Charmed

Issue 0

This is referred to as a sourcebook since it basically explains the series. It starts out explaining who the charmed ones are then moves to a biography of each of the sisters. Then it defines a number of terms including witches, elders, whitelighters and others. The magic school is then covered along with some typical spells.

Then there are discussions of the main dark characters followed by a year-by-year breakdown of what happened in the series. Finally, there's a short preview of issue #1.

This is pretty much a must for anyone who likes the series but may not recall all the details.

Issue 1

The series takes up where the show left off, with the sisters married and having children of their own. Nothing much has been happening, but now a man and a woman have entered the underworld and are working on their own plan for obtaining power.

The babies themselves are manifesting early signs of having very strong with-type powers of their own. There are also short previews of Salem's Daughter and Neverland included in this issue.

Issue 2

There's more on the growing powers of the infants, and on the magic school that is being run. There's also a boy that has latent powers and is invited to the school, but is murdered by beings working for the man and woman pursuing power in the underworld.

Issue 3

The sisters realize that the innocents they have saved are being targeted for murder and they realize they will need to work together again. Meanwhile one of the sisters marries the latest incarnation of Romeo and Juliet while, in hell, the source of all evil is given a body yet again.

Issue 4

The story uses the Piper, Phoebe and Paige version of the sisters. As always, a source of evil is out to destroy the sisters. In this case it is causing people who are innocents to try to capture the sisters. Some of those attacking them are people close to them.

Then the source, the evil one, shows up on their doorstep, literally. Piper manages to stall the thing, but doesn't really know how she did it. The sisters decide enough is enough and they are going to deal with the source once and for all.

Issue 5

I really like the cover of this issue.

The charmed sisters are working on an idea to try and deal with the Source once and for all by gathering white magic from all over. Meanwhile, the Source doesn't realize he has problems of his own as conspirators plan to usurp his position.

The sisters put their plan into action and it seems to work. Meanwhile the conspiracy doesn't go exactly as this one guy expected. Meanwhile, the next generation of Warrens are starting to come into their own power.

Issue 6

There's a vision about a baseball player and a woman that Phoebe has that upsets her. She tries to get information psychically from Cal but gets nothing.

Later she checks with the editor-in-chief and finds out very disturbing news about Cal and how he is rumored to have attacked at least one woman and then sent threats to the paper in various forms. The sisters work together to help and find out the person they thought was in danger was not; it was someone else.

Issue 7

The cover brings up an interesting point. In stories like this the evil guys attack with the same types of things the sisters (or others) have; magic in some form or another. They good guys attack the bad guys, the bad guys don't have the power of the good guys (or maybe don't have the brains), and they lose.

In reality, the bad guys in this kind of situation would have an advantage since they don't have to use the same types of weapons they always do. The cover shows them in someone's gunsights. Attack with regular weapons like guns, dynamite and things like that would just as effectively kill the good guys as anything else would.

Anyhow, one of the children is manifesting definite with powers and fairly strong ones at that. Then the scene shifts to where the elders dwell and Leo being offered a chance to become a whitelighter again. The Elders have interfered and that doesn't sit well with either of them.

Which brings up another point. In all series like this, from Buffy on, there is always a Council or a Group of Elders or something like that, that have set themselves up, established their own rules, and judge others of their own kind, yet no one seems to explain just why this group of politicos has the right to do anything like that at all. It seems that the world of the gifted is more a dictatorship than a democracy.

There's also a darklighter (Renek) that's killing whitelighters right and left.

Interesting so far.

Issue 8

Another cover that I think is really neat. The sisters extract a baby from a woman that has just been murdered. Rennek had killed her. Then it's back to the underworld where the coup has taken place, but uneasy wears the crown as the woman is trying to keep the demons from finding out what she has done.

The enemy then attacks on the Golden Gate Bridge, easily dealing with the sisters. Then there's some mention of the woman from hell being the very first witch.

Issue 9

The history of Neena, the First Witch, is revealed, and how she attacked the Elders. Piper, meanwhile, is somewhere in a place that shouldn't exist. Suddenly, there's an appearance by one of the older and most memorable characters of the series.

Charmed #11

The three sisters are still separated, but things are building rapidly towards a showdown against a person who wants to unify the upper and lower realms (which would result in a terrible catastrophe) just so she can go to a higher realm yet and find someone she's in love with.

Paige gets drawn into something on the other side that involves a meeting with a her dead mother and grandmother and various other women. It's obvious that something major is in the works.