The Lost Conan Adventures: "Queen of the Black Coast," Part 4

But That's Another Story
Every Conan story leaves a few loose ends before the end.  Sometimes they're obvious, like Olgerd Vladislav in "A Witch Shall Be Born": the last time we see him is his ominous ride into the desert.  Others are more subtle: the fate of Altaro, Orastes' acolyte in The Hour of the Dragon, is never explicated.  The roots of future adventures are ripe for exploitation, as Olgerd and Conan crossing paths once again could form the core of an entire story, while Altaro could be biding his time and consolidating his power for future malevolence.  Sometimes, it's as simple as wondering what happened when the story ended: what did Murillo get up to after "Rogues in the House"? Did Conan and Muriela go to Punt to continue their little con game after "The Servants of Bit-Yakin"?  Where did Conan take the Wastrel after "The Pool of the Black One"?

The Lost Conan Adventures: "Queen of the Black Coast," Part 3

Weaving a Tapestry
Just as any one story can inspire future adventures, sometimes a story can be tied into earlier or later tales in Conan's life. Howard would develop the reference to Conan's adventures as Amra of the Black Corsairs in "The Scarlet Citadel" into an entire story, "Queen of the Black Coast."  "The Phoenix on the Sword" has references to Conan's thieving in Zamora, fighting with the Æsir, and as a mercenary soldier would be expanded into "The Tower of the Elephant," "The Frost-Giant's Daughter," and "Black Colossus."  Other examples are more abstract: Conan's reference to having seen "death strike a king in the midst of thousands" may technically apply to a previous story, or it could be an original adventure.

The Lost Conan Adventures: "Queen of the Black Coast," Part 2

Stories Within The Story
Howard's economy of writing meant that a great deal could be described in a few words, but there are times when one could imagine any number of things happening. Sometimes, it's a few months condensed into a paragraph, as frequently happened in The Hour of the Dragon; others, entire years go by between chapters, most famously in "Queen of the Black Coast." Other possibilities include what happens to other characters over the course of a tale, explanations for seemingly incongruous anomalies or plot holes, reconciliations with other stories - anything.

The Lost Conan Adventures: "Queen of the Black Coast," Part 1

The Tigress ranged the sea, and the black villages shuddered. Tom-toms beat in the night, with a tale that the she-devil of the sea had found a mate, an iron man whose wrath was as that of a wounded lion. And survivors of butchered Stygian ships named Bêlit with curse, and a white warrior with fierce blue eyes; so the Stygian princes remembered this man long and long, and their memory was a bitter tree which bore crimson fruit in the years to come.
But heedless as a vagrant wind, the Tigress cruised the southern coasts, until she anchored at the mouth of a broad sullen river, whose banks were jungle-clouded walls of mystery.
 - "Queen of the Black Coast," The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian, p129

Perhaps more than any other Conan tale, "Queen of the Black Coast" is the one most ripe for expansion.  In a way, it's actually two tales in one: the story of Conan's first meeting with Bêlit, and the story of their last adventure.  An entire saga could be spun between the first chapter and the rest of the yarn, and Conan's time among the corsairs is one of the most commonly referenced periods in other Conan stories.  It seems clear that Conan's time with Bêlit was a significant and lengthy period of his youth, and there are copious clues which could be teased into the legend of Amra and the She-Devil.

The Lost Conan Adventures: Introduction

This is part of yet another new series I'd been working on in the background, but the announcement that Brian Wood and Becky Cloonan would be working on "Queen of the Black Coast" galvanized me into action. While Wood emphasises that most of the 25 issues will be used to fill out the 2 years between "Queen of the Black Coast"'s "bookends," he shouldn't forget that Howard provided enough inspiration to fill an entire saga within the tale itself.  I guess I'm just hoping that if either Wood or Cloonan are reading what the rabid REH fanboys are writing about their comic, then they'll either take some of the ideas I bring up here into the comic, or that they've already come up with them.  Some elements might have been already used by Roy Thomas in either the past Marvel comics, or even in the recent Road of Kings arc: some might not be used at all.  All I can do is get my thoughts out there, so I can say that I did.

So, here's my latest Toad-of-Toad-Hall Mania.  I'd already done a lot of these in-between the Encyclopedia, but I figure it would be a good time to bump up this particular entry.