Dragon Age IDW comic review (A Video Explanation & Review)

Ugh, it's like the artstyle and the writing are in a competition to make me more nauseous.

There are some good bones there, but mostly the comic reads like bad fanfiction. I mean, Gleam is both such a good mage that she can forge swords that slice through steel like butter AND such a potent healer that she accidentally grew an arm? What a load of horseshit.

If you’re wondering who the “Man of Light” was, I would theorize it was Veness’ buddy who everybody mistook for her lover. He had a personal grudge against Greagoir and “Duty” and he was clearly set up to be a somewhat villainous character.

Yes to both questions.

I suspect this is partly why the comic is considered non-canon, on top of its general shittiness.

An excellent review and discussion about the comic. I enjoyed it too and felt the lore issues weren't serious enough to spoil the story. Certainly, it was a major coup for Bioware to get a Nebula and Hugo award winning author like Orson Scott Card to co-write it for them. I dare say that one factor causing it to remain unfinished was the controversy Orson was mired in for some of his comments, though I'll state right now that I'm not a fan of cancel culture.

Regardless, when I ran my pen-and-paper DA roleplaying campaign, I'd hoped to include elements from the unfinished comic book tale and managed to email Aaron Johnston through some forum or other. This was seven years ago, and incredibly he replied! Here's the text from that email, which I hope provides useful in providing clues to tie up some of the loose ends. I don't think I'm breaking any particular confidence - he comes across as a great guy:

Toby,

Thank you for writing in. Forgive me for the slow response. I have
been feverishly trying to meet a deadline for a novel. I so appreciate
your kind words on the comic series. I'm thrilled to hear that you
enjoyed them. Scott and I certainly enjoyed writing them.

The series was written five years ago, and I've done many projects
since then, so you'll have to forgive me but my memory is a little
fuzzy on all things Dragon Age. I had to dig through a bunch of old
files to remind myself who the Man of Light was going to be. Here's
what I found in the treatment Scott and I wrote for the project:

The Man of Light – a powerful blood mage who isn’t a man at all. Man
of Light is actually a woman, whose true identify is unknown but who
has allied herself with some Darkspawn and other dark creatures to
plot the destruction of the Chantry and templars. She secretly wants
to reestablish a magocracy with her at its head and is rumored to have
several within the Circle of Magi who are sympathetic to her cause.

There were a number of story ideas we were prepared to pursue at the
tower after Gleam arrived, but the makers of the game decided not to
pursue the comic series. Sadly.

But I'm thrilled to hear that these characters will continue to exist
in your roleplaying adventures. All best to you as you expand and
create and have fun in this universe.

Best regards,
Aaron Johnston

The whole book was not only stupid but just plain awful, regardless what you think Card's politics, the story is awful, the art is some how worse, the only good thing was the cover art by Herberto Ramos. I will admit while Ramos is bit of an acquired taste he's actually gotten better than his early 90s work would've suggested it also looked like he actually played the game or watched a lets play of DA:O.