New Sword-and-Sorcery Comic From Conan's Jim Zub

In a dark medieval-fantasy world, a skilled group of warriors and priests from a strict religious order have been tasked with escorting a dangerous prisoner back to the “Fayral”, an untamed primal realm of perilous elemental energy.

Their sacred charge is a mercurial and mysterious princess of the fay folk and, the closer the group gets to the land that powers her magic, the more difficult it will be to complete their quest. Worse still, at each step of this perilous journey secrets will be revealed about themselves and the history of their world that may save or damn them all.

March next year sees the publication of Omen-Bound #1, a new creator-owned comic from fan-favourite Conan The Barbarian scribe 'Grim' Jim Zub. It will be released via Image Comics.

The dark fantasy series was co-created with artist Alberto Alburquerque, while Misty Coats provides the colouring and and Marshall Dillon the lettering.

In his newsletter this week, Jim Zub describes the project as follows:

"Omen-Bound is dark fantasy, mysterious and emotional with an old school Dungeons & Dragons-style ensemble party and evocative narration familiar to readers enjoying my run on Conan the Barbarian.

"To say this is a passion project for our team is an understatement. I can’t wait for you to see how far Alberto is pushing himself on every single page and, when that’s coupled with Misty’s colors and Marshall’s lettering, it really is magic."

Guess this is going on my pull-list then?

Sample Omen-Bound art by Alberto Alburquerque

"Indiana Jones. I Always Knew Some Day You'd Come Walking Back Through My Door"

These belong in a museum

It seems fitting that on Karen Allen's birthday, we celebrate the arrival of a brace of gorgeous hardback collections of Marvel's Further Adventures of Indiana Jones comic books from the 1980s.

Each sporting faux leather covers and a stitched in red silk bookmark, both these arcane tomes are going to look majestic on a book shelf with my other Indiana Jones books acquired through the years.

Volume one contains adaptations of Raiders of the Lost Ark and Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, plus issues one to 16 of the Further Adventures of Indiana Jones, while volume two includes issues 17 to 34 of the Further Adventures of Indiana Jones series and the four-issue miniseries adaptation of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.

The main series was first published between 1982 and 1985, with five of the story arcs also serving as the basis for adventures in the much-maligned Indiana Jones roleplaying game from TSR.

I can't recall just how many of the original run I read back in the day, although I'm sure quite a few were also reprinted in a British Indiana Jones magazine if my memory serves me right.

So, I'm looking forward to being able to follow the full 34 issues of Indy's adventures here, in time for his next Marvel tale to launch this December. Hopefully, Marvel will also eventually be able to reprint his various miniseries runs from Dark Horse Comics in a similar stylish form.

You can read more about this pair of 500-plus page Further Adventures of Indiana Jones collections in an earlier article here.

Sonja's Back To Make Your Solstice Wishes Come True

Main cover art by Francesco Mattina

Ace swords-and-sorcery scribe Torunn Grønbekk returns to the pages of Red Sonja for the Red Sonja Solstice Special, due out from Dynamite on December 15.

Join the She-Devil of Hyrkania in a solstice celebration that turns quite bloody, truth be told! Sonja, having come into some gold, is celebrating at a tavern. It is midwinter, and people everywhere are celebrating the holiday season - but the tranquility is shattered by a trip to a cursed village, with demons, slaughter and carnage in its wake!

Art for this one-shot comes courtesy of Edson Novaes, who illustrated the recent Red Sonja Noir: The Plunder & The Princess.

Variant cover art by Josephine Tomarchio

READING REPORT: Not Much To Report

Honestly, I don't know where this week has gone. Have I been so under a cloud and distracted that it has slipped by me?

I know we had games night, I binged the excellent Reacher spin-off Neagley on Prime Video, and Rachel and I have been to the gym a couple of times, but beyond that it's all a bit of a blur.

Somehow I don't think I read a thing this week: no books, no comics... that can't be right, can it?

However, one definite thing I have "achieved" this week is the acquisition - or should I say "reacquisition" - of the Ace edition of the first volume of the epic shared world series Thieves' World, edited by Robert Aspirin.

In recent years I have been able to corral the subsequent four volumes, but this edition (shown above) was a right bugger to track down, especially when operating on a tight budget.

I owned, and read, this edition when it first appeared over here in the UK, almost 50 years ago, and, as much as I enjoyed the roguish, old school Dungeons & Dragons-style adventures within, it was the cover I was besotted with.

It was no surprise that it was also used on the cover of the roleplaying box set based on the book series, and its central city of Sanctuary, that statted up most of the main characters for a multitude of rules systems.

