Book Review - 'The Owl House: Hex-cellent Tales from The Boiling Isles' by Steve Behling (Adaptor), John Bailey Owen (Original Writer), Dana Terrace (Original Writer and Creator)

Don't mind me, I'm just having my fill of content from my favourite show of all time as I wait for 'The Long-Lived King' (2026) graphic novel to be published.

I could go on forever about everything I love about 'The Owl House', and how it shaped me as a person, a storyteller, an animation fan, a fantasy fan, a witch fan, and its recipient of joy and hope given to the world - it's no exaggeration that, along with 'She-Ra and the Princesses of Power' and 'Heartstopper', it pretty much helped me to survive adulthood, not to mention the 2020 pandemic - but I'll keep it short and to the point for the purposes of this review, of a short but funny little book, 'The Owl House: Hex-cellent Tales from The Boiling Isles'.

It's a chapter book that basically retells the season one episodes 'I Was a Teenage Abomination' and 'Adventures in the Elements', dialogue and all, with black and white screencaps from the show throughout, and it can be read in under an hour. Little King reluctantly exposits and brings us up to speed in between the stories, in his own King way. What humour and heart is put into this!

If I have to guess why these episodes specifically were chosen, it would be because of the theme of schooling and learning lessons from mentors, for this official Scholastic/school library-type product. And it's Disney Press, so of course at this point it would be "safe" in its LBGTQ+ content, the cowards. But there is the friendship and found family theme, as well, and the famous Luz Noceda and Amity Blight (Lumity!) are shown to be getting closer in 'Adventures in the Elements', as is faithful to their relationship development. The "school" stuff is far more fun than it sounds, at least.

'Hex-cellent Tales from the Boiling Isles' ends as it should: with the best jokes from King and Hooty.

I would love for there to have been more 'The Owl House' reading material like this. Chapter books of other episodes. A guidebook/worldbuilding book/scrapbook/spell book. Azura chapter samples. But oh well. Disney is terrible; the stale, cowardly, conservative, capitalist tools running it and eating themselves alive never know or care when they have a good thing. They never care for originality and risk.

'The Owl House' - I love and adore you. And so do all your loyal fans after these years. Fans you gave hope, progress, representation and understanding to when they needed them the most. You - and Dana Terrace, whom we all appreciate for everything they are doing - are a beacon; a miracle of a cartoon show and creator.

We cannot wait to see you again soon. You more than deserve to come back.

Final Score (for 'Hex-cellent Tales'): 4/5