Thanks to the release of The Suicide Squad, the villain known as Bloodsport has taken
center stage in the DCEU. But just who is this rampaging rascal,
and why is he such a big deal in the world of comics? This is the untold truth of Bloodsport.
"We're all gonna die."
"I hope so."
"Oh, for God's sake."
The original Bloodsport is Robert DuBois, a madman who kills dozens of innocent Metropolis citizens
during a rampage that unfolds in Superman Vol. 2 #4. DuBois commands a seemingly endless arsenal
of high-tech weaponry that he can teleport into his grasp, including a pistol that
fires slivers of Kryptonite. He is portrayed as a perpetually-enraged Vietnam War veteran,
often yelling at his victims that they're wasting the freedom he fought to preserve.
After Bloodsport's initial attack on a restaurant, in which he massacres over two dozen civilians,
Superman gets involved and corners DuBois in a bowling alley. Bloodsport wounds Superman with
a Kryptonite bullet, but thankfully, Jimmy Olsen's timely intervention saves Kal-El
from certain death. In the meantime, the fact that Bloodsport has access to Kryptonite leads
Superman to correctly deduce that DuBois' sponsor is none other than Lex Luthor.
It's Jimmy Olsen who figures out the key to defeating Bloodsport, when his research leads him
to the discovery that the villain never actually served in Vietnam. When his number came up,
he fled to Canada, and his younger brother Mickey went to Vietnam in his place, losing his arms and
legs for his trouble. DuBois' guilt drove him mad and turned him into Bloodsport. Jimmy finds
Mickey and brings him to the battle, where he pleads with Bloodsport to stop his rampage.
Bloodsport collapses in tears at the sight of his brother, and the gunman is sent to a maximum
security psychiatric facility. Of course, that's not the last of Bloodsport — not by a long shot…
Adventures of Superman #507 opens with a heavily armed masked man, who calls himself Bloodsport,
interrupting a mugging in a Metropolis alleyway. As he kills two of the three muggers,
you may believe he's a crime-fighter with less forgiving tactics, similar to Marvel's Punisher.
But when he cuts down the victim of the mugging too, things start to become a little clearer.
This is Alex Trent — a white supremacist dedicated to killing as many people of color as he can.
The story bleeds into Action Comics #694, and over the course of both issues,
the new Bloodsport kills even more innocents than his predecessor — mostly people of color,
though he's also happy to turn his violent attentions to whites he despises for
consorting with other races. With the arrival of the cyborg villain Hi-Tech,
it's revealed that both she and Bloodsport are pawns of the demon Bloodthirst.
Bloodsport is presumed dead following an explosion at the end of Action Comics #694, but the
following year, in Action Comics #702, he returns to continue his racist rampage. Just as Jimmy
Olsen is key to defeating the original Bloodsport, it's another Daily Planet employee — reporter Ron
Troupe — who locates Trent's Achilles' heel. Like DuBois before him, Trent teleports his weapons to
his hands, though his teleporter is implanted in his chest so no one can take it from him. However,
Troupe tracks down Bloodsport's weapons cache and destroys it, leaving nothing for the racist
to fight with. Superman captures Trent, who is subsequently sent to Stryker's Island Prison.
In 1995's Adventures of Superman #526, Robert DuBois falls victim to the most
devastating villain of all: budget cuts. Needing to siphon off some of its patients,
the psychiatric facility where DuBois is being treated has transferred him to Stryker's Island
Prison — the same prison Alex Trent was sent to after his latest series of killings.
DuBois and Trent are destined to collide, and things don't go well for either of them.
Hoping to ease tensions in his prison,
the Stryker's Island warden agrees to a boxing match between the two Bloodsports,
with the proviso that Superman act as referee. The Man of Steel agrees, though he accurately deduces
that allowing the boxing match probably isn't a great idea in the first place.
The match itself doesn't last very long. DuBois easily dominates Trent in its early stages,
after which Trent tackles his opponent to the ground. But when Superman pulls the boxers apart,
Trent reveals a gun. As it turns out, his Aryan Brotherhood allies have managed
to get him a new cache of weapons. A riot quickly erupts, and Superman must struggle
to control the rampaging prisoners while trying to get a hold of DuBois and Trent.
DuBois manages to get Trent's gun from him and even escapes past the walls of the prison,
but he's quickly gunned down and killed by the guards. Trent
survives the riot… but not for long. His Aryan Brotherhood buddies learn that,
at one point during the chaos, Superman had to save Trent from DuBois. Ashamed
that a Black man got the better of Trent, the Brotherhood burns Trent to death in his cell.