To my simple tastes, this cover painting is - and always will be - the definitive "you begin in a tavern" illustration. If I could start a campaign, or even an adventure, that gave me the same chills as this book cover I'd be a very happy gamesmaster.

Anyway, I came across this well-read but still in magnificent condition, book on eBay the other day and was delighted to see it listed as a "buy it now". You can imagine how quickly I slammed that button when I realised that even with postage this was going to cost me less than a tenner.

It arrived a couple of days later, well packed and ready to be shelved next to my other Thieves' World books (see below).

I'd been holding off trying to read these latter books because I wanted to start at the beginning of the franchise.

Now I can.

A snapshot of one of my sword-and-sorcery shelves

THERE CAN BE ONLY FOUR (ISSUES)

Issue one variant cover art by Brian Bysouth

Previously announced as a single graphic novel, Titan Comics adaptation of Gregory Widen’s original script for 1986's iconic Highlander will now, first, be released as a four-part comic book miniseries, debuting in December.

The adaptation is being written by Widen himself, with Szymon Kudranski on art duty.

A collected edition of Highlander: The Original Screenplay is now scheduled to follow in July.

Issue one variant cover art by Lee Binding

Issue one variant cover art by Szymon Kudranski 

Issue one variant cover art by Claudia Gironi

READING REPORT: Back On Track... Hopefully!

Two bits of great news on the reading front this week: I've finally resumed Draugr after too long a break and my copy of the Deathstalker novelisation has arrived, shipped all the way from the U.S. of A.

I can't believed I put Draugr aside in the middle of such a tense sequence, and now I'm back in the deep, dark, scary forest I'm pleased to report the book is still incredibly atmospheric and creepy.

With Deathstalker turning up there's been yet more jiggery-pokery with my "to be read" list, meaning that this movie adaptation is now the next thing I intend to read, once I wrap up Draugr, 

While all this excitement was going on, I did get another of my fortnightly comic book shipments up from Paradox Comics in Poole, which means another nine comics to also slip in the "immediate" reading pile.

This week's comics

As long as I can be disciplined about it, I'm hopeful that I can somehow alternate between Draugr and the comics, rather than putting the novel aside again to make way for comic books.

I'm feeling surprisingly confident that I'll be able to do this. To paraphrase Madonna, I reckon I'm getting "into the groove" with this whole "reading" malarky again after years of dithering because of my poor concentration.

Of course, I also really need to start reading some roleplaying game rules books as well if I want to prove to the Tuesday Knights that I'm ready to run a campaign for them without bottling it after a couple of sessions.

Meanwhile, as we stand. the top titles in my reading list to follow Draugr are: Deathstalker; The Hammer Horror Omnibus, Volume One; and Ghosts, Trolls and The Hidden People: An Anthology of Icelandic Folk Legends.

Holy Habitual Viewing, Batman, He'll Have Square Eyes!

With this morning's screening of Minerva, Mayhem and Millionaires, I have now watched every episode of the classic Batman serial from '60s in the order they were originally transmitted.

Thanks to the great Talking Pictures TV channel here in the UK, this has been my Saturday morning ritual for the last 28 months or so.

While the idea was to simply ensure I saw all the episodes of this magnificently camp crimefighting show, I can't help but pass comment on the third - and last - season, when the show's makers swapped out Aunt Harriet (Madge Blake) for Batgirl/Barbara Gordon (Yvonne Craig).

Clearly, they felt a '60s audience of (mainly) young boys couldn't cope with two lead female characters at once. It's a pity because as much as I welcome Craig's take on Batgirl, I did miss Aunt Harriet's obliviousness to the Bat-centric shenanigans going on under her nose in stately Wayne Manor.

It was also a bit sad - but emblematic of episodic TV at the time - that Dick Grayson/Robin's  (Burt Ward) aunt wasn't even mentioned this season.

Then again, perhaps she left Gotham at just the right time as the storytelling took a massive nosedive, thanks to attempts to mix things up.

The show largely abandoned its winning two-part story formula (thus eliminating the highly entertaining cliffhangers at the end of part one of every tale) as well as bringing in a host of bland new villains instead of relying on the iconic comic book antagonists (Joker, Riddler, Penguin, Catwoman etc).

The many, wildly popular, comic book continuations of the show have shown that with the right writers and characters, Batman '66 could have run and run.

Batman '66 #1 from 2013

This isn't to say, however, that the TV show was ever less than perfect Saturday morning entertainment.

No matter what silliness was unfolding onscreen, you could always guarantee that Adam West's Batman would take their circumstances seriously... and always have exactly the right Bat-doohickey in his utility belt to help him, Robin, Batgirl, and Alfred (Alan Napier) out of any sticky situation.

But Batman isn't the only vintage show I've watched from start-to-finish in the last couple of years.

