Conan: Scourge of the Serpent #2 review — The serpentine plot prepares to strike

The followers of the serpent god Set have begun to make their move across all ages of Titan Comics’s Howardverse —the shared comic universe comprised of the timeless character created by Robert E. Howard— in Jim Zub’s long awaited Scourge of the Serpent mini-series. Can our heroes, spread across time, hope to combat this timeless evil? Or will the serpent consume them all?

*Mild spoilers ahead for Conan: Scourge of the Serpent #2*

As with the previous issue, issue #2 follows 3 separate but connected storylines: one following King Kull in the Thurian Age, one following a young Conan in the Hyborian Age, and one following occult investigator John Kirowan in 1934. Unlike Jim Zub’s previous crossover, Battle of the Black Stone (which I reviewed here), thus far the story has not seen the three characters separated by eons come together physically. Instead, their storylines are connected through the shared threat of the serpent god Set’s followers, whose evil transcends the countless ages to challenge each in turn. Further binding the three ages together are a strange series of words, spoken aloud by Brule the Spear-Slayer in the Thurian Age, but heard by the others as if spoken directly to them in a voice only they can hear. 

Picking up immediately from the previous issue’s events, Conan finds himself in deep trouble after being caught with the corpse of Kallian Publico, the guilt of whose murder threatens to fall upon the Barbarian’s head given the highly suspicious circumstances. Granted, Conan had come to the museum to rob it —having been hired to do so by the governor’s nephew Azurias Petanius in the Free Comic Book Day Prelude—  a fact that he freely gives when protesting his innocence to the soldiers that surround him. His claims are believed only by Inquisitor Demetrio, though, as the other members of the Numalian Night Watch remain convinced by the damning coincidence. Adding to his trouble is the arrival of Azurias Petanius, who informs the soldiers that he’d never so much as seen the Cimmerian before. 

Meanwhile, in the Thurian Age, King Kull finds himself face-to-face with a horrific sight: a man who only moments before had been a familiar face, but now is revealed to be some kind of snake being. Brule informs him that there are many others within his palace that are likewise disguised, wearing faces that the king trusts. A troubling prospect, to be sure, especially as neither he nor Brule can know for certain how many snakes have now infiltrated his inner circle. Brule leaves to dispose of the body, leaving the king alone with his thoughts for a moment, before he suddenly returns and attacks the king. 

Jumping forward countless eons to Massachusetts in 1934, John Kirowan is in the home of James Gordon, where he is investigating Gordon’s claims that his wife tried to kill him after obtaining a strange serpentine ring. While speaking to Gordon’s wife Evelyn, Kirowan is suddenly overcome by a vision from another age. Evelyn is replaced by a priestess from a time long since passed, a harrowing sight that passes quickly, but leaves the occult investigator troubled, to say the least. 

Building from the events of the first issue, Scourge of the Serpent #2 raises the stakes for each of its main players. Not only do each of them find themselves further embroiled in a conspiracy that threatens their lives and countless others, but through King Kull’s storyline we learn more about the evil that our heroes face. An evil born of a primordial age, lying in wait for untold eons to strike at those who dared to believe it was defeated for good. While many things about it remain a mystery, such as how it seems to be connected across time periods separated by such great stretches as these three—, just as the mysterious words spoken by Brule are—, we’re told enough to gain at least some small semblance of understanding about the serpentine menace plaguing the Howardverse. 

That’s not to say that this issue provides little more than exposition, however. This is a Conan story, after all, and both Kull’s and Conan’s storylines contain action aplenty as one would expect from it. Kull’s fight against Brule is especially tense, even if it will come as little surprise to anyone that this isn’t actually Brule fighting. Not only is it largely a close match, but its timing so soon after discovering the first of Set’s shapeshifting followers will likely serve to make Kull all the more uneasy and cautious going forward.

The odd man out in this issue seems to be Kirowan. He neither learns of Set’s connection to the evil afflicting Evelyn, nor does he find himself drawn into a battle (though that looks like it will soon change). His storyline is slower paced, with a more grounded feel. Well, as grounded as an occult investigator can be. In many ways, this actually serves to make his encounter with Set’s evil more horrific. He doesn’t find himself coming up against snakelike shapeshifters or conniving villains ready to turn already hostile soldiers against him to save their own skin. He instead is conducting an ordinary investigation, one involving a colleague’s wife who appears to be possessed by something malevolent. While the prospect of shapeshifters replacing trusted allies is terrifying enough, it’s an entirely different matter when the threat is truly that person, or at least their body. The fact that this possession looks to be tied to the snake ring of Thoth Amon only makes this particular storyline more interesting, given his role in Zub’s recent Conan the Barbarian issues. 

Kirowan's storyline also provides a nice contrast to those of Conan and Kull, even as it highlights how nearly identical the two primordial warriors are. Kull and Conan feel so similar in their writing and demeanors that they could almost be the same character, with either being able to be swapped for the other easily. This similarity is ultimately a very minor complaint, and one that would likely be easily overlooked if other Howardverse characters also appeared in the story, as they did for Battle of the Black Stone. With the (currently) limited cast, the similarities between the nearly identical characters become all the more glaring. 

While this issue didn’t advance the overarching plot as much as I would have liked for all of the characters —one character in particular felt as if they were in a completely different story for much of the issue—, it’s ultimately an enjoyable second chapter to what promises to be an epic tale of intrigue. The idea that all of these events are happening simultaneously across an unfathomable stretch of time only serves to make Set’s threat all the more daunting, especially if one looks at Zub’s recent Conan the Barbarian books or other Howardverse books such as Patrick Zircher’s Solomon Kane: The Serpent Ring (stay tuned for that review) as proof that Set’s evil can never truly be stopped, only stalled. For now, though, we’ll just have to wait until next month to see where Jim Zub will take us on this slithering journey. 

Conan: Scourge of the Serpent #2 is available now from Titan Comics.