Ajani and Oko Among Returning Planeswalkers in Lorwyn Eclipsed

Last updated on December 17, 2025

Lorwyn Eclipsed Oko | Illustration by Kai Carpenter

Planeswalkers have been on a strange journey these last few years. I don't mean within the lore, which is certainly true with the whole post Phyrexian Invasion and Desparkening phenomenon, but rather, as a card type, planeswalkers have seen a shift in their importance within the design philosophies of MTG.

Right around Wilds of Eldraine, we were told that WotC was making a conscience effort to reduce the number of planeswalkers printed in Magic, usually with just one ‘walker per set being the new default. But then, Universes Beyond became a mainstay for Magic set releases, and these sets contain no planeswalkers at all, which meant you'd only see about three ‘walkers for an entire year. The pendulum's swinging in the other direction now, and it looks like planeswalkers are becoming a relevant part of new releases again. We have some confirmation of this from Lorwyn Eclipsed, though it's not clear who's actually going to be walking the planes and who's just showing up as a cameo.

The Art of the Planeswalker

We wrote recently about planeswalkers who were name-dropped in the Lorwyn Eclipsed story, but some art that's been released in the later episodes gives us more hints at who's actually showing up on the cards in mid-January.

Oko Lorwyn Eclipsed Art | Illustration by Kai Carpenter

Not you again! Oko's returning to MTG in this set, and plays a significant role in Episode 6 of the Lorwyn Eclipsed story. Best known for his absolutely degenerate planeswalker card, Oko, Thief of Crowns from Throne of Eldraine, Oko's a shapeshifting planeswalker who showed up again as Oko, the Ringleader in 2024's Outlaws of Thunder Junction. Here he is with some tatted up spirit elk of sorts, so let the 3/3 elk jokes commence!

Ajani Lorwyn Eclipsed Art | Illustration by Greg Staples

Ajani showed up in an early chapter of the story to fill Liliana (AKA Professor Onyx) in on some of the details involving Jace and his failed attempt to reset the multiverse. Episode 5 gave us this regal depiction of Ajani, which seemingly has the color pallet of a Naya card (). Across 14 different Ajani planeswalker cards, everyone's favorite hunky cat guy has been mono-white, red-white, and green-white, but never all three colors at once. Maybe that changes in this set?

There's something strange about these two pieces of art though: These are horizontally-framed instead of the typical vertical frame we associate with planeswalker cards. Both the Oko and Ajani illustration have similar framing, which has people speculating that these aren't actually planeswalker cards. As far as we know, both characters still have their planeswalker sparks, but perhaps there's a reason they'd show up as legendary creatures instead. Or maybe there's some card orientation trickery happening that we don't know about yet (horizontal art on battles, for example).

Evidence seems to point towards these being new planeswalker cards, with just the art orientation throwing everything off. There's this thing called cropping though, so just because these are horizontal illustrations doesn't mean they can't be used on a planeswalker card.

After all, we already know there's at least one confirmed planeswalker card in the set. Mark Rosewater's Lorwyn Eclipsed teaser came out on Monday, and one of the bullet points says there will be “a planeswalker that makes Kithkin tokens.” So we definitely will see at least one planeswalker, but there's no proof that it's either of the two mentioned above. It'd also be a little strange to see an Ajani that's aligned with kithkin creatures, but I guess there aren't any cat people on Lorwyn, so make do with what you've got. Ajani also literally planeswalks in the story, so that's pretty telling, too.

There's also the possibility that we'll see double-faced planeswalkers here. We've already seen some transforming legends like Ashling, Rekindled / Ashling, Rimebound, and we've had multiple waves of “flipwalkers” in the past, including Ajani, Nacatl Pariah / Ajani, Nacatl Avenger. This still doesn't explain the horizontal card art, and doesn't really align with characters we already know are planeswalkers, but maybe we'll see some new gimmick that explains why a planeswalker might transform into something with a horizontal art frame.

And after all, what better set to bring a bunch of planeswalker cards back into the fold than Lorwyn Eclipsed? Original Lorwyn was the first time we ever saw planeswalker cards with the Lorwyn Five, and it'd be fitting to pay homage to their debut with a handful of new ‘walkers in this set.