Solomon Kane Conflicts with the Original Stories, Part Two

Predictably, everything is draped in late Gilliam, and the action is meticulously humorless — as Howard was himself. The site of a "failed" witch burning, exploded out around the stake and scattered with eyeless corpses, suggests a more interesting medieval pulp tale, but what we get is brisk, atmospheric, and faithful, for better or worse, to Howard's earnest voice.
 - Michael Atkinson, who shows about the usual level of knowledge and accuracy of Howard and his work among film crickets 

Howard's character and theme of a Puritan fighting the supernatural evils of the world gets even grittier, and adds a backstory of Kane seeking redemption after showing him to be just as evil as the horrors he encounters.  This is a welcome addition and does not hamper the character... Liberties were taken with the character, but like The Dark Knight formula: if you remain true to the character, you can change the window dressing.
 - Chris Mancini, a professed fan who considers Solomon Kane accurate to Howard's creation

Based on stories by Robert E. Howard, the creator of Conan the Barbarian, the movie hews very close to the tone, spirit, and style of the source material. Instead of reinventing the character into a pastiche of modern archetypes and tropes like so many big-budget studio tentpoles, the filmmakers set their sights on faithfully translating the character to the screen without involving so much interpretation that the core elements that make him compelling disappear.
 - NO NO NO NO NO NO NO

Since Solomon Kane has been released in the land of his creation after almost three years since its release in other regions, we've been seeing a lot of reviews of the film with fresh eyes. Some are pretty good, which at least give decent reasons for their appraisal of the film, and others are pretty bad, with the same depressing mix of "it takes itself too seriously for a proper fantasy romp" and "doesn't this all remind you of Van Helsing and all these other films that are themselves highly derivative of the source material."

My appreciation for the film has suffered over time, but I still want to say it's a decent film. It's certainly better than a lot of these dark historical fantasy films that've been released of late, and I maintain it's one of the better Sword-and-Sorcery films out there. I'll happily recommend it from that point of view. As a Howard adaptation, though? Ye gods.

Having taken time off following a hospital trip, I took the opportunity to read. In addition to a few new books, I also re-read some old favourites, including the Kane stories, but this time, I read them with the qualification: does this story still make sense if Solomon Kane happened?

(Prepare for spoilers for a 3-year-old film I've been talking about since 2008 that's only playing in a dozen or so theatres, probably because the Weinsteins are the Weinsteins)

What I'm Up To These Days

So I've been making all these vague references to "real life" issues, cryptic allusions to off-internet concerns. Well, I think it's time for me to explain just what I want to do with my life.

Hyborian Musings: Mappa Mundi, Secunda Pars

As a follow-up to my musings on Hyborian Age Cartography, there's been a veritable avalanche of activity on the subject at the Robert E. Howard Forums, and I simply have to share some of the results.

First of all, earlier this year Trent provided a rather brilliant map based upon Amra's extrapolations. Amra's work ignored the previous official maps of the Hyborian Age, choosing instead to work from Howard's original maps. This "back to basics" approach followed Dale Rippke's paradigm-shifting research and Vincent Darlage's subsequent inferences: nonetheless, Amra's visualisations go in a different direction from those of Rippke and Darlage*:

I have my quibbles with this and Amra's map (viewable here), mostly in regard to the Black Kingdoms and the extent of change in the eastern lands, but it's by far one of the best extrapolations of the southern and eastern lands of the Hyborian Age out there. But ever since then, things have been getting very exciting. I've taken the liberty of uploading some of the images here to save bandwidth and for posterity, because this is really brilliant stuff.

Those of you with slower modems, beware, for these waters are rife with large images!

The Dweller in the Nasal Cavity

Some might say, sure, Al, everyone gets the cold, it's no big deal. And I'd agree. But this... this is no mere cold. It may have all the symptoms of the common virus, and it feels like it. But I know better: I know that there is something which has taken up residence in my head, and it means to torment and despoil my temperament.

Decription? One might as well ask to paint a picture of "irritation," or "subtle," or "mischief." It does not dwell in our paltry human dimensions, but in a veil between worlds, where it can exude its dripping malfeasance without physically occupying room in my brain: that makes it safe from prying foreceps and particularly violent sneezes. All the while wheezing and squeaking with unspeakable glee at the havoc It is causing.

But fear not: even as I type with my nose simultaneously blocked and running, even as a devilishly faint but maddening tickle in my throat conspires to elicit a coughing fit, even as my eyes stare bloodshot at the world, my forces are marshalling. Around the Lymph Node fortresses great armies are gathering. The fabled White Blood Cells, holy orders of warriors dedicated to driving out the heathen bacteria, the heretical toxin, and the insidiuous virues, have summoned the Immune System: the cunning Lymphocytes detect their foe, and the relentless Phagocytes consume and destroy them. Then a host which seems to encompass the membrane: the serried ranks of dendritic cells, the platelet clans, the bacterial foederati, the wild tribes of antibodies. Soon they shall march upwards to the battle, steel in hand, to expel the invaders...

