler and Hannibal King fighting alongside him. In fact, he denounces them as amateurs, so badly that it sounded like Wesley Snipes was not acting at all but was disparaging the director's decision to have human characters fight alongside Blade, and take up more screen time than him. In fact, Blade's criticism is a real evaluation in this movie.

So a villain is in town: his name is Drake. Yeah, I know, he does not even look like a true villain unless he dons his true form. He is angry that he has been awoken after millennia of dormancy. He finds it pointless to embark on this escapade until his followers fail to subdue Blade. In fact, I have seen him play a part as a lapdog to Danica Talos. Danica shows herself to be fiercer than Drake, vocally and facially. I even wonder why they awoke Drake in the first place. (They believe that through him they can become immortal. Whatever.)

So what has created such a poor reception towards this movie? The fact that Blade has been demoted to a secondary character in his own movie while his sidekicks take up the main roles. Hannibal talks too much and makes inane comments. Abigail gets emotional over any matter at hand. Both of them do not possess special abilities and can prove to be real deadweights. I do not see how Blade can put up with mostly King, as shown in a scene where he crashes in and ignores him chained up to a concrete floor.

I think this movie would have had more momentum if Drake had a motivation for his appearance. As it appears he does not have one; the only reason for his presence is so the Nightstalkers can cultivate his blood and design a special "Daystar" virus to wipe out all the vampires. In fact, looking back to the previous movies I can see the motivations of the primary villains: Deacon Frost wanted to awaken a blood god, La Magra; Jared Nomak wanted to take his revenge on his creators for jettisoning him. Drake, who retreated from this world, could care less for his fallen race.

Unfortunately this movie thought that if Blade II could encompass several other characters and still succeed, than it would do the same and still pass. But as it can be observed, Blade hasn't been pleased with this sequence of events since the death of Whistler. We, too, haven't been impressed by the way they have decided to turn the tables to favor the subordinates in this movie. Less bloodshed, no gore, strong use of the c-word in a 15-rated movie, are just a washout. I think of this movie as passable and inferior.