comic books

This week I have the somewhat rare pleasure of debuting a new X-Men reading order for Patrons of CK – rare because I cover so many X-Men titles already! When this character got her own ongoing series earlier this month it was an easy choice to dig in and create a reading order for her every appearance because she is one of my favorites – a feeling shared by many fans and players of Marvel Rivals! Of course, I’m referring to the woman who is the magic, the muscle, and the teleporting-through-Limbo school bus of Cyclops’s X-Men… yep, it’s a brand new Guide to Magik – Illyana Rasputin!

Guide to Magik – Illyana Rasputin

CK readers have requested many different X-Men solo guides and given an infinite amount of time I’d love to create them all!

One of the deciding factors of what guides I’m actually willing to attack is whether a character who has rarely had a solo title still has an identifiable story arc. There’s a big difference between Magneto, who has a finite number of gradual pivots to and from heroism, and Storm, who has just been in a whole heckin’ lot of comics every single month for the past 50 years.

Magik is experiencing a surge of popularity right now thanks to her appearance in the recently-launched Marvel Rivals. That led us to finally hold an often-teased “Map My X: Magik” panel on Near Mint Condition’s channel last week… which is a super-obvious thing to do when your panel always includes Ødfel, who is an amazing Magik cosplayer!

In prepping for the panel, I started to re-read every Magik appearance – which, fun fact, I have read all but five issues of already. As I rea-read everything there is to read about Illyana Rasputin, my mapping notes for the show quickly morphed into the beginnings of a Guide to Magik. I quickly realized that Magik is one of those X-Men characters who has a specific arc despite going 40 years without a solo title of her own.

I also realized writers love Magik. She is never in the cast of a comic purely as an accessory or a background player. Every time she has appeared in a run over the past four decades she has been used often and used well. There are truly no bad Magik stories.

Really, Magik has had three arcs over the course of her publishing history.

[Read more…] about Guide to Magik (New For Patrons!)