I don't always buy multiple covers of the same comic books. There are some variants I really liked so I picked up over the years. But I actually tried collecting all the covers of the Dreamwave books. Since their fall you can get just about any of them for cover price or less, so it is not too daunting a task. Though finding them at stores and such is actually somewhat rare I've found. Even in online shops they aren't always abundant.
The Warlands story starts strong in this issue. Almost immediately into the action but also a good opening page to build up some lore.
Really love that page. So much going on visually. The story is basically what I explained in the preview. Malagen and the vampires from Datara attacked the Eastern Kingdoms. Elves, Dwarves, and Humans were almost wiped out but Malagen retreated when he heard about the Darklyte Armor and the prophecy of his demise.
It has now been centuries. Most of the Eastern Kingdoms have moved on and rebuilt. But there are rumors of another attack from the Datarans.
The story begins centered around an outpost led by Captain Pendar. One of our main characters is introduced here, Jerell. They notice what looks like some small boats coming for them. They sent out a single soldier on a boat to warn them to turn around because they think it is just fishing boats.
That soldier is killed with an arrow and the boats continue on. After they hadn't heard back and the boats kept coming the Captain realizes it is not a boat at all. It is a dragon and he orders everyone to the wall. The fort is quickly overtaken however. Verdemis and Aalok, along with Verdemis' dragon make short work of the soldiers.
Jerell, a few other soldiers, as well as a mage named Delezar, a seer named Zeph, and an Elf named Elessa are trying desperately to get out of the fort so they can live but also deliver a message to the King.
The other soldiers perish in the chaos which leaves our party of 4 to escape. Aalok, somewhat merciless toward even his own soldiers, discovers a book protected by magic. Not a lot is shown after that. But it seems pretty important.
In the Dataran capital, Mortara, Malagen is also gathering the clans. Figuring out who is loyal and not. Only one, Korzeth, seems to potentially not be on his side in the coming war. But Malagen is not concerned with him yet.
The first issue is pretty exciting. We get some great action. A lot of character introductions. A story backdrop as well as some world building. The bad guys are really bad, the good guys are interesting and flawed with an uphill battle ahead of them. Really well done in my opinion.
I really love the art style as well. Pat and co. really pioneered a good mixture of classic comic style and eastern anime/manga style. Back then, comics were not so much digital art as they are now. Colors especially were being added in new ways all the time. The style, detail and colors in Dreamwave's books were really kind of innovative.
I am obviously somewhat bias because I love these books, so I'm going to also point out some of the criticism people levy at this title, to be fair. It gets compared to Record of Lodoss War a lot. I also loved Record of Lodoss War though. Delezar is obviously very similar to Slayn. Aalok is also quite similar to Ashram. Aalok's progression, which we'll see more of later, is also similar to the third story arc of the manga/anime for Ashram. Most of the other comparisons get weaker and weaker. Elessa for example is barely similar, if at all, to Deedlit, in my opinion. The overall story also is quite a bit different, other than the mentioned plot point with Aalok above.
I think this may be an issue with Fantasy in general. Probably also why Fantasy does not seem to work well in comic books. So many people are just like... seen one elf, seen them all, amiright? 😅 Nevermind that beyond the standard tropes the characters act differently and do different things.
On that note, I think I'll wrap this up. See you in Issue #2!
To Be Continued!