{"id":4385,"date":"2018-11-14T21:19:15","date_gmt":"2018-11-14T21:19:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/?p=4385"},"modified":"2018-11-14T21:19:15","modified_gmt":"2018-11-14T21:19:15","slug":"what-if-magik","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/?p=4385","title":{"rendered":"What If?: Magik"},"content":{"rendered":"

There was a time when the basic format of\u00a0What If?<\/em> stories was to take a previous story and change the ending, usually by showing what would have happened if the good guys had lost. \u00a0(Spoilers: it was generally the apocalypse.) \u00a0More recently, the more common approach has been to do some completely alternative take on the characters, often in the vein of a mash-up of sub-genres.<\/p>\n

In this issue, Leah Williams and Filipe Andrade take the opposite approach. \u00a0The official title is “What If Magik Became Sorcerer Supreme”, but that’s not really the story at all. \u00a0In fact, it’s the end point – so if you actually do want to know what would happen if Magik became Sorcerer Supreme, you’d better hope for a sequel.<\/p>\n

A more accurate title would have been “What If Magik had Doctor Strange as her Mentor?”. \u00a0But then I suppose they can’t call it that, because it was already a subplot in Brian Bendis’s\u00a0Uncanny X-Men<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The actual hook here is much simpler. \u00a0Magik starts off as a genre mash-up character; she’s a magic-based character who’s somehow found her way into the X-books. \u00a0Her connection with the X-books lies mainly in her being Colossus’ kid sister. \u00a0And so the question this issue is really asking is: what if we just got rid of the X-Men and put her in\u00a0Doctor Strange<\/em> where she belongs?<\/p>\n

That doesn’t seem like it should work, but the resulting comic is unexpectedly good. \u00a0Magik’s origin story of being kidnapped by a demon as a girl, and returning to Earth as a teenage witch, can stand alone; it really doesn’t need the X-Men. \u00a0This issue doesn’t write them out, so much as simply ignore them; maybe the X-Men don’t exist in this world, maybe she’s just not related to them because Colossus isn’t around or something. \u00a0It doesn’t matter. \u00a0Either way, Illyana is back on Earth and she’s wandering America, the associated problems of which are pretty much not a concern for her, given that she grew up in Hell.<\/p>\n

But she attracts the attention of Doctor Strange, who shows up, realises that something odd has happened to her, and takes her under his wing. \u00a0Not being much of a people person, Strange initially fails to grasp that he’s offering himself up as her new Belasco, which might be why she doesn’t seem so thrilled about the whole idea. \u00a0But since it’s the concept, and it’s only a single issue, she does swiftly accept, and we bring on the training montage. \u00a0It’s all about her struggles to produce a version of the Soulsword, apparently because her sense of self is so buried under her experiences in Limbo that she has trouble producing anything which is an expression of her soul; actually a good hook, and a nice example of a way that the basic elements of Magik’s story could have been played differently.<\/p>\n

After that, we get the showdown with Belasco, and Strange helping her literally overcome her angst so that she can move on with life to become Strange’s heir apparent as sorcerer supreme. \u00a0It’s very straightforward, it hits all the key points from Magik’s core story – except for the X-Men specific stuff, which it doesn’t need anyway – and unusually for a\u00a0What If?<\/em>, it actually has a happy ending. \u00a0After all, this Magik is being mentored by somebody who actually knows what he’s talking about where magic is concerned, so it probably shouldn’t be surprising that he gets better results.<\/p>\n

More to the point, though, it’s very well executed. \u00a0Andrade’s artwork – and Chris O’Halloran’s colouring – are beautiful. \u00a0I’m reminded somewhat of a more delicate Rick Leonardi, which is a good thing. \u00a0But there’s also good use of understated twelve panel grids to set up low key magical effects, weird off kilter sequences with Strange’s house distorting, and striking abstract backgrounds for the montage and the climax. \u00a0And there’s some fabulous cartooning as well, since the Strange\/Magik relationship is really the core of this issue, with Strange’s usual schtick first grating on Illyana before she comes round to him.<\/p>\n

There’s a sense in which this issue is really just a simplified version of the core Magik story, with a happier than usual ending. \u00a0Strip out the clutter – and from Magik’s point of view, the X-Men are clutter – and play it straight. \u00a0But it brings out the strength in that central story, and it’s a beautiful issue.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There was a time when the basic format of\u00a0What If? stories was to take a previous story and change the ending, usually by showing what would have happened if the good guys had lost. \u00a0(Spoilers: it was generally the apocalypse.) \u00a0More recently, the more common approach has been to do some completely alternative take on […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4385","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-x-axis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4385","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4385"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4385\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4386,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4385\/revisions\/4386"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4385"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4385"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4385"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}