What was your favorite Afterlives short? How did Afterlives compare to other animated shorts for you?

Yesterday, Blizzard released the fourth and final Afterlives short. This time, we learned a little more about Revendreth, Sire Denathrius, and the Anima drought that’s plaguing both it and the Shadowlands as a whole. Oh, and Garrosh was there.

All in all, it was one of my favorite shorts because the video didn’t just feel like a look at Revendreth — it felt like the entire artistic approach to the video was rooted in Revendreth’s aesthetic. From the silent cold open to the way the entire thing was essentially an open letter from Denathrius to the residents of Revendreth, it just felt different from the other Afterlives shorts. That said, it wasn’t my favorite of the four.

No, that honor goes to Bastion’s animated short. Even if that one didn’t have the same artistic flourish that Revendreth’s did, it still had just about everything else I could’ve asked for in a short: Characters both new and old, major lore bombs, and enough information that it left me with a whole lot of questions I can’t wait to (hopefully) answer when the expansion comes out. And while I liked the Maldraxxus short, it felt a little too focused on Draka to feel as weighty as Bastion’s. Ardenweald’s, meanwhile, was objectively very good… just not the part of WoW I’m super interested in (sorry, Druids).

Overall, I’d say the Afterlives shorts were a solid introduction to the zones, but they didn’t land the same way the Warbringers shorts did for me. After all, it’s pretty hard to top a sea shanty sung by Laura Bailey, a close look at one of Warcraft’s most infamous villains, and the burning of Teldrassil. I’ll admit it’s been a while since I’ve watched the Harbingers shorts so it’s hard to say where they rank, but the Burdens of Shaohao shorts still hold a special place in my heart for being the first time I’d seen World of Warcraft tell a story in that sort of way.

What did you think of the Afterlives shorts? How do you rank them? And how do they compare to the other animated short’s we’ve seen from Blizzard in the past?