Robin Marx's Writing Repository

Fantasy, horror, and science fiction reviews

This review originally appeared at Grimdark Magazine on January 11, 2026.

Conan the Barbarian #25

By Jim Zub (Writer) and Alex Horley (Artist) – Titan Comics – October 8, 2025

Review by Robin Marx

In Conan the Barbarian #25, after untold leagues of single-minded solitary travel, a cloaked stranger presents himself at the city gates of Tarantia, capital of Aquilonia, demanding to speak to King Conan. Initially rebuffed as a vagrant by the city guards, the anonymous visitor simply sits in the dust and waits patiently outside the gate until Conan finally gives in to curiosity and grants him an audience. Revealing himself to possess bone-white hair and the pallor of a corpse, the stranger claims to bear a great gift for Conan, but one that will only be bestowed after receiving three days of the king’s hospitality. In the days to follow, Conan’s queen and closest allies each approach him with their misgivings, but the king remains determined to stay the course even despite the visitor’s unsettling demeanor. At the close of the third day, the so-called “nomad” springs his trap, drawing Conan into a phantasmagorical realm where the barbarian-turned-king must survive a series of life-threatening ordeals to win “a prize akin to immortality.”

Entitled “The Nomad,” this special extra-long one-shot issue commemorates two full years of Conan the Barbarian at Titan Comics. While the barbarian has appeared as ruler of Aquilonia before in the ongoing The Savage Sword of Conan title, this issue marks the first King Conan story in Titan’s main Conan the Barbarian title and the first one penned by Jim Zub himself. But what makes this issue so remarkable is the artwork by Alex Horley. Over the course of a year, Horley rendered every page of the artwork as oil paintings. Horley has consistently delivered some of the most eye-catching covers for Titan’s The Savage Sword of Conan, so seeing an entire issue of the main comic receive such deluxe treatment is impressive.

Appropriately for an anniversary issue, with Conan the Barbarian #25 writer Jim Zub delivers a retrospective of Conan’s career that simultaneously does double duty as an approachable introduction to the character. Through flashback-like visions the reader is treated to a series of pivotal scenes in Conan’s adventures, some of which have been covered in the Titan comic run (Conan’s encounter with Atali’s frost giant brothers), and others which have as yet only appeared in the original Robert E. Howard fiction or previous comic adaptations (e.g., we see the ape-like Thak, from “Rogues in the House,” and Conan’s crucifixion in “A Witch Shall be Born”). Conan’s opponents are mocking, talkative specters, and through the dialogue Zub demonstrates both the aging Conan’s philosophy and his indomitable spirit. In the end, Zub brings it home by neatly tying the story in with one of the most recognized and quoted passages in the Conan literary canon.

Alex Horley’s artwork is truly gorgeous throughout. Horley offers up dynamic combat, excellent depictions of favorite Conan the Barbarian monsters, and the most alluring portrayal of pirate queen Bêlit seen in the Titan Comics titles so far. While never obtrusive, the texture of the canvas is occasionally visible through the artwork, a pleasing reminder of the care and workmanship that went into this issue. Even in a series blessed with talented artists, the work here is something special.

Conan the Barbarian issue 25 is perhaps the best single issue of the Titan Comics incarnation to date. Not only is it visually gorgeous, but the story is also an eloquent summation of the appeal of both the character of Conan and Sword & Sorcery fiction in general. If I knew a comic reader who wanted to know what this whole Conan business was about and why people are still excited about this nearly century-old character, this is the issue I would hand them.

#ReviewArchive #ComicReview #Fantasy #SwordAndSorcery #JimZub #AlexHorley #TitanComics #ConanTheBarbarian #GrimdarkMagazine #GdM

This review originally appeared at Grimdark Magazine on November 7, 2025.

The Essential Horror of Joe R. Lansdale

By Joe R. Lansdale – Tachyon Publications – October 7, 2025

Review by Robin Marx

Joe R. Lansdale is your favorite horror writer’s favorite horror writer. Widely anthologized and the recipient of no fewer than ten Bram Stoker Awards, it doesn’t feel accurate to characterize the prolific East Texas author as underrated, per se, but to this reader it has long felt like Lansdale should be much more of a household name, up there with Stephen King. Lansdale’s Hap and Leonard series of novels has received popular acclaim from crime fiction fans, but readers who are less plugged into the horror short fiction scene (as opposed to the novel market) are all too often unacquainted with his work. Tachyon Publications is attempting to rectify this injustice with The Essential Horror of Joe R. Lansdale. This convenient volume packages 16 tales spanning the lengthy career of this “Champion Mojo Storyteller.” The stories gathered here are dark, occasionally crude, often bleakly humorous, frequently gross, and always offbeat.

