Pointed Discussion

Poor man's Cryptic Command, and this poor man ain't complainin'.

Yeah, you could make a card that costs one more than Cryptic Command and does like one-sixth of what the Command can do. And it still looks pretty reasonable for a card.

Will make you say unsavory things under your breath in drafts for the next few months.

Too expensive to cast.

I like the idea of casting this, returning your snapcaster mage, then casting snapcaster mage to flash this back and return the snapcaster mage again. That will put a frown on the face across the table.

It's decent. Counter a Spell and bounce an opponent's land.

Suits flashback decks in my mind, oddly enough. First off there's the mentioned fun of Snapcaster Mage being bounced, but then there's just how flashback works as a mechanic. You need more mana, generally, to utilize flashback, mitigating this card's high cost by quite a bit, and it's based on card advantage, so countering a spell and bouncing a permanent certainly fits that bill as well. You don't always need a card to be as efficient as possible to do plenty of damage with it-- just look at geistflame as a prime example (4 of them can potentially kill 8 creatures, yet because it's not shock or lightning bolt level damage it's overlooked). Glad it's not a 1UUU cost or the like, though... possible to splash quite feasibly with just 3UU.

Great in limited for late games. I had my Balefire Dragon & Ashmouth Hound attacking, but my opponent had a Curse of Death's Hold out on the field. I figured he was holding on to a Rebuke, so I waited for it to be played, countered, bounced the curse, ended the game. My opponent, being a weekly standard player, said something under his breath about 5 cost counterspells.

This could have some uses in a counter control deck running 8+ counter spells since you're getting the utility of a bounce spell without having to give up a card slot for it. But most likely it's just for limited shenanigans.

CMC 4 on this card would have made it into a nice tool for Blue T2 Decks. Too bad most cards are either limited fodder or rares n mythic these days.

At least it's not strictly strictly worse than cryptic command :D
(3 blue mana is sometimes harder to pay than 1 genric mana more)

A solid card. It is a poor man's Cryptic Command, but a somewhat weaker version of an incredibly powerful card is not a bad thing. Admittedly, this probably won't see much play in Standard, but in Commander, this card just earned itself a solid spot among other counterspells that do more than just counter. The ability to counter a spell and bounce something - such as a big creature that was getting in the way - is well worth considering in Commander. Finally, it lets you play politics - counter player 1's spell and bounce player 2's creature, for example.

Better than it seems. Can be absolutely crippling at times.

This is not so bad as it seems. No, it's not cryptic command, but cryptic command is way above the power curve anyway. I would happily play this in T2 or in casual. Counterspells rarely give you anything extra, and if this cost even one less it would be far more than it should be. If you are playing a deck that usually works on the opponent's turn anyway, this will rarely be a bad thing to be carrying in your hand.

The art is nice, but I would prefer it with... well, less mist I suppose! Brings to mind Ophelia.

I just think it would be fun to counter a Rampant Growth or Primeval Titan then bounce a land. Mana advantage? Not anymore.

If only you could pick different targets for the countering and bouncing. Then it would be way more useful!

Cancel and Boomerang got together to have an okay looking kid.

Bounce Archaeomancer, Mnemonic Wall or Izzet Chronarch. It's a reusable counter. It would cost less mana with Cryptic Command, but it would cost more money. . . . How much does mana sell for on the open market?