Review:
World of Warcraft Special #1

Every writer worth his salt, no matter the genre of fiction, follows (or at least should follow) one single mantra. Never tell the reader something when you can show them instead. World of Warcraft Special #1 is 20+ pages of being told something instead of being shown it. Which may I add is a truly impressive feat considering comic books are an almost entirely visual medium.

However, what truly makes me detest this issue is not the fact that that one sacred rule is being violated, but the fact that what we're being told in essence is "The Horde and Alliance don't get along so well and kill each other and stuff...ya...". Basically, this issue exists to clue the reader in on that one detail and to introduce us to a plethora of characters (which I'll be getting to in a second). Honestly, who out there that would have even a passing interest in World of Warcraft would not be aware of this? Why must there be an issue based on this concept, especially considering there are previous WoW comics in circulation that have no doubt already established the antagonistic relationship that exists between the Alliance and Horde.

The one other article worthy of discussion where this issue is concerned, is its attempt at introducing us to characters that apparently will be featured either in their own one shot graphic novels or be integrated into the running series. Unfortunately, there are something like 12 or so characters being introduced on 22 pages, the vast majority of them being the poster boy/girl/cowthing for the word stereotypical.

Well to be frank, that's all fine and dandy, this is WoW we're talking about here, I didn't come into this expecting the pious Paladin to have the depth and complexity of Shakespeare's Hamlet. I did however expect to be able to spend more time (ie, pages) with these characters. On average each character only got 1, sometimes 2, pages to themselves. It just wasn't enough to establish, well... anything. Sure I found out this one guy lost his little girl, this other one is in some forbidden relationship, but they were all literally one liners where the backgrounds were concerned. They could just as easily have been (and most likely will be) included in whatever issue/book these characters eventually appear in.