The Great Magic: The Gathering Comics Reread!
BACKGROUND
(Note: If you’d like to skip the self-serving part of this entry, kindly scroll down to “PURPOSE.”)
I’ve always been interested in the origin of things, which is probably why I like the act of creating. As a writer, doing the world building for a story is sometimes more fun than writing the actual story itself.
In addition to creating worlds for my own work, I also like challenging myself to remember the origins of my chosen fandoms. When did I first hear a song that started my love affair with a certain band? Who recommended a certain author to me?
I can remember, vaguely, that it was my parents who introduced me to Star Wars (they had gone to the original film’s opening weekend in 1977, after all). And I can recall when we got the Nintendo Entertainment System that opened me to the worlds of Super Mario, Link, Mega Man, Samus Aran, and all the others.
But my introduction to the collectible card game Magic: The Gathering (MTG) is … fuzzy. I remember playing with my sister when we were young (which consisted of us mashing all the cards we had together into two crazy decks that had zero synergy) and I can even pinpoint Ed Grabianowski’s wonderful article on io9 that rekindled my love of the game after a 17-year hiatus.
How I learned about Magic in the first place, though, is a mystery.
I suspect (and this could be a fanciful recreation of my imagination) that the MTG comics had a hand in it.
At about the time that Magic’s Revised Edition came out in 1994, I was 11 years old and very into collecting comic books. This was a hobby my mother encouraged and even helped with. She got me a copy of the Overstreet Comic Book Price Guide, and together we made my first comic inventory on loose leaf paper. (When other parents pearl-clutchingly asked if my mother was concerned that I was reading comics, she would say, “I don’t care what he’s reading as long as he’s reading” — my mom is pretty cool like that.)
My guess is that, at some point between 1994 and 1995, I saw some cool-looking fantasy comics, asked to buy them, saw that they came with a cool-looking fantasy card, and realized there was a whole game built around this lore. I asked for a Fourth Edition starter deck, and the rest is history.
I’m not sure if this is how the scenario actually played out. The time frame is right since my earliest cards were from the Revised set, the majority were from Fourth Edition, and the newest (at the time) were from the Ice Age expansion, which was released in June 1995.
What I can be sure of is that my love for the comics lasted longer than my initial flirtations with the game. I would return to them often for great fantasy stories about mages, elves, and Planeswalkers — the most powerful beings in the MTG universe. Looking back now, I can appreciate how formative those comics were for me and how they impacted some of my earliest writing endeavors.
PURPOSE
As Magic: The Gathering celebrates its 25th anniversary, it’s amazing to see how the game has grown from a niche pastime to a competitive e-sport enjoyed by millions of people the world over. This infographic, prepared by Magic’s publisher Wizards of the Coast, gives you a scope of how far the game has come in two-and-a-half decades.
But it’s not just the game that’s evolved; it’s the in-game lore as well. Now owned by Hasbro, MTG has built a small media empire that includes dozens of novels, comics, art books, and short stories. Most weeks, a new chapter in this ongoing saga is posted on MTG’s website, and whole online communities have grown up on forum boards and social media sites to analyze the smallest minutiae of every tale.
As a result, that original run of MTG comics that I so loved has unfortunately become a bit forgotten over the years.
Between 1995 and 1996, Armada Comics (a division of Acclaim Entertainment) published 35 comics that told the story of the game’s earliest expansion sets. Those books are chock full of lore, though some of the details have been retconned over the years as Wizards of the Coast has exerted closer control over Magic’s storyline. Additionally, the overall Armada series was canceled before the ending could be told, which is particularly unlucky because it robbed readers of the climax.
Nonetheless, there are 35 volumes from which to draw from. My goal with this project is to attempt to reread the series in rough chronological order (story order, not publication order) and offer reflections on each series or one-off.
Many creative people were involved in the creation of the original Magic: The Gathering comic books. As the gaming community celebrates the anniversary of a trailblazing game that has meant so much to so many people, this is my love letter (so to speak) to the talented men and women who may have introduced me to this world.
