Scarlet Witch #1-4
Originally released in 2015
Written by James Robinson
Art by Vanessa Del Rey (#1), Marco Rudy (#2), Steve Dillon (#3), Chris Visions (#4)
Magic is broken, and Wanda Maximoff must go on a journey to try and repair it. However, every spell, no matter how well-intentioned, comes with a price. As it turns out, I hadn't read a series for this blog yet that had the Scarlet Witch in a major role, so I decided to read a semi-recent series starring her. (the striking covers, by David Aja of Hawkeye fame, also helped)
As I mentioned, Wanda's magic comes at a cost. It's a premise that Marvel seems to have been using more often when it comes to magic; from what I recall, a semi-recent Doctor Strange comic reveals that Wong has set up a group of mages to absorb the magical backlash from all of Strange's spells so that Strange himself doesn't have to face those consequences. In Wanda's case, her soul is aging, which she sees the results of whenever she looks in the mirror. If she uses too many spells, she'll die. (though I'm guessing this will be fixed once Wanda repairs whatever's gone wrong with magic)
Accompanying Wanda is the ghost of Agatha Harkness, who was seemingly killed by Wanda at some point in the past. While she's content to follow Wanda around, invisible to non-magic users, and make snarky remarks at Wanda's expense, I wouldn't be surprised if there's more to her than she's letting on. I'm guessing the series will end with her being restored to life (it was roughly fifteen issues long), and I could see her being responsible for the problems with magic in order to create a situation where Wanda is able to revive her.
While she starts in Manhattan, Wanda's search for the source of the magical rot takes her around the world, with her visiting Greece and Ireland in the first few issues. In Greece, she encounters the Minotaur, seemingly the same one from Greek mythology, while seeking advice from the goddess of witches Hekate.
The comic has a rotating group of artists, which is funnily fitting in a way given the chaotic nature of Wanda's magic. They all do a great job, but issue 2 was the highlight for me, with the shadowy depictions of Greece's darkened streets as the minotaur attacks contrasted with the sunny oceanside view in the daytime. The visuals provided as Wanda and Hekate discuss the Minotaur attacks are trippy and stunning.
When she visits Ireland, she encounters a sorcerer who goes by the title of the Emerald Warlock. He seems like a rather transparent attempt at giving Wanda her own arch-nemesis independent from the Avengers, between the similarly-themed name, his callous disregard for the lives of others, and the fact that he literally calls himself her arch-nemesis.
I have a gut feeling that he's not going to last as long as he seems to think, though - I could see him being killed to establish a bigger threat, likely the being that's causing the problems with magic. Throughout this series, there's an ominous cloud of doom and gloom hanging overhead, as though Wanda's decaying and her death is nearing. Considering that she's still alive and well in comics, it doesn't seem like they're going to follow through, but maybe she will die and come back even stronger. (stranger things have happened in comics)
Even with the art inconsistency, I thought this series was interesting, and I'm curious about where this will lead. I don't know if it will wind up being as good as Tom King's Vision series, but Wanda's usually part of an ensemble cast (mainly the Avengers), so it's an interesting change to take her out of that zone and make her a solo hero instead. The emphasis on the cost of magic makes things tenser, as Wanda can't always pull out a spell for just about anything, and it adds a ticking clock to this plot. I don't buy the idea of the Emerald Warlock being Wanda's arch-enemy, but the rest of it is great.
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