Daily Comic Book Mission #041: Conan the Barbarian #100

Welcome back to your daily comic book mission from comicbook.beer. You are all going to want to get a cold 40 of malt liquor, but do not drink it yet because we are going to need to pour that out at the end for Belit because this is her final issue. And according to the letter section at the end of Conan the Barbarian number 100, 50 percent of the readers are sick of Belit because she has been with us since issue number 58. By now Conan has had a girlfriend for a long time. They have gone steady for what is that, 48 issues, no 42 issues. I cannot do math. It is too early.

So your daily comic book mission is Conan the Barbarian issue number 100, though I do recommend you read some of the earlier ones to either like or get sick of Belit. Maybe both, because she is a complicated character. She is a pirate, she is stubborn, she is strong and courageous, but she is also selfish, greedy, and jealous. Like constantly jealous. And I think over the past several issues Roy Thomas and crew have been depicting her as less likable in general, just to maybe get readers ready for her departure. So this is the last issue with Belit.

It is a double sized issue titled Death on the Black Coast. And I always assume everybody knows this, maybe you do not. Maybe you are a new listener to your daily comic book missions. Maybe you love Conan but you did not realize Conan originated in the early 1930s from the mind of writer Robert E Howard. Howard died young and took his own life, but before that he wrote a whole bunch of Conan stories and published them in magazines at the time. Then later in the sixties or seventies a lot of those stories came back as paperback books. Some other writers like Lynn Carter and Elspreg De Camp continued the series, and a lot of the early Conan stories came from or were inspired by those original Howard stories. Including this one, based on probably the most famous Conan story of all, Queen of the Black Coast, which is where the character Belit came from. The comic books expanded on her character a lot more than that one story ever did. She has been with Conan for years now in the series. I am not sure how much time has actually passed, but the series ran for many years.

With Belit as Conan’s sidekick, like Batman and Robin, it is Conan and Belit. And a lot of readers felt like Belit was taking some of the spotlight away from Conan. Other readers really liked her addition to the series. I think it is time for her to go. That is what I think. I think we have had enough Belit by now. We need Conan back to boozing and wenching freely across the countryside. It is like when James Bond tries to get married. It never works out.

Belit is starting to take unnecessary risks for treasure. And they are sailing on the Tigris, and they come across or return to this spooky river called the River Zarkheba, which translates to death in Cimmerian, Conan says. So maybe do not go down the Death River, but they do because there are rumors of a secret city at the end of the river filled with treasure and untold riches. And this is what motivates Belit. It is all she cares about, riches. Maybe she is drowning in credit card debt. We do not know. She spent all her money on Kull the Conqueror’s OnlyFans account unbeknownst to Conan. Yes, these are the things I think about.

Anyway, they go down this river and the crew is like no, we do not want to do this. And Conan is like this is actually a terrible idea, but they do it anyway. And there is a moment on the deck that feels like they lifted the panel straight out of this issue and put it into the Conan the Barbarian movie, which I love. The dialogue goes, What of your gods. I have never heard you call on them for aid, only swear by them. And Conan goes, Their chief is Crom. He dwells on a great mountain. What use to call on him. Little he cares if men live or die. Better to be silent than to call his attention to you. He will send your dooms, not fortune. I am reading this as Crom will send me multiple copies of Doom. That does not sound so bad.

As if this issue could not get any better, there is also an ad featuring The Thing from the Fantastic Four fighting a giant robot hawking Hostess fruit pies with the mystery flavor. Peach. There is a peach Hostess fruit pie in this issue. So we have a robot eating a fruit pie, The Thing eating fruit pies, and those look like Jawas in the background eating fruit pies. You get a big delight in every bite of Hostess fruit pies with apple, cherry, and peach. I have never had a peach Hostess fruit pie. Just another reason I need to go back to 1979 and stay there. You can keep your future. I will take the seventies.

Anyway, as they sail down this Poison River, this snake monster comes out and grabs one of the crew members and there is a really great shot of Conan running to save the guy. The artwork in this is among John Buscema’s best, and that says a lot because everything he drew was really good. This was created by the Roy Thomas, John Buscema, Ernie Chan team, and there is a lot of really nice background work as Buscema depicts this spooky city crumbling into the ground and overrun by vines.

The crew finally makes their way there and Belit goes straight for this altar. She is like, there is definitely treasure under this altar. She is reckless. A bunch of her crew members are killed and she is like, yeah whatever, let us take all the treasure. She discovers a huge mass of treasure underneath. Conan is like, you kind of suck now, what is wrong with you. But she is crazy for treasure and finds this string of jewels which Robert E Howard describes in great detail in the book, and Buscema does a good job drawing it here. This string of red jewels she is enamored with and wears around her neck. But as they are fumbling with all this treasure they miss the fact that something poisons all the water on their ship so they cannot leave because they cannot get back to the ocean without fresh water. So Conan is going to take a team of crew members into the woods to look for water while she stays behind with some others to load the jewels onto the ship.

Now if you have read the story you know what happens. Conan ends up wandering into this black lotus flower patch which is poisonous, but since he is Conan and he is so badass he just goes on a psychedelic trip and sees what this whole secret city was like in the past before humans were even a thing. Thousands of years ago there was this beautiful race of winged silver creatures that lived in this emerald city. They were geniuses and awesome at everything apparently. But then there were earthquakes and the river turned poisonous and they started to drink from it and it killed them or turned them into horrible monsters. And remember earlier there was a winged monster they saw in the distance. We can start to put two and two together.

Additionally we learn that any humans who have discovered the city since then, if they fall asleep there, they wake up as horrible hyenas or something. So there are lots of reasons not to go to this city. Conan eventually wakes up from his trip and finds his crew is either driven mad or they are all dead and he has to kill one of his friends. Then he races back to camp only to find Belit strung up on her ship by the string of jewels. The moral of the story is do not go down the River Death. She apparently was not a great pirate. Her greed got the best of her.

But we are only halfway through the issue. There is still a lot more to go because eventually Conan has to fight this monster and there are hyenas and it is filled with action. It is a really well made Conan issue. And if you like the Belit character it is sad to see her just hanging there and Conan is really upset. It is a great issue though I would not start with this as your first Conan read. Read a bunch of the earlier ones first. Get to know the Belit character and there is a surprise at the end. It is a moving, touching ending of the Belit saga. I do not think it takes Conan very long to go back to his boozing and wenching. He probably reflects on this for like 30 seconds and then he is like, all right, let us go to the bar.

And that is your daily comic book mission, an important entry in the Conan the Barbarian saga. The letter section at the end titled The Hyborian Page is very good, as the creators were excited to make it to issue 100, a double sized issue. This is a 60 cent issue of Conan in 1979. Normally they would have been 40 cents, so you get twice the Conan and only half the Belit since she is dead halfway through. There you go. That is your daily comic book mission. Now it is time to pour that 40 out for Belit. Glug glug glug glug glug. That is for you. Good job. Way to go. Do not sail down the River Death. How long does it take Conan to mourn Belit and go back to his boozing and wenching ways. Like 20, 15 seconds. We do not know. And that has been your daily comic book mission. Thanks for listening. Make sure you subscribe to ComicBook dot beer. I will see you tomorrow with more awesome comic books and complete nonsense and hopefully Hostess fruit pies.