I started with all the available episodes of Dad's Army, being shown on U&Gold.

This has always been a very special show to me (and warranted its own article here), because of its connections to my dad.

Then, thanks to Legend, showing four episodes each weekend, I saw every episode of the original Twilight Zone.

Most recently, thanks to the BBC, I watched the entirely of the sublime I, Claudius from the 1970s. I remember watching some of the episodes when I was a child and some, much later, when I was in hospital recovering from my aneurysm. But I'd never seen the entire show from start-to-finish before.

The thing is I have Blu-Rays of the complete runs of both Batman and the Twilight Zone, but it felt somehow more 'authentic' to watch them weekly as new episodes were released on standard definition channels.

I'm also a great believer in the concept of "appointment television". I've a ton of shows on Netflix (where all the episodes drop at once) that I've started, but then felt no incentive to push on with.

However, knowing I'll have to wait a week for a new episode keeps the flame of enthusiasm lit.

Of course, I do binge shows. I'm not a luddite. But weekly shows are still my preferred form of delivery. Because I'm that old.

It did strike me that there was possibly something a tad morbid about this particular project of mine: ensuring I'd seen every episode of select great shows before I pop my clogs.

But I can assure you my motives are a lot more positive. There's so much great television being made all the time that it's easy to overlook the classics of old in the rush to embrace the new.

This is especially true for shows that - over the years - I've dipped in and out of, rather than watching religiously.

With my increasingly unreliable memory, I want to make sure I'm not missing great television from earlier decades while consuming the current crop of high calibre entertainment.

I'm now contemplating what show I might tackle next.

The original run of Star Trek is definitely a contender, although that will be a binge rather than appointment viewing as it's on Paramount Plus these days.

It's actually being shown on Legend as well, but that channel is in the middle of the second season and I don't want to have to wait for them to get round to the start of season one again if I'm going to go "where no man has gone before" as soon as possible.

Will I be boldly going from start to finish on the Final Frontier next?

Supergirl (2026)

So, Supergirl. It's not as bad as you've probably heard, but it isn't that great either.

Kara Zor-El (House of The Dragon's Milly Alcock) aka Supergirl is celebrating her birthday with a bar crawl on red sun worlds (where her super powers are suppressed so she can get the full benefit of the alcohol she consumes) with her dog, Krypto, tagging along.

However, she finds herself "recruited" by a vengeance-seeking young girl called Ruthye (Eve Ridley) whose parents were brutally slain by Krem (Matthias Schoenaerts), the bland leader of a bland bunch of generic ne're-do-wells called The Brigands (I kid you not). 

Initially, Kara wants nothing to do with all this, but then Krem shoots Krypto with a drug that will kill the beloved dog in three days - without the antidote that the leader of The Brigands carries around with him.

With Ruthye following along, Kara then sets out to track Krem and get the medicine that will save Krypto. 

Along the way they run into the immortal bounty hunter Lobo (Jason Momoa), who is tracking another member of The Brigands, and he kind of ends up helping Kara and Ruthye more by luck than design.

The plot is essentially True Grit in Space, with Ruthye as Mattie Ross, Supergirl as Rooster Cogburn and Lobo as the Texas Ranger LaBoeuf, with an element of Mad Max: Fury Road thrown in at the end as The Brigands are kidnapping female aliens to use as "brides".

One of the major weaknesses of Supergirl is the wretchedly uninteresting generic blandness of the film's antagonists. Krem is just a bloke with facial piercings who could easily have been "alien number 23" in the background of almost any shot of James Gunn's Guardians of The Galaxy trilogy at Marvel.

And that's the odd thing, Gunn produced this movie, but it was written by first-timer Ana Nogueira (seriously, this was her first feature film scripting credit) and directed by Cruella and I, Tonya's Craig Gillespie, loosely based upon a divisive comic book series from Tom King called Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow, yet it is desperately trying to look like a Guardians of The Galaxy movie.

Which is dumb as DC Comics - home of the Superman Family - has its own style for space adventures and a rich catalogue of memorable villains that could have brought some life to the central thread of the film.

Again, this is highlighted by some of the delightfully odd supporting alien characters, making you wonder why the creators of Supergirl opted for the "people on the way to Burning Man" look for the movie's main villains.

The film's lack of inspiration also spills over into the multiple planets the story takes place on, with none being particularly memorable or exciting, the only real variable is the planet bathed in the light of a green sun, which has a crippling effect on Kara for unexplained reasons. Is it a Kryptonite sun? Or is she just allergic to the colour green? 

Luckily, though, the planet has two suns... and the other is yellow.

This was supposed to be a clever trap by The Brigands, using the "green sun's rays" to debilitate Kara the Kryptonian, and yet they completely overlooked the fact that the system's second sun would then power her up to full strength again.