(This extrapolation of the immune system brought to you by 8-year-old Aly, though by no means the only one) In other words, I have a cold, I'll get back to you, I really think someone could make a fun Sword-and-Sorcery story using the immune system as a setting. Educational and fun!

Art of Time's Abyss

Concept art for a "Sword & Dinosaur"* universe I've been cooking up, with inspiration ranging from Burroughs, Howard, Conan Doyle, Verne, Gurney and more. No sprawling empires, no shining kingdoms, just tribes of barbarian dinosaurs, roaming an ever-changing and dangerous world...

In keeping with the Caspakian theme, welcome to Art of Time's Abyss! Since I've been concentrating on work off the 'net, I want to keep contributing without spreading myself too thin.  So, to remedy that, I'm starting a new series.

Wait, don't go!

THIS IS AN ACTUAL PANEL FROM AN OFFICIAL CONAN COMIC

Presented entirely without comment.

EDIT: I'm moved to comment. *MORATORIUM, DEACTIVATE*

Normally the devil's advocate in me would be inclined to go against the grain despite personal opinions. A tiny part of me actually wants to defend Lolos' art: if nothing else, it's certainly different.

However, I must draw the line at defending something simply because it isn't the very worst: something doesn't have to descend below Bennet's "God-Fall" to be subject to criticism. Yes, there have been bad issues in the past with Conan - after decades of top-quality material from Thomas, Smith, Buscema, Alcala, etc. I won't say Thomas was perfect, that he had no off-days, or that Smith's early work was inferior to his later work, or that they didn't have a bumpy start - but they were doing pretty solidly for many years before The Dark Times.

The current Conan run isn't even ten years old. This semi-reboot hasn't even gotten to the ten issue mark.  We've just started one of the great Conan story arcs in "Queen of the Black Coast," which stretched the story to over 40 issues in the Marvel comics, and Conan's barely out of his teens.  We should not be at the stage where this

is a panel of the main Conan comic series.

I'm going to break my moratorium to shock you all: I don't hate Lolos' art. I don't particularly care for it, and I think the constant off-model characters are distracting. But I'm not going to go so far as to say his art is bad, because he clearly has an eye for expression, his scenery is competent, and he has a definite style. That's something.  But at the same time, this is the main Conan the Barbarian line, taking one of the most ambitious and important story arcs in the character's entire life. "Something" isn't enough, this has to knock it out of the park. Lolos isn't doing that: he isn't even playing baseball.

This would be fine for a one-off, a Daughters of Midora or Songs of the Dead. But what happens in these issues affects every Conan comic in the Dark Horse series that follows until the very end.  This series acts as if exists in a vaccuum instead of being part of a long-running series with an established continuity, which means that everything Busiek and Truman did is essentially forgotten.  Wood's Conan never commanded the armies of Khoraja against Thugra Khotan; he never captained the Saucy Wench; he never freed Yogah; he never became friends with Nestor.  And when Wood's off the series, what then? Will another author continue with Wood's alternate-universe Conan, or will we get yet another reboot, only this time the massive potential of "Queen of the Black Coast" has passed by?

Yes, yes, Conan has survived the '90s, he'll survive this. That's not in question: what is in question is the potential of something truly special being wasted. And I do think the potential of "Queen of the Black Coast" is not being exploited by Dark Horse. With all due respect to Wood, the fact that he's explicitly working with such a limited pallet as the original story (possibly mandated by Dark Horse) means that we've had 8 issues of a series about the Black Coast, with three issues that are actually set on the Black Coast: three issues go back to Messantia, which has been covered in the previous arc, and two issues in Cimmeria, which was the setting of two major arcs in the past few years. We still have the current Cimmeria arc to finish before we get to the next arc, which finally takes us back to sea.

*MORATORIUM, REACTIVATE*

Good Scot/Bad Scot: Conan & The Daughters of Midora

So Conan: Daughters of Midora and Other Stories is out, and much like recent Kull, Solomon Kane and The Road of Kings collections, it's a trade paperback I'm not in a particular hurry to purchase, even if it includes a brand new story exclusive to the book. Zach Davisson has a review up, and it's fair to say he and I have rather divergent viewpoints on some aspects of Howard adaptations and pastiches. Case in point, he loved Conan and the Daughters of Midora, the banner story in this collection, which should tell you something about the quality of the pieces therein.* I... Well, I wrote a rather cynical review of it for the fifth issue of my REHupa 'zine. And since the collection's out, it seems timely to dredge it up again.

I should note that this was written in late 2011, so some of the references are a bit dated: I'm not collecting the main Conan title any more, and Savage Sword of REH has started getting on with Howard adaptations.