The third version of Bloodsport to appear in the comics has so far proven to be the most
mysterious. Unlike the late Robert DuBois and Alex Trent,
he doesn't make any claim about twisted ideals serving as his inspiration,
and like many supervillains, he seems to don his red skullcap mask purely for the money.
During the late 2000s, Bloodsport appears as one of five villains hired to kill the Man of
Steel by the criminal organization Intergang — the others being Riot, Silver Banshee,
Livewire, and Hellgrammite. This story is part of DC's "One Year Later" event,
in which Superman's powers are just beginning to return after a battle with Superboy Prime.
Superman's narration indicates that this Bloodsport's techniques are at
least a little different from those of his predecessors, and suggests that the
teleportation he uses to retrieve his weapons is "extradimensional" in nature.
In spite of his weakened state, Superman is eventually able to defeat the five villains.
This new Bloodsport's name is never revealed, but it's clear he's more of a mercenary than
the villains who previously took the name. He expresses excitement at the money offered
for Superman's life, particularly after some of his comrades have been defeated and he realizes
he could get a bigger piece of the pie. This Bloodsport's given name has yet to be revealed,
and since "One Year Later," most of his appearances have come in the form of cameos.
Bloodsport made his mark on the DC Animated Universe in the mid-2000s,
though in a relatively minor role. In 2005, he made his first appearance on
Justice League Unlimited in season 2's "The Cat and the Canary." The episode revolves around
a meta-brawl run by the entrepreneurial villain Roulette. In this epic showdown,
supervillains and heroes fight for sport — some of them against their will. Here,
Bloodsport is introduced briefly as he's locking horns with the Batman bad guy Electrocutioner.
It isn't clear whether or not Bloodsport survives the events of Justice League Unlimited,
though it seems unlikely. While he's usually only seen in the background, Bloodsport is a
member of the Legion of Doom in the series. But when the Legion of Doom's spaceship is destroyed
by Darkseid in the show's penultimate episode, it isn't revealed whether or not Bloodsport survives.
His death is implied, however, as he isn't one of the villains saved by Star Sapphire and Sinestro.
It's never really made clear exactly who this version of Bloodsport is supposed
to be. His given name isn't revealed, and the unnamed version of Bloodsport had yet
to appear in DC's comics at the time the series was produced. For the time being,
this has to be chalked up as yet another unsolved Bloodsport mystery.
Before Idris Elba took the role in The Suicide Squad, David St. Louis played Robert DuBois in
the season 3 premiere of CW's Supergirl. However, while he shares DuBois' name,
there are significant differences between this Bloodsport and the villain from the source
material. Instead of covering up his draft-dodging like the original Bloodsport, Supergirl's version
does have a military background — which proves invaluable in his job as a terrorist-for-hire.
"Meet Robert DuBois. Goes by the name of Bloodsport,
which is not any sport I've ever heard of."
Bloodsport first locks horns with Supergirl in the cold open of "Girl of Steel," when she
joins the National City Police in pursuit of DuBois and his goons. While he doesn't appear
to have any metahuman abilities, Bloodsport is clearly close to peak human condition,
as he not only survives getting knocked a hundred yards through the air by Supergirl and crashing
onto the roof of a parked car, but he's even able to brush himself off and escape moments later.
It's later revealed that Bloodsport is working for the crooked businessman Morgan Edge. At Edge's
behest, Bloodsport steals some captured alien technology, then uses it to cloak a submarine and
attack the city's waterfront. Inevitably, however, he's quickly defeated by Supergirl and arrested.
Robert DuBois' time in the afterlife comes to an end in 2021's Suicide
Squad #5. The issue opens with a quick recap of DuBois' origin,
though there's no mention of his death in 1995's Adventures of Superman #526.
With all the various reboots and re-workings DC's continuity has undergone since 1995,
it can probably be assumed either that DuBois was resurrected by undisclosed means in the
intervening years, or that his death at Stryker's Island Prison has been erased from history.
Bloodsport's role in the Suicide Squad is more specific than the rest of Task Force X.
Amanda Waller sends him through a number of different dimensions,
gathering intel and recruiting new captives for Waller to use. To help him, Waller arms
DuBois with a new suit and helmet to protect him from the strains of interdimensional travel,
as well as a nearly unlimited arsenal of weapons that he can teleport to himself across dimensions.
While a flashback montage early in Suicide Squad
#5 suggests that Bloodsport has been going it solo for a while,
he probably won't be able to manage on his own for long. The issue finds him in Earth-3,
the home of the Crime Syndicate — a group of super crooks made up of sadistic versions of the
Justice League heroes. By the end of the issue, Bloodsport is captured by Ultraman, Earth-3's
brutish answer to Superman, forcing Waller to send in a new team to bring Bloodsport home.
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