Avengers Writers Talk Bringing Conan Back to the Marvel Universe

In 1970, Marvel Comics introduced a whole new generation of fans to Robert E. Howard's iconic fantasy hero Conan the Barbarian when they began publishing brand-new tales featuring the character. Most of those stories were set in the antediluvian “Hyborian Age,” which was folded into the larger Marvel Universe.

That allowed many of Conan's villains to menace Marvel's modern day heroes, and the Cimmerian even had a few brief, but often non-cannon encounters with some Marvel icons. That ended in 2000 when Dark Horse Comics acquired the rights to Conan, but Marvel recently reacquired those rights and this year the character is set to make a huge return to the company in a number of comics.

The first of those are the recently launched new volumes of Conan the Barbarian and Savage Sword of Conan. And in the fifth issue of the currently unfolding weekly miniseries, Avengers: No Road Home, the Cimmerian suddenly found himself among the ranks of Earth's Mightiest heroes.

Why was he brought into the miniseries? What role will he play in the Avengers war against the villainous Olympian god of Night, Nyx, and her children? And how does this story set the stage for the upcoming Savage Avengers series? For the answers to those questions and more, CBR spoke with writers Jim Zub, Al Ewing and Mark Waid about the back half of Avengers: No Road Home.

CBR: Conan makes his debut at the end of Avengers: No Road Home #5. How much of his personal history will impact the story you're telling in the back half of this miniseries?

Mark Waid: To be honest, Jim's our navigator as far as Conan's backstory goes. We're following his lead!

Al Ewing: Jim knows -- and loves -- Conan on a level we can't match, though I am finding myself developing a sneaking fondness for the big lug. And when it comes to Conan's history -- well, the Cimmerian enters the narrative at a very specific point in his life...

Jim Zub: Thanks, guys. Writing Conan again is a thrill for me, as anyone who read that gushing letter in the back of Issue #5 figured out. When we got the go ahead to use the Barbarian, I wanted to make sure we did our due diligence on when this was taking place in terms of Marvel Conan canon. Readers don't need to dig through back issues of the series to understand any of the things happening in No Road Home, but I know where we're at and that helps inform Conan's attitude and reactions in the series.

This is Conan in his "prime," after Queen of the Black Coast. He's powerful and capable, but also carrying a lot of his own personal darkness on this journey.

NEXT PAGE: Conan and Vision Will Have an... Interesting Time Together

What can you tell us about Conan's role in No Road Home? Who are

some of the characters he'll run into and afoul of as the series heads towards its climax?

Waid: His interactions with the Vision are really fascinating. Conan has very little idea what to make of him, and their relationship is bizarre in ways we couldn't have predicted.

Ewing: I've been in a similar position regarding Hercules -- on the surface, they seem fairly similar, both being shirtless fantasy types, of a kind. But their temperaments are very different from one another at the start, and especially at the end -- they don't have a relationship as such, but just putting them together in a room starts to make for a fascinating contrast. Though I guess that says more about our plans for Herc than for Conan.

Zub: As shown at the end of Issue #5, Wanda has found herself with the Cimmerian and the majority of Issue #6 is about their time together -- the barbarian and the witch -- on the hunt for one of Nyx's shards, running afoul of brigands, cultists and strange creatures. Conan's no fan of magic, so it's a fun pairing to write right from the start. Lots of moments here that all of us had fun brainstorming.

Obviously, adding Conan to the mix is something that will open up a ton of storytelling opportunities, but it's also a move that some fans are inevitably going to view as a sales stunt. How did he become part of the story, and what does he bring to the table that you couldn't have gotten from an established Marvel character, or even an all-new one?

Waid: We really wanted to reward the readers of this book with a "whoa!" curveball of major proportions, akin to the way Hulk was "reborn" in Avengers: No Surrender [Waid, Zub, and Ewing's first weekly Avengers story, which was published in 2018]. We're very lucky the stars and timing aligned.

Zub: I get that gut reaction, the feeling that it's not "right" to mesh bits from these different narrative worlds together, but it's been shown time and time again that comics are the perfect place to go crazy and attempt things that would give other stories pause. There's a reason why movies and TV have been rushing to catch up to the potential of comics and I think a big part of that is the fact that, as a medium, we take more risks and do stranger stuff.

