Jewel Riders Comic Review – Guest Post by Stormy

Hi Jewel Fans! Chris here. Friend of the site Stormy allowed us to re-post her review of the 2024 Jewel Riders reboot comic from Maverick. If you would like to read it in its original context, check it out here at Stormy Tumblr page, Moonlight Real. We have added a few images to the review for supporting context.

“Here’s my full review- I gotta say, I liked the comic a lot more on a second reading, the love for the world of the cartoon is wonderful but the lack of attention paid to new readers still makes me mad so I have both good and bad feelings at the same time!

What I loved:

-The art. Gorgeous! Flowed well, the colors were good. Love it!
-That they made Merlin creepy. In the cartoon Merlin is clearly supposed to be a gentle, all-wise mentor but something about him always came off as a tiny bit creepy in a way the creators of the show did not intend. The creators of the comic picked up this creepiness and ran with it and I am well chuffed that something that was a fanfic idea I had was also going through these creators minds and they went with it and I love it.

-The creators’ love for the world of the Jewel Riders. They brought back the sheep! They remembered Kale’s evil-baby-deer form! They love Tamara and got her spot on! (true Jewel Riders fans love Tamara, we all just do) they had a scene where Fallon is upset and sits with Moondance one of the more powerful moments in the show. The writers of this comic must have really loved the cartoon, the silliness and the darker tone both together. This is completely a Jewel Riders graphic novel. It’s got the right vibe, the right worldbuilding, it is so perfect at being what it is!

-The plot driver being Queen Anya/Adrianna’s love for her banished sister, with flashbacks to them as teenagers in training to be Jewel Riders. Setting up Merlin as being responsible for Kale getting denied her magic jewel and turning evil and opening up redemption possibilities. Flashback images of young Kale and Adrianna. This is the perfect plot decision, I love it, 10/10 no notes.

What I did not love:

-The story was presented… not badly, but there were a lot of moments that made me go “I think this is what they’re trying to say, but I’m not sure.” For example, Gwen is getting ready to marry Drake and become queen, and she doesn’t want to. I think the intended plot is…

In the cut-from-the-final-version words of Princess Rosella, “But I’m not prepared to put my freedom on the shelf. How can I share with someone else what I don’t understand myself?” Gwen likes Drake but isn’t sure she wants to marry him and she knows she doesn’t want to marry him right NOW, and she knows she’ll be queen someday but she isn’t ready to stop adventuring YET… is what I think the graphic novel is saying, but it isn’t saying why Gwen can’t just say all that and spend more years as a Jewel Rider.

And it seems like Drake got fired from being a wolf riding boy Jewel Rider to… be Gwen’s full time bodyguard and fiance? But why would that mean giving up his own adventuring? And why does everybody seem to be cutting him out of all the action? There’s no logical reason he isn’t still a Jewel Rider. He even has his Forest Stone in a few panels. While I utterly love how Queen Adrianna missing her sister summoned said sister back from evil banishment but it happened kind of confusingly. Adrianna summoned her sister, started seeing visions of Kale? Gwen didn’t see them. And then suddenly the land is all thorny and apocalyptic with no “Since Merlin said that Kale had returned, evil thorn plants have been growing out of control!” from anybody.
…is anyone else getting the same vibe that I’m trying to describe here? Like there’s a good plot, but like I’m having to do some long stretches to connect the pieces and the writing could have been changed just slightly to pull everything together in a way that requires less “it seems like” from the reader.

-And here comes the rant.

The thing I really did not love. The thing that made me downright furious with the creators of this graphic novel.
The book had nothing to help new readers who hadn’t seen the cartoon understand what was going on. No little explanatory text, no introductions to the characters and world. There needed to be at least a simple character page like manga have in the beginning… hang on, I can photoshop. The graphic novel needed this:

Ok I made that in like 5 minutes and it’s garbage, but you see my point! This would have added so much for people who just thought the cover was cool and picked up the graphic novel with no prior knowledge of the world. Without it, I’m afraid that the book will only sell to fans of the show, and I can’t imagine that there are enough of us to keep a graphic novel series going. So I think the creators’ decision to write something that’s ONLY for old fans and NOT AT ALL for new fans will result in the series being a flop instead of delivering more Jewel Riders fun for all of us for years to come, and for that I am so angry I could spit nails, so angry I could yell at the people who made a graphic novel that I have so much good to say about!

I hope so much that I’m wrong, and there will be more volumes published because I am just going wild to find out what happens next. What’s up with Kale now that she’s back? What’s up with Merlin now that he’s getting more and more questionable?

And as a longtime fan, what else are the creators going to bring back? Kit the prismfox? That critter made an impression on a lot of us! Ian, the beast of the forest who Gwen kinda had a thing with? The gliders? Will Morgana be back? Will we see any of the other girls’ parents? Will there be anything about Moondance and Cleo being princesses of the unicorns? Might they introduce another zebracorn friend for Shadow, or explore his origins? Could they go mining in the show bible and pull out the biggest unused gemstone: Gwen’s younger sister Tara? They’d have to figure out a way to explain how Tara was never mentioned once in all the show, but maybe she was hidden away for her protection, or kidnapped and the queen was so distraught she swore never to speak of it or something, silly lampshades but why not?

The world of Avalon has so many directions for a writer to explore and I want to see all of them!