Customer Reviews

World of Warcraft Vol. 2 HC

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Having enjoyed the first WoW comic relatively well, I was looking forward to this new collection coming out in HC format. Having read the comic now, I'm not really sure it was worth the wait.

The book itself is about 170 pages in length, and it definitely suffers from the lack of pages. Much of the action is muddled (a complaint echoed in the first book as well) and it feels like the plot and script is just an annoyance getting in the way of the artists wanting to draw really high action scenes.

The main storyline still revolves around Varian Wrynn - whom we met as Lo'Gosh in book one - attempting to reclaim the throne of Stormwind. However, there is an usurper who looks just like him already in Stormwind. There's some sort of mish-mash with Defias and Dark Iron Dwarves mixed in, but when you boil it down, this is the story that's supposed to go along with the Onyxia raid. There's also a half-hearted attempt to keep a side story running with Broll Bearmantle and Valeera Sanguinar (Valeera essentially plays the roll of a drug addict, and Broll her "AA Sponsor" trying to keep her clean) but it's only mentioned when convenient and used as a plot device rather than an actual storyline.

The art is still very clean, but it feels like a step down from Book One. The pencils and inks feel a lot looser and less detailed, the lines much thicker, and much of the slack is left to be picked up by the colorist (to be fair, the coloring is gorgeous). Also, as mentioned above, the layout is very poorly done - you'll often be looking at a scene that is the middle of a giant battle, some critical event happens that the characters are all yelling about, and you'll do a double/triple-take on the previous panels and still have no idea what supposedly happened.

Book 2 is worth getting if you're simply looking to finish up the story left in Book 1, but on its own neither the art nor the story is really worth the $20 cover price.

My son has been a WOW fan and player for several years. Now that he has read the books he loves it even more. He repeatedly reads this book from front to back and can recite most of the text word for word.

The main problem that I have with these books is that they are completely inconsistent, as if they sacrificed quality over deadlines. If the art is good, the story is god awful, if the story is good, the art hurts my eyes. Theres really no winning here. The stories are kind of forced at points and don't really have the kind of pacing that you would expect from a professional comic, and the artist himself doesn't really seem to understand how to create good sequential art that fluidly tells a story.I bought all three of these books at the same time, and at some points was so confused by what was happening that i would have to read a couple pages over and over again to really figure out what they were trying to impart and i really don't feel like there was enough quality content per book to justify the prices (and these books were super discounted), HOWEVER the books did get here super early, and were in great condition when i got them. So thats like the one good point.

What I am really trying to say here is that if you are super into the lore of world of warcraft you may want to just jump on the WOW lore wiki and sit these comics out, unless you are an ocd completeionist, if you are just looking for warcraft lore pick up any one of the novels by Christie Golden, or if you have your heart set on a World of Warcraft: The Shattering: Book One of Cataclysm or if you just want a really good fantasy comic book grab the first Dungeon and dragons trade Dungeons & Dragons Volume 1: Shadowplague HC

After reading the first comic i must admit this one does seem slightly more rushed. However i don't feel it suffered much for it. Could this have been a better more in depth comic? yes. But, it serves its purpose explaining the lore that it was written to explain so in my opinion it gets the job done. Is it worth the price tag? For a someone interested in Warcraft lore I say yes, if not then no.

I did not enjoy this trade as much as the first and the main reason has to do with the fact it's a different artist. I personally LOVED Ludo Lullabi's pencils in the first part of this story arch. However, I found the pencils lacking in this book. The characters appeared stiff. The action sequences lacked any sort of energy. As for the writing, it isn't amazing but it isn't terribad either - it's forgivable. The whole Varian Wrynn split personality plot was poorly executed and almost forced. I can understand this book is aimed at a younger demographic so I really didn't expect Watchmen or anything. In sum, I would have given higher marks if the artwork was better or if Lullabi had stayed on as the regular penciler (he only did the covers).

After what I thought was an excellent introduction to the World of Warcraft in the first hard cover graphic novel set, I was disappointed with the conclusion in this followup. After reading the first World of Warcraft graphic novel collection, I read WoW:Ashbringer and wasn't impressed with it so I was really looking forward to this followup. I don't want to be completely negative about it in this review because I still think the art is nice and that they did a good enough job providing us with a conclusion. But when I compare it to volume 1, it doesn't feel like the creators were having as much fun working on the issues collected in this book. If you're just looking for a distraction and have some extra dollars to spend, go ahead and buy it because it is still entertainment at the end of the day. Otherwise, I would pass on this.

It's a good read if your a Warcraft fan, if not you might not like it.