In the course of its 31 years, Magic: The Gathering has had some truly remarkable antagonists. Yawgmoth, the doctor-turned-mad-God; the Eldrazi, world-eating Lovecraftian horrors; most recently Valgavoth, the plane-sized nightmare Demon. Within this rogue’s gallery one villain stands head and twisted shoulders above the rest, however: The Elder Dragon Nicol Bolas, big bad for what was likely Magic’s most popular story arc.
While he eventually lost the War of the Spark, he lives on in eternal imprisonment somewhere in the Multiverse. As is often the case in fiction, however, prison bars tend to loosen over time. According to a recent post by Mark Roswater, Nicol Bolas will return to MTG sooner rather than later. Looks like the Multiverse will soon be a much more hostile place for its few remaining planeswalkers.
Nicol Bolas Will Return?!
This juicy bit of gossip came via one of Mark Rosewater’s Blogatog posts yesterday. In response to a lore question about Bolas, Rosewater gave an unusually direct answer.
“moroklumpen: How much of his power did Nicol Bolas lose when he was de-sparked? Because if an omenpath opens up to his prison realm I’m worried.
Mark Rosewater: You have good reason to be worried.”
This is about as direct a confirmation of Bolas’ return as we could possibly expect. Generally Rosewater prefers to offer more cryptic hints or even just brush off questions like this. Here, however, he straight-up confirms moroklumpen’s theory.
Well, perhaps not entirely. The part about an Omenpath opening up that links his prison realm to other planes certainly sounds like its locked in though. As a plot development, this makes a ton of sense. After the Phyrexian Invasion, Omenpaths between planes started opening up left and right. The idea that one could connect to Bolas’ prison realm, then, is totally reasonable.
The first part of the question, concerning Bolas’ current power level post-desparking, goes unaddressed here. Based on the last time we saw him, things aren’t looking too hot, however. While his power reached God-like levels during the War of the Spark, that was largely down to all the planeswalker sparks he managed to harvest. At the conclusion of that story arc he lost all of those sparks, including his own. That, naturally, puts him in a much weaker position than before.
On top of that, the prison realm is guarded by Bolas’ brother Ugin, who has dedicated himself to keeping him sealed away. This implies that desparked Bolas is still a major threat, and probably one that could escape the prison realm alone given enough time. Whatever happens to return Nicol Bolas to the story of MTG, it will likely involve some kind of outside interference via Omenpath.
A Quick Catch-Up
Before we start speculating about that, lets go over some of Nicol Bolas’ history in the story of MTG. He has one of the longest, twistiest tales the game has to offer, starting way back in 1993’s Legends. He was among the original cycle of Elder Dragons from which EDH draws its name, who found themselves locked in the Elder Dragon War. The conclusion of this conflict saw Bolas’ planeswalker spark ignite and he traveled the Multiverse, fighting with his brother Ugin.
This led to the events of Khans of Tarkir block, where histories were changed and timelines were shattered. After this, and several other minor background adventures, Bolas made his biggest move yet: the invasion of Amonkhet. Totally taking over and shaping the world to his will, he sowed the first seeds for his master plan in the Amonkhet sands.
From here, Bolas recruited some planeswalker allies, meddled in Alara, and ultimately masterminded the release of the Eldrazi during Battle for Zendikar block. The idea here was to draw a large number of planeswalkers so he could harvest their sparks, but it didn’t quite work out. Not yet, anyway.
Bolas then gathered a duo of magical artifacts: a Planar Portal from Kaladesh, and The Immortal Sun from Ixalan. With these he transported an undead army from Amonkhet to Ravnica and took the plane by force, killing Niv-Mizzet. He then lured a huge number of planeswalkers to the plane and harvested their sparks, essentially ascending to godhood.
Just when things were bleakest, a betrayal from Liliana and a heroic sacrifice from Gideon turned the tides, and Bolas was defeated. Stripped of his powers and even his name, he was confined to the prison realm with Ugin for the rest of his days.
Possible Futures
This is where we left Nicol Bolas, and where we can start speculating as to what his return might mean for the overall MTG narrative. Luckily for us, Wizards gave us a very nice place to start. The art above, taken from the Planeswalker’s Guide to Aetherdrift, may show Bolas’ hand gripping the Aetherspark. This is the prize for the winner of the Ghirapur Grand Prix in the set, and it seemingly has the power to grant an individual a planeswalker spark.
Given that Bolas recently lost his spark, it makes perfect sense that he’d attempt to restore it via the Aetherspark. The art above seems to imply that he’ll succeed in doing so, though I find it unlikely that he’ll win it fair and square in the race. Working through some kind of agent fits his character better.
From here, Bolas will presumably play a key role in Tarkir: Dragonstorm. This is planned as the final set in the Dragonstorm arc, so having a dragon step into the antagonist role here makes sense. Tarkir is also a plane with which Bolas has plentiful past ties, so there’s a lot of material to work with here.
I’d expect Bolas to stick around into the future, too. Early art for Edge of Eternities, the next mainline set after Tarkir: Dragonstorm, shows off a shiny new Tezzeret. As one of Bolas’ top henchmen in past sets, Tezzeret may well be doing more of his diabolical bidding in this one. Perhaps even something Eldrazi-related, based on the title.
This is all speculation, of course, but however things pan out, it’s great to know Nicol Bolas is coming back. The place really wasn’t the same without him.
