Red Sonja/Conan: The Blood of a God by Victor Gischler

Genre: Sword and Sorcery – Red Sonja & Conan

Series: Stand Alone

Publisher: Dynamite Comics (February 16, 2016)

Author Information: Website | Twitter

Length: 96 pages

My Rating: 3 stars

Red Sonja and Conan team-up! A can’t miss sword and sorcery extravaganza!

Huh.  No, I’m not talking about that movie.

What I’m talking about is the most recent comic pairing of these two legendary characters.  Red Sonja and Conan joining forces as the leaders of the king’s army, sent to defeat a vile wizard called Kal’Ang. This sorcerer having usurped power, using Blood Root to mutate his soldiers into hideous monsters who reek havoc on our heroes until an even more fearsome villain from their past emerges to destroy them once and for all!

I can’t really say I’ve ever been a Red Sonja fan until Gail Simone began writing this series a while back.  Simone turning the she-devil with a sword into a fun comic, where Sonja was always portrayed as a brash and crude warrior; she herself making sarcastic remarks about her chainmail bikini and slyly explaining the tactical advantages of her opponents looking at her boobs during a sword fight.

So when I picked this one up that Gail Simone-type story was what I was looking for.  But I didn’t get that.  Here the creative team paints Sonja as a straight up sword and sorcery heroine with Conan along for fun.  The two trading sword strokes and sexual innuendo as much as they hack down their enemies.  All of it fun, just not what I was expecting.

As for the art, I can’t complain.  There were pages where I thought Conan looked more like a Neanderthal than a barbarian and Sonja more like a lingerie model than a woman warrior though, but the former I can overlooked and the latter I can enjoy.  I mean, this is a sword and sorcery fantasy after all, so realism isn’t what I was looking for.

To sum up, this is a fun, sugarcoated, sword and sorcery tale.  Don’t pick it up expecting serious drama or even Gail Simone-like tongue-in-cheek humor, and you won’t be disappointed in the roller coaster ride it takes you on.

I received this book from Netgalley and Dynamite Entertainment in exchange for a fair and honest review. I’d like to thank both of them for allowing me to receive this review copy and inform everyone that the review you have read is my opinion alone.

Buy the book at Amazon.