Creative Staff:
Story: David Barnett
Art: Tom Fowler, Craig Taillefer
Colors: Marissa Louise
Letterer: Todd Klein
What They Say:
All Tim wanted to do was impress a pretty girl by getting the two of them into the Glastonbury Festival. But one poorly thought-out spell later, they’ve instead found themselves at a different festival-the ancient carnival of the realms, where all the worlds of magic go to let their hair (or tentacles, or tendrils of fire) down and have a good time! It’s just a shame that for some species, “a good time” might turn out to mean “eating humans”…Don’t miss the start of this two-part tale written by guest writer David Barnett (Punks Not Dead).
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
Getting back into the swing of things with Books of Magic isn’t as hard as one might think after the initial delays of the pandemic. The main storyline had wrapped up just before things went south with distribution and a new storyline gets underway here from a new writer with David Barnett taking over. And it’s a book that reads well and doesn’t try to re-introduce everything while at the same time introducing some new characters. The art team remains the same and that’s definitely one of the big pluses as Tom Fowler and Craig Taillefer are pretty great here in what they’re doing in defining Tim’s world and the various other places we go. Marissa Louise does step in for color duties here and she blends into it really well with the team, making for a natural fit.
Tim’s in a bit of a weird place at the moment as things have finished out from before and it’s the summer holidays, so Dr. Rose is off on some time off herself and just getting away from Tim at this stage isn’t a bad idea. Tim’s trying to keep things cool at home with his dad but nearly everything that ends up coming up has him bringing up his wife and that sends him into a depression. There’s a fun little nod to his younger days when he went to Glastonbury once and that he had a life when he was young but since so much of his identity is wrapped up in Tim’s mother, there’s only so much that he can do before he falls into that trap. That leaves Tim just feeling very, very, bored and wandering around the city looking for something to do – until he finds a young woman about his age that’s playing with some low-level magics and thievery.
Izzy, it turns out, has just moved down from the north with her father because his work changed and is getting to know the city. There’s a fun dynamic between the two because Tim worries that she knows him by name and might be involved with Cold Flame but Izzy just seems like a starter practitioner and he’s being wary, rightly so. It does lead to him trying to get her to be on the right path a bit more forcefully than he should but the two also look to have some fun, such as taking a doorway to Glastonbury. That, naturally, goes wrong and they end up at Festival, a decades-spanning mystical event with all sorts of creatures that has trapped a few people along the way. This ties into the subplot from the start of the book with someone who had been there before and has spent thirty years trying to get back, which touches nicely on some classic Sandman material. But the main story is Izzy, at least into it shifts upon the arrival of Geoff.
In Summary:
It didn’t take much to get back into the groove of Books of Magic and getting a nice little side story for a couple of issues with no grand stakes is definitely welcome. It’s good just to see Tim making a friend of some sort here and just coping with things in a way that feels very teenager-ly. Barnett’s story has a good flow once it gets a little momentum underway and the introduction of Izzy works well for me as does getting to see Festival and adding another odd little dimension to things. It’s a fun book with great artwork and plenty to see and do, which is welcome to get back into after a few months away.
Grade: B+
Age Rating: 17+
Released By: DC Comics via ComiXology | Amazon
Release Date: May 26th, 2020
MSRP: $3.99