Conan The Barbarian #24 - Marvel Comics

CONAN THE BARBARIAN No. 24, October 2021

Besides being something of a lack-lustre lead in to “the landmark three hundredth issue next month and a shocking return to a fan-favourite Conan era”, Jim Zub’s script for “A Sacrifice At Sea” probably struck many within the publication’s audience as something of a non-story. For whilst the twenty-page periodical’s plot eventually serves up an antagonist of sorts for the Cimmerian in the shape of the unsociable navigator Naogu, it is debatably never made clear whether the mad sailor is actually responsible for either the “drowning hell” which almost sinks the good ship Crow, or the utterly bizarre sign seen “emblazoned across the sky” during a deadly storm.

Indeed, the circumstances surrounding just how Captain Hu’s sailing vessel suddenly finds itself assaulted on every side by numerous tower-tall waves during the middle of the night is never explained, as the Canadian author instead simply tries to intimate that the terrifying tempest has mysteriously been drawn to the Barbarian’s very location like a hunting hound following its prey’s scent; “And yet trouble always comes where you tread, no? What did you do to bring such a curse down upon your life?”

Of course, that isn’t to say that Issue Twenty Four of “Conan The Barbarian” doesn’t contain some pulse-pounding panels, all dynamically drawn by penciller Cory Smith, as the titular character desperately deposes a maniacally super-strong helmsman so as to allow the skipper to frantically take the wheel. Yet such a straightforward storyline as the muscle-bound adventurer simply surviving a night-time squall, no matter how lethally ferocious, is arguably hardly the stuff of Hyborian Age legends or the central basis of an entire comic book based upon Robert E. Howard’s sword and sorcery hero.

Somewhat cynically however, “A Sacrifice At Sea” doesn’t actually finish with the barbarian stoically sailing off into the sunset with the vessel’s half-dozen survivors, courtesy of Zub ‘bolting on’ to its end a short, disconcertingly unfinished tale involving the Queen of the Black Coast “years later”. This incongruous conclusion depicts Belit and her black-maned lover stumbling upon the entranceway to a temple, perturbingly prettified with the “ominous symbol” witnessed during the downpour which cost Hu and Naogu their lives, and abruptly concludes without either pirate actually stepping foot inside the wholly unwelcoming building.

Writer: Jim Zub, Artist: Cory Smith, Inker: Roberto Poggi, and Colorist: Israel Silva