Conan: Battle of the Black Stone #4 Review
Writer: Jim Zub
Artist: Jonas Scharf
Colorist: Jão Canola
Letterers: Richard Starkings & Tyler Smith
Editors: Chris Butera & Matt Murray
Cover Artists: Thomas Nachlik, Andy Belanger & Mike Deodato
Publisher: Titan Comics
Price: $3.99
Release Date: December 4, 2024
James Allison delved into the dark recesses of the soul. El Borak sought to protect the kidnapped son of a tribal chief. John Conrad accompanied his friend to view a treasure hunter’s discovery. Dark Agnes wanted to stop an evil wizard from raising the dead and practicing Human sacrifice. Conan followed Pict zombies into a dark citadel to rescue his captured kin. Now, all five are dead. Only John Kirowan, Soloman Kane, and Brissa the Pict scout remain. Can the surviving trio defeat a monster that attacks through space, time, and memories? Let’s leap into Conan: Battle of the Black Stone #4 and find out!
Story
John Kirowan’s thirst for knowledge brought him to The Wanderers Club to meet El Borak. The scholar didn’t understand the adventurer’s fright until the Beast of the Black Stone attacked. Then, the creature invaded El Borak’s mind and killed him. His friend, John Conrad, was fueled by proof of this fantastic otherworldly power that brought them to the Hyborian Age. But like Pippin Took and Saruman’s Palantir, John Conrad didn’t respect the Black Stone’s power. So, the monster invaded John Conrad's mind like it had El Borak. In Conan: Battle of the Black Stone #4, John Kirowan’s friend lies dead with Dark Agnes and Conan the Cimmerian.
Conan’s investigation in the Pict lands near Conajohara served as a beacon across time and space. His death uproots the surviving heroes' anchor to the Hyborian Age. But John Kirowan refuses to be fate's puppet. Taking inspiration from Odin and the occult rituals he has studied, Kirowan chants an incantation and plunges a knife into his eye. After forging a link with this otherworldly energy, he perceives the spirits of Brissa’s ancestors walking through the forest. Like Star-Lord, the others help John Kirowan channel the Stone's energy into Conan's body, reviving the Cimmerian.
Soloman Kane threatened Conan when they met in Jim Zub’s story. As Soloman Kane didn’t know Brissa, his suspicion of Conan’s friend drove the wedge between him and the Cimmerian deeper as they traveled. Yet in Conan: Battle of the Black Stone #4, Soloman Kane risks his soul and place in eternity to revive Conan.
After his battle alongside Kull, Conan discarded the Atlantean sword in Shadizar, refusing to play an ongoing role in this otherworldly struggle. Now, Brissa holds what she wanted when they pursued the Tribe of the Lost beyond Hauler's Roam. She wields the spear of her ancestor, Brule. Her mother's spirit sent her on this quest for redemption. Like El Borak and John Conrad, the Black Stone invaded her people’s minds, turning some into zombies, corrupting their heritage, and dooming their future. Brissa must find a way to defeat it, or the Picts will be its slaves forever.
Art
Jão Canola's otherworldly fire burns yellow and green, threatening to consume John Kirowan, Soloman Kane, and Brissa like Human torches. The fire tinges the forest orange and fills the background with darkness in Conan: Battle of the Black Stone #4. Yet as it surges through Conan's body, it turns his bulging eyes yellow, and he awakens as on Akiro’s sacred burial grounds. John Kirowan smiles as the green and yellow fire surges from his eye socket. Not only has he helped pull back a comrade from death's clutches. Finally, John Kirowan sees the world as he always yearned to.
Jonas Scharf's characters follow glowing spirits along a yellow serpentine trail while a blue-and-yellow Macaw wings overhead. Amid a break in the forest, the adventurers spy a beacon of light shooting through the color-filled sky, evoking Atali’s plea to Ymir for help. Walking alongside ghosty Picts, John Kirowan seems as confident as his living compatriots, while the spectral form of James Allison flies through the sky like Akiro’s spirits. When they find the monster surrounded by an orb of energy, perhaps John Kirowan remembers how his friend John Conrad compared it to a dirigible. Does the sword El Borak embedded in the creature's skull remind Soloman Kane of a cross on a lonely hill?
Richard Starkings and Tyler Smith conjure black uppercase words into white dialogue balloons and green narrative boxes in Conan: Battle of the Black Stone #4. The letters grow bold for intonation, swell for raised voices, and rarely shrink. James Allison's explanations and warnings haunt cloudy dialogue balloons as the group treks through the forest. Yet later, his words inhabit light blue clouds, untethered by arrows, as his spirit finds a new place to roam. Thanks to Titan Comics and Heroic Signatures for providing a copy for review.
Final Thoughts
When the Black Stone’s power proves too powerful for stalwart warriors to combat, a scholar’s thirst for knowledge and a writer’s imagination proves pivotal in defeating a mind-consuming power in Conan: Battle of the Black Stone #4.
Rating 9.8/10
For more covers and interior art, see my Conan: Battle of the Black Stone #4 Preview.
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