(Note: If you’d like to skip the self-serving part of this entry, kindly scroll down to “PURPOSE.”)
I’ve always been interested in the origin of things, which is probably why I like the act of creating. As a writer, doing the world building for a story is sometimes more fun than writing the actual story itself.
In addition to creating worlds for my own work, I also like challenging myself to remember the origins of my chosen fandoms. When did I first hear a song that started my love affair with a certain band? Who recommended a certain author to me?
I can remember, vaguely, that it was my parents who introduced me to Star Wars (they had gone to the original film’s opening weekend in 1977, after all). And I can recall when we got the Nintendo Entertainment System that opened me to the worlds of Super Mario, Link, Mega Man, Samus Aran, and all the others.
But my introduction to the collectible card game Magic: The Gathering (MTG) is … fuzzy. I remember playing with my sister when we were young (which consisted of us mashing all the cards we had together into two crazy decks that had zero synergy) and I can even pinpoint Ed Grabianowski’s wonderful article on io9 that rekindled my love of the game after a 17-year hiatus.
How I learned about Magic in the first place, though, is a mystery.
I suspect (and this could be a fanciful recreation of my imagination) that the MTG comics had a hand in it.
At about the time that Magic’s Revised Edition came out in 1994, I was 11 years old and very into collecting comic books. This was a hobby my mother encouraged and even helped with. She got me a copy of the Overstreet Comic Book Price Guide, and together we made my first comic inventory on loose leaf paper. (When other parents pearl-clutchingly asked if my mother was concerned that I was reading comics, she would say, “I don’t care what he’s reading as long as he’s reading” — my mom is pretty cool like that.)
My guess is that, at some point between 1994 and 1995, I saw some cool-looking fantasy comics, asked to buy them, saw that they came with a cool-looking fantasy card, and realized there was a whole game built around this lore. I asked for a Fourth Edition starter deck, and the rest is history.
I’m not sure if this is how the scenario actually played out. The time frame is right since my earliest cards were from the Revised set, the majority were from Fourth Edition, and the newest (at the time) were from the Ice Age expansion, which was released in June 1995.
What I can be sure of is that my love for the comics lasted longer than my initial flirtations with the game. I would return to them often for great fantasy stories about mages, elves, and Planeswalkers — the most powerful beings in the MTG universe. Looking back now, I can appreciate how formative those comics were for me and how they impacted some of my earliest writing endeavors.
PURPOSE
As Magic: The Gathering celebrates its 25th anniversary, it’s amazing to see how the game has grown from a niche pastime to a competitive e-sport enjoyed by millions of people the world over. This infographic, prepared by Magic’s publisher Wizards of the Coast, gives you a scope of how far the game has come in two-and-a-half decades.
But it’s not just the game that’s evolved; it’s the in-game lore as well. Now owned by Hasbro, MTG has built a small media empire that includes dozens of novels, comics, art books, and short stories. Most weeks, a new chapter in this ongoing saga is posted on MTG’s website, and whole online communities have grown up on forum boards and social media sites to analyze the smallest minutiae of every tale.
As a result, that original run of MTG comics that I so loved has unfortunately become a bit forgotten over the years.
Between 1995 and 1996, Armada Comics (a division of Acclaim Entertainment) published 35 comics that told the story of the game’s earliest expansion sets. Those books are chock full of lore, though some of the details have been retconned over the years as Wizards of the Coast has exerted closer control over Magic’s storyline. Additionally, the overall Armada series was canceled before the ending could be told, which is particularly unlucky because it robbed readers of the climax.
Nonetheless, there are 35 volumes from which to draw from. My goal with this project is to attempt to reread the series in rough chronological order (story order, not publication order) and offer reflections on each series or one-off.
Many creative people were involved in the creation of the original Magic: The Gathering comic books. As the gaming community celebrates the anniversary of a trailblazing game that has meant so much to so many people, this is my love letter (so to speak) to the talented men and women who may have introduced me to this world.
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