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Deacon Frost – cool name.

As a vampire who was ‘turned’, we can say that Deacon Frost is thricely ‘authored’. 

Originally, he was – as with all human beings – the product of his parents’ union and his upbringing. However, upon his being bitten by a vampire, he then became the product of this ‘Sire‘. Then, he willingly enables the vampire god, La Magra, to invade his being, thus becoming authored for the third time.

Frost is an interesting character to study because he breaks with those of his authors who would impose their intent upon his text, and freely chooses to give himself to La Magra. Also, as vampire, he epitomises that transgressive quality that makes the undead so attractive to modern youngsters. Ironically, however, it also Frost who, inadvertently, gives birth to (or authors) the Daywalker, Blade.

Before we deal with this paternal relationship, though, let’s look more closely at Deacon Frost as his own text.

We know nothing of Deacon Frost before he became a vampire. Except his name, of course. Accepting that it is a fictional name, it remains, nonetheless, an interesting choice. Is it an accident that he who is named after the lowest rank of cleric should be so anti-authoritarian? A ‘deacon‘ is called to serve, the word coming from the Greek ‘diakonos‘, meaning servant or helper. Clearly, Deacon Frost sees himself as more than mere servant. Deacon Frost would be god!

There is a whole area of study dedicated to exploring the importance of names and naming. As far as our study of Deacon Frost is concerned, there are two interesting questions: to what extent, if any, the character is influenced by the name and how might the name influece how the character is perceived?

To take the second question first, we might expect the name ‘Deacon Frost’ to indicate a man (there being no female deacons in the Catholic Church) who has given himself in service despite lacking an outward show of emotion; a man, therefore, who, despite his actions and belief, is probably judged harshly by others, who will always be reluctant to go to him in time of need, preferring someone less ‘frosty’.

Does this sound anything like the Deacon Frost of ‘Blade’?

We can certainly say that the character in the film has given himself in service; assuredly not to the House of Erebus, where his allegiance is supposed to lie. The whole of Deacon Frost’s actions, throughout the film, are directed towards one goal – the raising of the vampire god La Magra. This is as it should be for a ‘deacon’ (even if in a somewhat twisted manner), a life of service to god.

And Frost is dedicated.

Despite the hedonistic lifestyle of the New World vampire, partaken of by Frost’s coterie, he is less immersed in wantonness, often preferring time alone to study. Even towards other vampires, the character can seem a little ‘frosty’. 

And this isn’t the only difference between Frost and those who benefit from his break from authority. For Frost hasn’t fully committed to the lifestyle he offers those others. 

There is the scene when Frost kills the policeman who crashes the party to tell of his very recent encounter with the Daywalker. Frost turns to one of the female vampires and they share a “kiss” – more a bit of a lick, really. This contact is more about the blood than sex. Frost, you see, is a man of commitment, not only to his god but, it would seem, also in his relationships.

The young woman bitten while pregnant, whose unborn child is to survive the attack, somehow found her way back to her attacker, becoming his ‘partner’ (in the cohabiting sense). In one scene, Frost, as usual, is engrossed in his study of the scrolls’ translation, when, behind him, a hi-tech coffin opens and a beautiful African-American woman emerges. We’re not permitted to see her face, (though it should be obvious just who she is) but she approaches Frost, touches him lovingly, possessively, on the shoulder while reminding him not to be late. It is an intimate moment between lovers.

Though we don’t know who the biological father of her child is, could it, in this world of half-human/half-vampire and ‘Purebloods’, even have been Deacon Frost? Certainly, he has a double claim on the role of father: in a very real and biological sense, the child is a product of his physical penetration of the mother, and, as the mother’s partner, he is a sort of step-father – if he isn’t the actual sperm donor! 

Either way, as is not unusual, as a man committed to a greater goal, Deacon Frost neglects his duty as father to the child – much as Victor Frankenstein does – leaving the child free to write his own story.

Deacon Frost, then, lives up to his name, manifesting characteristics that might be expected in one influenced by that particular combination of signs.

If he is inscribed by his name, to what extent does he write his own identity?

Frost is bound by his history, having being made vampire there simply aren’t too many choices for him. The nature of the vampire is not human and so he lacks, in large measure, the freedom available to human beings. Only that which is human is capable of real freedom.

Conversely, having the possibility of freedom made unavailable is the greatest of evils. The vampire, and all such creatures of myth and legend, are, by definition, a threat to humanity because they are a form of life incapable of ascending to the higher plain that makes the human a creature in the image of god. Most humans probably don’t make the most of the freedom available to them, but this is due to human weaknesses. The freedom is forever there for them to obtain. 

Not so for the vampire.

Deacon Frost does have choices, however. Any form of commitment is a choice and we have seen how Frost is willing to commit. As a vampire, though, he is dominated by his needs. As such he can never be anything other than what he has been inscribed to be. The first step in any form of recovery is a choice – the decision not to be subject to that which holds sway over one’s life. Frost is aware of this, hence his rebellion against Dragonetti and the House of Erebus. Unfortunately, it’s a rebellion doomed to failure for it’s the wrong choice. If he had learned to commit fully to his role as partner, lover, father – if he hadn’t abandoned the child, becoming through his role as creator rather than erasing himself to become through the destroyer, then he might have witnessed the freedom in others he will never experience himself. This is why we only see him translating a text already written rather than writing his own. Condemned to always being authored, Deacon Frost lacks the freedom to create – to write instead of translate.