Review by Frank Plowright
Although written by Jim Zub and title-featuring the black stone menace connecting his other Conan graphic novels, there’s a reason Battle of the Black Stone isn’t a regular series volume. In fact the cover of Conan alone hides a pleasing secret. The mystical threat here extends its tendrils across time and space to affect the protagonists of other fiction written by Conan’s creator Robert E. Howard. These range from relatively known Puritan warrior Solomon Kane to those based in 20th century USA whose appearances in comics have been few. Each of them separately comes across a sigil in different forms.
Yes, it’s Robert E. Howard Team-Up, which might disappoint people just grabbing the book on the basis of the Conan title and cover portrait. However, they should stick with it as Zub’s come up with a viable method of spotlighting wildly different adventurers, noting the sigil as a sign that slips into the subconscious and echoes there. That means it can equally affect French huntress Agnes De Chastillon in 1456 and John Conrad and Professor John Kirowan in 1936. Zub even manages to include Pict warrior Brissa, introduced in Bound in Black Stone.
Several different time periods mean Battle of the Black Stone can’t be anything other than episodic at the start, but characters from different times unite as the story plays out.
Those different times mean artist Jonas Scharf has to be adaptable in presenting Conan’s rough world as credibly as a 1936 gentleman’s club, which he does via effective use of shadow. There’s a beast connected with the Black Stone, and Scharf’s design is suitably other-worldly, causing pause just at the sight of it, while it’s also constructed to be effective in action.
Zub manages several surprises, and Conan eventually becomes the priority. It means, much, but not all, of the supporting players are limited to a few pithy comments. The back of the book text pages give explanations as to who the other characters are, and it seems as if Battle of the Black Stone is means of introducing them for later plans. They’re a varied bunch, with the nearest equivalent selection being the assorted titles Mike Mignola has sprung from Hellboy (see recommendations).
As an exercise in mixing vastly different characters, this is a success via not diluting any of them while simultaneously pleasing Conan’s fans.
