Constantine just showed he would rather have an evil blood-sucking vampire as a friend than save the world but he has a good reason.
WARNING: The following contains spoilers for DC vs. Vampires #4 by James Tynion IV, Matthew Rosenberg, Otto Schmidt, and Tom Napolitano, on sale now from DC Comics.
John Constantine has always been a morally complicated character. Nevertheless, he is still a hero and a part of the Justice League Dark. Therefore, he’s one of the world’s best defenses against mystical and occult threats. Unfortunately, in DC’s darkest reality, he’s inadvertently taken the side of the villains, and all in the name of friendship.
Constantine was approached by Zatanna in a bar in DC vs. Vampires #4. The magician was previously revealed to have been turned into a vampire and on the hunt for new recruits in the upcoming human-vampire war. When she tried to turn Constantine in this issue, he saw through her ruse and restrained her with his magic. Rather than staking her through the heart like the rest of DC’s heroes are doing, however, he freed her and decided to have a nice chat instead.
With humanity’s future on the line, why would Constantine side with the evil vampire Zatanna? He’ll have to pick a side soon and as a part of Justice League Dark he will be asked to side with humanity and kill the vampires, friends like Zatanna included. John Constantine has always been a nuanced character but his reason for choosing not to go for the killing blow right here was simple. He has very few friends and even fewer people willing to listen to him.
Essentially, friendship means more to Constantine than the end of the world. But why is that? Perhaps because he has one of the worst track records when it comes to friends. He’s often betraying them, manipulating them, or even sending them to their untimely deaths. This was particularly true of his oldest and closest friend, Francis “Chas” Chandler. In the story “All His Engines” by Mike Carey and Leonardo Manco, the Hellblazer got Chas’s grandaughter captured by a demon and then possessed by an ancient Aztec god, all because he didn’t want to serve the demon. He threatened to kill the girl if the god didn’t leave her body. Knowing Constantine, he would have done it too. Chas never forgave him for it. In his more recent Hellblazer adventures, John sent his oldest friend to his death, purely to buy time. It didn’t work in the end, meaning that he sacrificed one of his only friends for nothing.
Constantine has always been very comfortable with demons and the occult, so it isn’t too surprising that he’s ok with Zatanna’s new insidious lifestyle. In fact, with everything he’s done to his friends in the past, he probably thinks it’s better that she’s a blood-sucking monster. If she’s as bad as he is, then she’ll have less reason to leave him in the end. He may be horrible sometimes, but it’s still sad to think that this is the only way Constantine can find companionship in this world.
It was all soon brought to an end by Dr. Fate, who killed the vampire Zatanna. Constantine was visibly upset by it too. Much more upset than he was when he found out that his friend was evil and undead. He may have restrained Zatanna when she tried to attack Fate but he didn’t like it when Fate attacked back either. When Fate argued that the fate of the world was on the line, John snapped back “When isn’t it?” World-ending crises are a dime a dozen to him, but friends are far rarer. It may doom the world, but he may be right to hold onto friends wherever he can find them. Even if they’re irredeemable monsters.
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