The Essential Horror of Joe R. Lansdale opens strongly with “The Folding Man.” Some teenagers out joyriding after a Halloween party encounter a big black automobile carrying a group of nuns. One of the boys decides to “moon” the nuns as a joke, and the sight of his bare buttocks immediately sends the nuns into a murderous rage. When their savage high-speed pursuit fails to eliminate all the teens, the nuns produce a bizarre mechanical man from the trunk of their car, dispatching it like the robot from The Terminator to hunt down the survivors. Relentlessly paced, filled with graphic violence, and operating by incomprehensible nightmare logic, “The Folding Man” sets the tone for the stories to follow. It lets the reader know that they are now in Lansdale’s world, in which a quirky, chance encounter can rapidly escalate into something horrific and fatal.

Weird Westerns are one subgenre in with Lansdale excels, perhaps due to his Texan background, and this volume includes a pair of them. In “The Hoodoo Man and the Midnight Train,” a gunsmith with some aptitude for folk magic and his apprentice are hired to retrieve the soul of an innocent woman condemned to an eternity as a passenger on a ghostly train guarded by a demonic duelist. The clever and methodical way in which the Hoodoo Man tackles this supernatural predicament feels like a satisfying blend of the early Witcher stories by Andrzej Sapkowski and the Silver John Appalachian folk horror tales by Manly Wade Wellman. “The Hungry Snow” is the second Weird Western, in which a wanderer known as the Reverend Jedidiah Mercer encounters a handful of bedraggled travelers stranded in the Rocky Mountains. Having exhausted their supplies, the hapless survivors have resorted to cannibalism. While the Reverend is understandably cautious around his hungry and desperate new acquaintances, the party as a whole face a greater threat: a prowling Wendigo lurking just beyond the campfire. Like “The Hoodoo Man and the Midnight Train,” “The Hungry Snow” features a level-headed and resourceful protagonist using their expertise and their wits to extract themselves from dire straits.

The Essential Horror of Joe R. Lansdale also includes a pair of post-apocalyptic tales, each with an appropriately unconventional spin. “Tight Little Stitches in a Dead Man’s Back” chronicles the descent into madness of a scientist emerging from an underground shelter into the world he had a hand in destroying. Humanity is all but extinct, and the surface world has been claimed by bizarre, hostile wildlife, forcing the scientist and his estranged wife to shelter together in a lighthouse waiting for the inevitable. While it still feels a little overstuffed to me, like it has more than enough ideas to sustain two separate stories, “Tight Little Stitches in a Dead Man’s Back” was one of the more memorable stories from the George R. R. Martin-edited volume Wastelands 2: More Stories of the Apocalypse (2015). The frequently anthologized novella “On the Far Side of the Cadillac Desert with Dead Folk” is another work of exceptional post-apocalyptic fiction. When a bounty hunter and his ruthless quarry are captured by religious zealots building an undead army, the two enemies must join forces to escape torture and death. Replete with a “Jesusland” theme park, sexy nuns, Mouseketeer ear hat-wearing zombies, and a dash of necrophilia, this story epitomizes Lansdale’s gonzo, deranged appeal.

The second novella collected in The Essential Horror of Joe R. Lansdale is probably his most famous work, due to the well-received 2002 film adaptation by Don Coscarelli (Phantasm, The Beastmaster, etc.): “Bubba Ho-Tep.” Set in an East Texas retirement home, the story is told from the perspective of an elderly man who is either Elvis in his twilight years or an impersonator who has kept up the act so long that his original identity has become foggy. When their fellow residents begin dying under mysterious circumstances, Elvis teams up with a nearly victimized Black man convinced that he is former President John F. Kennedy. They soon learn that a resurrected Egyptian mummy prowls the halls of their old folks’ home looking for souls to devour. With a colorful cast of addled characters and Lansdale’s trademark wit, comedy is very much at the forefront of “Bubba Ho-Tep,” but he doesn’t neglect the horrific aspect of the premise. The reader is reminded that the retirement home residents are incredibly vulnerable, death at the hands of the mummy results in eternal torment, and outside assistance is not coming. The threat may be somewhat ridiculous, but it is a lethal one, nonetheless.

Regular, well-meaning folks in the wrong place at the wrong time are common horror protagonists, but Lansdale also relishes putting the reader in the shoes of the truly despicable. Callous, bigoted, deceitful, or just plain demented. Sometimes they get their just deserts, sometimes they don’t. “My Dead Dog Bobby” is a two-page piece of flash fiction about a young boy playing with his decomposing pet. Lansdale is sometimes lumped in with