Review by C.J. Bunce

Get ready for the best drawn Conan comic in years.  As we enter the tenth decade of Robert E. Howard’s Conan the Cimmerian, this week Heroic Signatures and Titan Comics are bringing back one of the most popular titles in the hero’s history.  This week The Savage Sword of Conan begins again with its first issue.  In a sweeping tale filled with action and intrigue, writer John Arcudi sends Conan on his next journey as artist Max Von Fafner provides the most densely illustrated, stylish and grand vision of Conan in years.  Marvel Comics legend Roy Thomas writes the forward to the story, and the 80 page issue includes both a Solomon Kane story written and illustrated by Patch Zircher, and a short story of Conan by Jim Zub.

It’s Conan confronting dinosaur threats and more, with a story that conjures a blend of ideas from both Frank Cho dino-books and a similar drawing style to Frank Miller, all in the stark black and white of the early Savage Conan tales.  Take a look at our preview of the first issue and the new beginnings for The Savage Sword of Conan:

Robert E. Howard’s fantasy hero Conan has taken many journeys, written by many people, but which is the “real” Conan, and which is your personal favorite?  Is it the virile Cimmerian of short stories in serialized pulp magazine tales written by Howard himself?  Where do you place Roy Thomas’s hero of even more decades of Conan the Barbarian comic book stories?  Do you consider Arnold Schwarzenegger as the definitive Conan, or the way he’s been drawn by painters and sketch artists?  Maybe Jason Momoa is your Conan.  As with Sherlock Holmes, James Bond, Tarzan, and so many other fantasy characters, the stories have continued in the form of pastiches written by others, stories that try to perfectly emulate the original writer’s style.  Only last year we reviewed a new novel of Conan here at borg.

For fans of Conan in the comics, this is a book you’ll want to add to your pull list at Elite Comics or your local comic shop.  The Savage Sword of Conan Issue #1 is in stores right now.