Bago Book Review – Magic the Gathering IDW Comic Series

<p>Wizards of the Coast have crafted several wonderful games over the years that entertain and enchant players&period; One of their most prominent titles&colon; <em>Magic the Gathering<&sol;em> a trading card game&comma; has branched off into novels&comma; board games and a few comic series&period; The <em>Magic the Gathering<&sol;em> IDW comic series is one that is worth picking up for fans of the game&period; The card series contains hundreds of stories and countless characters who each have their own story&period; In a universe where realms are separated into planes&comma; each with their own distinct culture&comma; environments&comma; histories and races&period; Everyone lives upon their own plane never realizing there are other worlds apart from their own except for a select few&period; They are known as planeswalkers&period; They poses a spark&comma; that once ignited&comma; are able to travel between the planes through the space between the worlds known as aether&period; These planeswalkers each posses their own magical specialties and are able to cast more intense spells than normal wizards&period; Which includes the ability to summon creatures from the aether&period; 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&period; From IDW Comics in 2014&comma; came a short comic series involving a single planeswalker from the vast multiverse found within the <em>MTC<&sol;em> massive story&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;126082" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-126082" style&equals;"width&colon; 419px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;" wp-image-126082" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2017&sol;06&sol;03151147&sol;magic&lowbar;s301&lowbar;cvra11&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"419" height&equals;"636" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-126082" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">Magic the Gathering IDW Comic &sol; IDW<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>Dack Fayden is searching through various planes for the evil sorceress who destroyed his home town and murdered his beloved family&period; Walking between several worlds throughout his journey&comma; Dack becomes a more complicated character that has to face decisions that alter the fates of others&period; 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&period; Dack is pretty much a rogue version of Aladdin&period; He steals artifacts in order to use his psychometry talents to learn as much as he can about his enemy Sifa Grant&period; The use of magic spells to defeat unforeseen enemies is something all Magic players can easily relate to&period; And having a real MTG card come with each new wrapped comic that matches one of the spells in the comic is special&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>As interesting as the comic&&num;8217&semi;s main story is&comma; it&comma; unfortunately&comma; is left unfinished&period; The plot is rather loose and the outcomes of situations result in predictable endings&period; Dack is ALWAYS able to either talk himself out of a problem or escape narrowly with the aid of others&period; He seems to rarely understand the weight of his artifact thieving actions&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The artwork of this is confusing&period; With so many comic artists with wavering styles&comma; the story art is conflicting&period; Dack&&num;8217&semi;s design is altered several times along with the style of the background&period; From one page to the next the changes in the art are a bit jarring&period; Two pages in a comic will have extremely thick outlines while the next page has thin line art&period; The color schemes vary along with the thickness of the lines&period; Occasionally the books will feature dark saturated paint and other pages will be lighter&period; The best artwork&comma; like many comics&comma; is featured on the cover and DOES NOT reflect the style of the books themselves&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;126083" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-126083" style&equals;"width&colon; 395px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"size-full wp-image-126083" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2017&sol;06&sol;03151220&sol;mtg-IDW-Comic-pic-1&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"395" height&equals;"600" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-126083" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">Magic the Gathering IDW Comic &sol; IDW<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>Although this short<em> Magic the Gathering<&sol;em> IDW comic series is heavily flawed&comma; following along with a single <em>MTG<&sol;em> character throughout a visual story is still a special experience&period; The story ends without a sense of finality&period; Readers will still be left wondering if Dack will catch up with Sifa and complete his revenge&period; Flipping through the collection of books&comma; it&&num;8217&semi;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&period; Despite the problems of the comic series&comma; <em>Magic the Gathering<&sol;em> comics is a nice collectible extra for those who also walk the path of a planeswalker&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>If you would like to check out the <em>Magic the Gathering<&sol;em> IDW comic series yourself you can find the individual books through <a href&equals;"http&colon;&sol;&sol;www&period;idwpublishing&period;com&sol;product-category&sol;magic-the-gathering&sol;page&sol;2&sol;"><strong>IDW<&sol;strong><&sol;a>&period; You may be lucky and find a used or possibly new copy at your local comic shop&period; Look forward to my next Bago Book Review coming next month&period; If you want to read a review about a particular fantasy&sol; sci-fi book&comma; comic or manga series leave a suggestion below&excl;<&sol;p>&NewLine;