World of Warcraft: Death Knight: Blizzard Legends by Dan Jolley
Verdict: an ok read, but doesn’t do much of a deep dive and only follows Thassarian through a series of vignette moments in his journey as a death knight. the art was sometimes difficult to understand
Summary
Blizzard presents an original manga set in the World of Warcraft Universe, studying one of the newest classes in the game–the Death Knight. This story follows the tale of Thassarian, a farm boy who joins Arthas’s army and is turned into a remorseless dealer of death — until one order goes too far.
Thoughts
While this was interesting to read, if I didn’t already know the lore and story somewhat, I would have been totally lost. This moves really quickly, doesn’t explain things in great detail, and gives just the straight facts of a situation. If you’re looking to learn the origins of Death Knights, this is more of a supplement than a thorough study, as it focuses primarily on Thassarian’s journey alone. It reads like a collection of memories, each one just touching on the situation enough to see what’s happening, then moving on to the next.
That said, it was still an enjoyable story to read! I was hoping to get a little more meat in the story, as there wasn’t much new to me that I haven’t learned from the games and other WoW lit (mainly, Arthas: Rise of the Lich King).
The art was pretty consistent with the style of other comics in the WoW series, but had I had some difficulties with it. Some of the more complicated scenes were hard to track through and figure out exactly what was happening. I read this on a tablet screen, so it’s likely easier with a print version. The font for headings and place names and such was sometimes difficult to read. I was able to figure it out, but it definitely slowed the read and took me out of the moment a bit. I also mixed up the characters embarrassingly often, as they tended to look pretty similar in their hair, face, armor…. Between these issues and the breakneck pace of stripped facts, it was okay, but not a critical addition to WoW reading.
My Book Joy 