The plot - despite being based on one of the greatest Western stories in the canon - is predictable and linear, punctuated with a confusing and messy jumble of fight scenes that aren't really as engaging as good action scenes should be.

Lobo, a tiresome, one-joke character from the comics that I really dislike, adds nothing to the story, except the occasional bit of muscle, but his role is ultimately an extended cameo purely to cement Jason Momoa's role in this new post-Zack Snyder era of the DC movie universe.

Momoa is always good value for money, but I still enjoyed his portrayal of Aquaman in the previous DC movies more than his appearance here.

Conversely, there's some incredibly impressive work done on building Kara's backstory and personality, differentiating it from Superman's and allowing the character of Kara to grow into accepting her role as Supergirl by the final act.

The flashback scenes of Kara's early years on Argo - the protected city blasted away from Krypton when that planet exploded - are truly tragic and give the film heart that the main plot lacks.

Even when she's sharing a scene with David Corenswet's Superman (who pops in for a couple of cameos of his own), Milly Alcock holds her own and gives us an interesting and convincing take on Supergirl, that, I'll confess, going into the film - with all the bigoted baggage it had attracted - I wasn't 100 percent sure we'd see.

I know the film didn't perform as well at the box office as expected (after the great success of Superman), but I really hope we see Alcock's Supergirl again.

Through this film, despite faults elsewhere, she developed into a version of the character that could provide a novel contrast to Superman's Big Blue Boy Scout, without going full-Synderverse grimdark.

HAVE YOU READ SONJA?

Back at the height of the cinematic swords-and-sorcery boom of the 1980s, a half-dozen novels were published featuring the She-Devil With A Sword, Red Sonja.

All were written by David C Smith and Richard L Tierney and are now long out-of-print. Until now!

January sees the publication of The Collected Chronicles of Red Sonja, a 928-page hardcover collecting all those stories in a single volume.

Since her introduction to the Hyborian Kingdoms, Red Sonja has become one of the most iconic characters in fantasy, spawning dozens of comics, novels, and multiple live-action films. Now, almost fifty years later, the original novels are collected for the first time in one omnibus edition. Follow Red Sonja's tale from sorcerous start to sword-slashing finish, and see, in the mists of legend, how the she-devil with a sword was born...

The six stories are: The Ring of Ikribu ; Demon Night; When Hell Laughs; Endithor's Daughter; Against the Prince of Hell; and Star of Doom.

I welcome the republication of these eagerly sought-after novels and attribute this decision to the success of Heroic Signatures and Titan and their great work with the characters and worlds of Robert E Howard.

This has really lit a fire under the sword-and-sorcery genre that has grabbed the attention of new fans as well as pleasing the hardcore fans of old.

Long may this new age of sword-and-sorcery reign!

Photo Guide To Military Odyssey

Our favourite living history display of the day

On Bank Holiday Monday, Rachel, Alice and I attended Military Odyssey at the Kent County Showground, as we usually do.

Once again I had the benefit of a hired mobility scooter to get around (often with Alice riding in my lap) but poor Rach put in thousands of steps keeping up with us.

As ever, the show was a magnificent blend of historical periods, from the ancients to modern warfare (although with the ever-present bias towards the Second World War), represented by talented and knowledgeable reenactors, all more than happy to talk about their area of expertise.

In our enthusiasm to get there we'd forgotten that Alice absolutely hates the (near-constant) sound of gunfire at the event, so we've assured her that if we come back next year she can spend the day with Rachel's parents - which she would much prefer.

She was only really settled when we popped into covered café area for dinner, where there was old time music and dancing going on.

Our "small" selection of pictures can't do the event justice, and don't even include the many, many stalls selling militaria, action figures, army surplus, antique swords and guns, books, artwork etc

ANCIENTS

JAPANESE DRUMMING & WEAPONS

ALL-IMPORTANT ICE CREAM BREAK

LUNCHBREAK

Sadly, the only time of the day when Alice wasn't stressing out 

OUR FAVOURITE DISPLAY

The display by Hell-and-Back was so impressive, a Second World War medical unit had taken over a crumbling, derelict building. The delightful man - who could have stepped out of the pages of a vintage war comic - that we spoke to, for ages, explained how it was all assembled from flatpack and scavenged items. And we talked about dogs (of course).

OTHER WORLD WAR II DISPLAYS

EMOTIONAL SUPPORT GEESE

Because why wouldn't you? 

Rachel says I can't have an emotional support goose

MISCELLANEOUS

Alice was confused by the tiny people in tanks

THE OLD WEST

PURCHASES

Three sale purchases covering a good spectrum of my interests