Good Scot/Bad Scot: A Retrospective of McFarlane's Conan, Part One

While I certainly have a great number of Conan-related piece of paraphernalia interned in my household, I'm not what you'd call a Conan collector: I just buy what I like, rather than feel compelled to get the whole set, as it were.  I have many of the reprints of the Marvel comics that adapt the stories, but I didn't see much point in going beyond the Roy Thomas run: likewise, I have thus felt no need to liberate the Conan the Adventurer action figures from whatever warehouse they're currently collecting dust in.

I was going to make an exception for the McFarlane Conans.  You can't exactly call these action figures on account of the preposterous lack of articulation: "action" figures would be something of a misnomer.  Even the Battlechargers had more freedom of movement.  However, one doesn't buy these to enact fun little battles: one buys them to display, like you would a sculpture.  It just happens to have some variety in accessories and trinkets available.  It's a nice idea, all the same.

However, the more I looked at the McFarlanes, the louder Bad Scot started to grumble.

Bite-Sized Blog: Conan, Theosophy, and Expendables

Iggy Pop dressed as Conan, looking about as depressed as I do looking at this cover to Conan the Barbarian #10.

Well, time for another update: times are interesting indeed, as it turns out I have more time for one project when I was under the impression I had a matter of days, while the other project is still in the womb of creation, waiting to be snatched out. How purposefully vague.

In the meantime, quite a few things have happened in the world of adventure.

In lieu of new posts, some links

Once again, I apologise for the lack of activity on the blog. Essentially, I've been getting ready for a big project not related to Howard. I've been reticent in posting "real life" issues on the blog, since nobody's interested in that sort of thing, but I figure I might as well let you all know I'm still chugging along.

I don't think I realised just how ambitious "80 Years of Conan" really was. I'm only two stories in, and I'm in over my head: if I'm like this for "The Frost-Giant's Daughter," how on earth could I manage such meaty courses as "Beyond the Black River" or "The Tower of the Elephant," let alone the mighty "Hour of the Dragon"? So I'm going to scale it back a bit after this. Future instalments will probably not see quite as much detail as in the final two parts of TF-GD (if they aren't split further!), but will be more like starting points of discussion. Asking the questions without necessarily answering them, if you will. I'll endeavour to make them worthwhile reading, all the same. In the meantime, I offer a few links of interest.

First, I'll give some props to my literary colleague Ross Leonard, whose comic Maximum Alan (the grand saga of Alan Moore battling legions of his alternate universe counterparts, of course) was illustrated by my artistic colleague Brian Rankin. They were barely beaten out by another acquaintance's book, Gordon McLean's No More Heroes, for the top prize at the Scottish Independent Comic Book Awards. I thought it would be expedient of me to mention them since I'm hoping to work with these fine fellows in the future.

Keith Taylor's back in action with the second part of "If Wishes Were Horses." Part one can be found here. Anyone who's been over at The Cimmerian knows that the good Mr Taylor was a fellow blogger, and so it won't surprise anyone that I must admit that fact in any discussion of his fiction. Full disclosure, and all that. Nonetheless, almost despite my appreciation of his Howard scholarship, I can't recommend his fiction highly enough. A number of Howard fans and scholars have also entered the literary field, befitting aficionados of the great yarn-spinner, but that doesn't necessarily mean that their works are my cup of tea. Keith Taylor, dear readers, very much is my cup of tea. It took me a while to track down a copy of his Bard series, but they were well worth the effort, and I think the same could be said for yourselves.

"Gudrun Blackhair has returned."

Men said it all down both sides of the Narrow Sea. The Jutes of Kent said it with violent curses, and looked to their spears and their new king. When he heard the news he did not smile again for a full day.

Watchers on the white cliffs saw a ship pass by, a long swift ship bearing the emblem of a raven with spread wings on its crimson sail. Blackhair was flaunting. It was for show, that sail. She had two plain gray-green ones for business, but it was not in her mind to sneak home. Let them all know!

 - Prologue, Bard III - The Wild Sea

Being your usual stereotypical Scot, I eat stuff like this like salted porridge.

Although the Bard books are criminally out of print, Keith has returned to the realm of fiction with Servant of the Jackal God. Quite a change of pace from post-Roman Britain, but I don't doubt Mr Taylor's usual historical rigour would let up when his scribing hand turns to Egypt.

In a final tiny bit of REH-related news, I noticed that Gary Amdahl lists Conan the Barbarian among his literary pillars:

THE PILLARS OF ADOLESCENCE:
Conan the Barbarian
Harlan Ellison’s I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream
Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood
Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment

Would've been nice to mention Howard's name, and while I instinctively rankled at putting Conan in the "adolescent" category, it's alongside the works of Capote, Ellison and blasted Dostoevsky. How could I possibly fault REH's proxy inclusion among such individuals?