The Sword and the Serpent!

CONAN THE BARBARIAN — Issue No. 89, May 1978

Book: Conan the Barbarian

Issue No.: 89

Published: May 16, 1978

Title: “The Sword and the Serpent!”

Cover Price: 35¢

Format: Digital Scan

This is another solid issue of Conan the Barbarian from Marvel’s first-string Conan team of 1978, writer Roy Thomas, penciler John Buscema, and inker Ernie Chan. It hits the ground running, opening with a brawl between the good guys (Conan, his girlfriend Bêlit, and his mohawk-sporting warrior pal Zula) and the goons of the king of Stygia. This king happens to be a woman — since Stygian law doesn’t allow for rule by a queen, she killed the previous king (her brother) and took the name King Ctesphon III.

Conan and company end up making an escape from the Ctesphon’s castle via a series of subterranean caves where they first have to fight a giant snake with the head of a man (and that head has smaller snakes instead of hair, in the Medusa tradition) and then shape-shifting men with snake heads. All the snake-themed monsters seem to be courtesy of Thoth-Amon, a sorcerer looking to curry favor with the woman king.

Our pal Red Sonja gets a mention here — Conan explains that she taught him the magic words “Ka Nama Kaa Lajerama,” words guaranteed to send snake people running. Those words work as advertised, and the story ends with Conan and friends escaping from Stygia. But writer Thomas promises that this won’t be the last time Conan has to deal with Thoth-Amon.

The fan-mail page in this issue has a couple of interesting notes, the big one being that as of this issue of Conan, artist John Buscema broke the Marvel house record (at the time) for most penciled pages of a single character — Jack “King” Kirby previously held the record for his iconic run on the first one hundred issues of Fantastic Four. The editors also mention an upcoming (as of 1978) Conan daily newspaper strip by Thomas and Buscema, which I don’t think I ever heard of before now. One day maybe I’ll find time to read the classic Marvel-related newspaper strips like Conan, Star Wars, and (of course) Spider-Man.

Next time — the Defenders, plus a whole bunch of other super-heroes!