Bago Book Review – Magic the Gathering IDW Comic Series

Wizards of the Coast have crafted several wonderful games over the years that entertain and enchant players. One of their most prominent titles: Magic the Gathering a trading card game, has branched off into novels, board games and a few comic series. The Magic the Gathering IDW comic series is one that is worth picking up for fans of the game. The card series contains hundreds of stories and countless characters who each have their own story. In a universe where realms are separated into planes, each with their own distinct culture, environments, histories and races. Everyone lives upon their own plane never realizing there are other worlds apart from their own except for a select few. They are known as planeswalkers. They poses a spark, that once ignited, are able to travel between the planes through the space between the worlds known as aether. These planeswalkers each posses their own magical specialties and are able to cast more intense spells than normal wizards. Which includes the ability to summon creatures from the aether. Several novels and articles have been formally written by Wizards of the Coast and their partners to help further immerse their audience into the multiverse. From IDW Comics in 2014, came a short comic series involving a single planeswalker from the vast multiverse found within the MTC massive story.

Dack Fayden is searching through various planes for the evil sorceress who destroyed his home town and murdered his beloved family. Walking between several worlds throughout his journey, Dack becomes a more complicated character that has to face decisions that alter the fates of others. More familiar planeswalkers meet up with Dack such as Jace and Sorin who remind him of the planeswalker power and the consequences that may arise from their actions. Dack is pretty much a rogue version of Aladdin. He steals artifacts in order to use his psychometry talents to learn as much as he can about his enemy Sifa Grant. The use of magic spells to defeat unforeseen enemies is something all Magic players can easily relate to. And having a real MTG card come with each new wrapped comic that matches one of the spells in the comic is special.

As interesting as the comic’s main story is, it, unfortunately, is left unfinished. The plot is rather loose and the outcomes of situations result in predictable endings. Dack is ALWAYS able to either talk himself out of a problem or escape narrowly with the aid of others. He seems to rarely understand the weight of his artifact thieving actions.

The artwork of this is confusing. With so many comic artists with wavering styles, the story art is conflicting. Dack’s design is altered several times along with the style of the background. From one page to the next the changes in the art are a bit jarring. Two pages in a comic will have extremely thick outlines while the next page has thin line art. The color schemes vary along with the thickness of the lines. Occasionally the books will feature dark saturated paint and other pages will be lighter. The best artwork, like many comics, is featured on the cover and DOES NOT reflect the style of the books themselves.

Although this short Magic the Gathering IDW comic series is heavily flawed, following along with a single MTG character throughout a visual story is still a special experience. The story ends without a sense of finality. Readers will still be left wondering if Dack will catch up with Sifa and complete his revenge. Flipping through the collection of books, it’s hard to think of why IDW and Wizards of the Coast did not at least have one last book to at  wrap up the plot. Despite the problems of the comic series, Magic the Gathering comics is a nice collectible extra for those who also walk the path of a planeswalker.

If you would like to check out the Magic the Gathering IDW comic series yourself you can find the individual books through IDW. You may be lucky and find a used or possibly new copy at your local comic shop. Look forward to my next Bago Book Review coming next month. If you want to read a review about a particular fantasy/ sci-fi book, comic or manga series leave a suggestion below!