Scarlet Witch #1 2016

Scarlet Witch #1 (2016)

Beautiful art, but I still maintain that font is distressingly tacky

In Scarlet Witch #1 (Story by James Robinson and pencils by Vanesa Del Rey), Wanda is trying to leave the past behind her and be her own hero -- a hero whose goal is to save magic as we know it and to do it solo.


The book begins with Scarlet Witch startling awake after a dream and examining her reflection. In the panel before, the iconic press photo from when she and her brother joined Cap's newly formed Avengers team (issue #16, year). "A little more grey, a few more wrinkles" she muses, before she puts on the coffee and exchanges some witty banter with her roommate, the ghost of Agatha Harkness. A few pages of exposition about her motives (To right magical wrongs without the support of her team) walks us downtown to a crime scene and a violent exorcism that reveals some of what we can expect Ms. Maximoff to be fighting against in her first story arc.

Agatha looks amazing on the dark backdrops

So, I know reviews of this book have been mostly positive and I would love to like this book but so far I'm not impressed. Vanesa Del Ray's art is lovely sometimes but it suffers for a lot of the book -- it's can look a little muddled, it's so stylized it seems to take away from the story, and her faces get a bit wonky in many panels. However, her fight scene was gorgeous (though, again, a bit hard to follow). The colorist, Jordie Bellaire, should get special props for the work he did making the art in this issue pop. Someone decided on a odd, thick seventies style font for her title and it feels goofy and out of place.

Story wise, Scarlet Witch is interesting -- the origin of the hex is neat and the twists are, too -- but the book moves into adventure too quickly. I wish the author had taken the time to introduce me to who Wanda has become. I want to see her moving into her slick upper east side townhouse, I want to see her pouring over her bank statement with Agatha Harknesses's ghost, I want to see exactly how she happened into having a ghost roomie to begin with. Robinson makes it very clear that his Wanda is doing it for herself, but how can I care If I'm not sure exactly who she is?

I'll definitely give Scarlet Witch it's first story arch to find its feet before I make a firm decision either way, and I really hope it doesn't disappoint. I'm not optimistic, but I would love to be surprised!