Magic: The Gathering has had quite the history in bringing the most unexpected of set trailer videos for its sets.
Recently, Wizards of the Coast unveiled their trailer for Lorwyn Eclipsed, utilizing puppets made and performed by the Jim Henson Company. Whether they were Magic fans or not, a sudden trailer featuring Henson company puppets in the style of Fraggle Rock/The Dark Crystal threw everyone off and even caught Muppets fans off guard.
The top comments on the YouTube video said it all, with some now even hoping for future collaborations and even a Dark Crystal Universes Beyond release in the future:
"Now this is what Magic needs more of."
"this has no business going as hard as it does, but it is in fact kind of awesome."
"Props to actually putting effort into your original IP ideas"
"Jim Henson company for a Lorwyn promo was such a good idea"
"As someone hyperfixated on Muppets, Magic the gathering, and theater including the musical variety, this is targeted at me specifically is the the most specific way i have ever seen, and i love it! hype above hype. perfection!"
"This is the best thing magic has ever done for advertising"
Usually for Magic trailers you get video game-like CGI/mo-cap, live-action, slightly animated stills, or some combination of the three. Since set trailers began well over a decade ago, the vast majority of them employ these.
As for a few examples, there is Journey into Nyx:
Ixalan:
And even more recently with Edge of Eternities:
and Duskmourn:
The biggest change has been that many more aim to be like movie trailers. Innistrad: Midnight Hunt went for a more horror movie trailer feel:
While the whole Phyrexian issue brought about a pretty long cinematic with a Lord of the Rings vibe:
But, as Lorwyn Eclipsed proved, every once in awhile Magic goes full on with theming and hype and brings out something that even non-fans get excited for. They go a completely different route and, well, they become pretty beloved.
Throne of Eldraine is perhaps the best known trailer as, while they still used CGI, they took notes from Shrek and Up and created a whole love story and song between two gingerbread people. It's emotional, heartfelt, sad and insane:
The trailer, and character, proved so popular that, when the sequel, Wilds of Eldraine, came out, the gingerbread woman not only had her own card, Syr Ginger, but she was on the prominent collector's edition booster wrapper as well. Keep in mind, she was a one off character in a trailer, and she was virtually the face of the sequel.
And while Lorwyn Eclipsed has the Muppet vibe going on, Bloomburrow did a similar thing. As it harkened back to things like the Redwall series and 90s childrens' cartoons, Magic made the trailer exactly that, using 2D hand drawn art by Brazen Animation to create an animated trailer:
Like the Lorwyn Eclipsed trailer, the general outline of the plane and what the situation is there played through subtly and brought a lot of hype for the expansion. For Lorwyn Eclipsed, it was returning to a fan favorite plane after nearly two decades. For Bloomburrow, it was going to an animal plane that had been the most requested new plane by fans for years.
Kamigawa: Neon Dynasty also went the animated route. But while Bloomburrow went for the more kids show approach, Neon Dynasty opted for a full on anime, complete with song in Japanese:
And to make it authentic, they sourced it right from their Japanese office. This one also caught many off guard. First, it was revisiting a plane that had a first time mixed reception. And second, there had been a few years of more standard trailers - something straight out of Crunchy Roll was the last thing they were expecting.
There have been other odd ones too. War of the Spark even had an Evanescence song thrown in:
Every once in a while, and especially when they are going with a more unique plane, Magic goes that extra mile for a trailer as an added way to explain the expansion and get you in the right mood for it. Lorwyn Eclipsed and using Jim Henson Company Puppets is only the latest one of these.
