In the first Blade film it is revealed that Whistler lost his wife and two daughters to an attack by a vampire who had arrived at their home posing as a drifter. Whistler was beaten and tortured, being forced to choose which one of his family died first. These events shaped his hatred of vampires and his mission to destroy as many as he could. Whistler is a weapons expert and master of several martial arts, having a part in creating many of Blade's
Animated Whistler in Blade
weapons. When he discovered a thirteen-year-old Blade on the streets preying on the homeless, he took him under his wing. Realizing that he was half human and lacked a vampire's normal weaknesses with the exception of their thirst, he developed a serum to suppress Blade's vampiric lust for blood. Deacon Frost, an ambitious vampire whom Whistler and Blade had been tracking, located their base and attacked Whistler, ordering him to be infected with vampirism. After informing Blade of Frost's plan to resurrect an ancient vampire god, Whistler then seemingly commits suicide, considering death a better fate than becoming a vampire. However his death is not seen on camera, only the sound of a gun firing is heard.
Blade II
It is revealed in the second Blade film that Whistler 'survived' his suicide attempt, to be kidnapped by another gang of vampires and taken to the Czech Republic. During his time with them, he was repeatedly tortured to the point of 'death', allowed to heal vampirically, and then tortured again. Killing all but one of the vampires responsible for his imprisonment, Blade frees him from suspended animation, taking him to Prague and injecting him with the "cure".
Blade, Whistler, and Scud are summoned by the Shadow Council, ruled by overlord Eli Damaskinos to eradicate the reaper threat. Reinhardt and Chupa (played by Matt Schulze), a friend of Priest who now wishes to kill Whistler to even the score with Blade, corner Whistler, and Chupa proceeds to savagely beat Whistler. Reinhardt leaves the two. Whistler, to save himself, releases the reaper pheromones into the air. As Chupa nearly beats Whistler to a pulp and is about to finish him off with a gun, reapers swarm the sewers and feed on Chupa, allowing Whistler to slip away.
Blade: Trinity
In the third Blade film, Blade is framed for the murder of several humans (who were in fact familiars who willingly volunteered to being used as bait). Blade, now in the public eye and wanted by the FBI, is hunted down. In a raid on their new hideout, Whistler sets the self-destruct mechanism and seemingly dies in an explosion. He is not seen or heard of afterwards (although Drake took the form of Whistler when he attacked the Nightstalkers).
Whistler fathered a daughter out of wedlock or before marriage. This daughter, Abigail Whistler, eventually tracked down her natural father and asked to be trained as a vampire hunter. Whistler trained her, although he trained her separately from Blade who was totally unaware that Whistler had any protégés other than himself. Whistler also set Abigail up as the leader of one of the many Nightstalker units he had secretly founded. It is assumed that these units were set up because one man (or half-vampire) is not enough to destroy an entire species. Also, since Blade is not immortal (he will eventually die from old age if he is not killed in action first), Whistler did not want the war to die with him.
Blade: The Series
In Blade: The Series, which takes place after Blade: Trinity, the writers go deeper into Whistler's background. In the episode "Sacrifice", we learn that Whistler got his trademark limp from a young Blade, who escaped his father's house and broke Whistler's leg in an attempt to get away from him. Blade's father called Whistler in at the urging of a helpful policeman, and Whistler tested him to learn that he was not a regular vampire. He asked Blade's father to give him the boy to use as a weapon against vampires, but Blade ran away before a decision was made. After Blade joined and turned a street gang called the "Bad Bloods", Whistler found him and ashed several members of the gang before taking Blade under his wing.