Wonder Woman/Conan #1 Review and SPOILERS

Savage!

Written by: Gail Simone
Art by: Aaron Lopresti and Matt Ryan
Colours by: Wendy Broome
Letters by: Saida Temofonte
Price: $3.99
Release Date: September 20, 2017


I must admit I’ve been excited about this title ever since it was first announced. As a Wonder Woman fan of many years and a Conan fan for even longer, the prospect of these two iconic characters sharing the printed page was mouth-watering to say the least. That Gail Simone was to be responsible for the script only added to the anticipation. Simone’s understanding of everyone’s favourite Amazon princess is already well-established and her run on Red Sonja is compelling evidence that she can do sword and sorcery with enviable skill. In short, I expected this to be good. Even so, I wasn’t adequately prepared for just how enjoyable and satisfying this first issue was…


Engineering a crossover between two beloved franchises set in markedly different universes is not an easy thing to accomplish. There are, it seems, a couple of ways of doing it. The first, a la the recent Planet of the Apes/Green Lantern series, is to provide a clear in-story reason for the coming together of the different franchises; the second, a la the Snyder/Orlando/Rossmo Batman/Shadow series is to avoid addressing the issue, pretend that the two franchises have always been linked and hope no one cares enough to ask too many awkward questions. This series looks like it’s going to be opting for the former approach, although, by the end of the issue, we’ve still not got a full explanation of how Diana ends up in Aquilonia. What we have got, however, is an exceptionally engaging Conan-centric first half of the issue.

The issue starts with a single-page flashback to Conan’s youth, when, attending a meeting of clan leaders with his father, he encounters a warrior woman and Yanna, a younger warrior girl. The younger Conan is visibly struck by her… well, what exactly? She is very pretty, but it’s not her beauty that the narration focuses on but the notion that, to Conan at any rate, she “walk[s] in mystery”. What this means exactly is not clear. There is, perhaps, the hint of something supernatural going on here, but there’s not much time to dwell on this as the action shifts to focus on an older, more cynical Conan. He is about to ride past a group of three Aesir tribesmen who are preparing to burn off the jaw of Kian, a scrawny Aquilonian. Kian’s quick talking manages to persuade Conan to intervene and save him, but his promise of a gold reward for our barbarian hero proves to be a little more speculative than Conan was expecting. Despite finding out that his promised remuneration depends upon the favourable outcome of a bet on a match in the local arena, Conan is content to follow Kian and extract his reward after the fight is over.

It’s worth pointing out that both Simone’s dialogue and Lopresti and Ryan’s artwork are excellent here. Simone presents Conan with a dry sense of humour and a mercenary streak that is entirely in keeping with Howard’s original creation. The fight between Conan and the three Aesir is rendered clearly and the details of the action are appropriately bold and brutal. To cap the whole episode off, when Conan asks the final Aesir why they were preparing to torture Kian, the Aesir uses his dying breath to inform him that Kian had welched on a debt. Conan’s reaction of “Crom” is nicely wry. It seems that the chances of Conan receiving his payment are diminishing by the page.

As Conan and Kian head for Shamar, the Aquilonian city, we get our first look at a certain warrior princess. (No, not that one!) Somehow captured by Dellos the Slaver and compelled to fight in the arena, Diana is nameless and wearing a crude approximation of her normal outfit, including a star daubed (or tattooed) onto the middle of her forehead. While she can’t remember how she got there or who she is, she can remember how to fight and takes on three male opponents in a really rather impressive action sequence. 

This, of course, is the match that Kian has bet on and he has, of course, bet on gender stereotypes and come up horribly short. It’s a good thing, then, that Conan, having seen Diana and been reminded of Yanna from his childhood, is too preoccupied with the Amazonian to be angry with Kian for not being able to fulfill his promise of gold.  There follows an interesting moment in which Conan and Diana meet and a cliffhanger ending that, given the nature of the story so far, is not especially surprising but nevertheless manages to round off the issue in a satisfying way.

This is an excellent issue for a variety of reasons. Firstly, Lopresti’s art, if perhaps a little too cartoony for some Conan fans’ tastes (he’s no John Buscema, after all), suits this kind of rollicking action yarn perfectly. There’s a wonderful gruesome clarity to the fight sequences and some interesting uses of perspective, too. Outshining the art by some distance is Simone’s script. Not only does she imbue each of the main characters with their own clearly-defined personalities, but also, through her narration and despite the odd misstep (“no amount of rusted valor would penetrate his thuggish cadre of guards” is not the best), she manages to convey a grandeur and insight that adds a welcome depth and complexity to the overall story. The moment when Conan recognises (or thinks he recognises Diana) wouldn’t have anywhere near the impact without the narrator repeating a key line from earlier in the book, for example.

As first issues go, this one does its job perfectly: the main characters have met and begun to form some sort of friendship; an antagonist has been clearly identified and an amusing supporting character introduced; key questions have been raised about just how Diana has come to be in the predicament in which we find her during this issue. Satisfyingly, Simone doesn’t seem to be in any particular hurry to explain things to us, instead preferring to concentrate on exploring the emotional connection between our two leads and that, it seems to me, can only result in a more natural-seeming and involving narrative.

Bits and Pieces:

In short, this is a great start to the series. The odd bit of poor writing notwithstanding, this is a thoroughly engaging issue with great characterization that forms the basis of an already intriguing chemistry between our two lead characters. Lopestri and Ryan’s artwork is dynamic and entertaining and there are hooks galore in the form of unanswered questions about Diana and an ending that promises plenty of action next time around. Highly recommended.

8.5/10