The Marvel Universe has similar primordial ingredients to Conan's Hyborian Age: Ancient evils, aliens and elder gods leaving their mark on the land and its people in subtle or strange ways. Fantasy and magic are part of the Marvel Universe, just like horror, trippy cosmic calamity, or street-level crime. Conan is far from the strangest thing that has made its way through Marvel canon.

Ewing: We could have invented someone like Conan, or brought in an established Marvel character from another dimension or the deep past. But it wouldn't have the same oomph, the same power. People know the real thing when they see it. The real thing -- especially when you bring that real thing to a time and place they shouldn't be -- there's an energy to that. There's a crackle of excitement and potential, a tingle you can't replicate with analogues or stand-ins, or even fully explain. And I know there are readers who finished Issue #5 and felt that crackle, and they know exactly what I'm saying.

So yeah, if you want the oomph and the crackle, sometimes only the real Conan will do. Is it a stunt? Well... we are jumping a lot of buses with this one. We're jumping the Grand Canyon on a rocket cycle. You'll have to wait and see if we land it.

We know No Road Home won't be Conan's only interaction with the Marvel Universe. Does this series set the stage for his role in Savage Avengers?

Waid: In one of the most surprising ways possible.

Ewing: Yeah, how he gets from here to there -- I guarantee nobody's going to guess it.

Zub: All I'll say, is that like No Surrender, our final issue sets the stage for some great stuff coming down the line, not just Savage Avengers.

One Avenger, who I'm especially interested in is The Vision. Jim, in Champions you introduced the idea that the Vision is dying and No Road Home has advanced that storyline quite a bit. Can you talk at all about the payoff to that story in No Road Home? Will there be a definite resolution?

Zub: Short and simple answer: Yes. There will be a resolution.

Vision was severely damaged in No Surrender and we discovered the full extent of that in Champions, but No Road Home is where it's all resolved. No spoilers.

NEXT PAGE: Nyx and Her Children Make Their Villainous Debut

We've talked quite a bit about the heroes of No Road Home. Let's move to the villains, Nyx and her children. What inspired you to chose these characters for your antagonists? Are all of them inspired by real gods from Greek mythology? And to your knowledge have any of them appeared in Marvel Comics before?

Waid: All originals, drawn heavily from actual Greek mythology (I so love living in a world in which we can have our own Magic Answer Computer-Phones in hand during our brainstorming sessions).

Ewing: Yeah, I was plugged into Wikipedia and a couple of Greek Mythology websites, and Nyx has a LOT of kids. So we really got to pick and choose who'd be the best of the children to bring in for this story -- they're all very much inspired by actual Greek myths. What made us think of bringing them in -- it was Jim who made the initial suggestion, I think. We'd already been thinking in terms of magic and mythology instead of science, so Nyx and company gave us plenty of that, and using the ancient personifications of concepts gave us a license to get a little weird and out of the ordinary with it.

Zub: Yeah, once we knew Herc was going to be in the cast and that we wanted to move into a different space from No Surrender, the mythic angle was a no-brainer. The Greco-Roman pantheon has so many characters to choose from, and so we started bouncing elements back and forth until the Queen of Night became the clear front runner for our ideas. I suggested Nyx and her kids and how they came to be with the shards of night. Al fleshed out their personalities wonderfully. Mark suggested a lot of their powers. As with so much of No Road Home, it's all three of us working well together to fill in the gaps and then the incredible art teams doing the heavy lifting to get it all there on the page. Paco Medina, Sean Izaakse, Juan Vlasco and Marcio Menyz have been superstars throughout.

What can you tell us about the events Nyx and the Avengers become embroiled in during the second half of No Road Home?

Waid: Pay very careful attention to the (small-v) vision that presents itself to Nyx as she starts to gather the Shards of Night. It's the key to everything. (Jim, Al -- too much info?)

Ewing: That's the right amount of teasing, Mark. A spark of light in the dark.

Zub: I think that's the perfect amount of info. Also -- keep an eye on Herc. That kid's going places.

Finally, I know you guys enjoy working together. So, has there been talk about collaborating for a third weekly Avengers event? Do you have ideas for another big Avengers story?

Waid: There's been no talk yet, but if we stick the landing on this one like we think we have...

Ewing: We make a good team and we enjoy doing this stuff, and I suspect it shows. If Marvel want the band back together for a difficult third album, I doubt we'd take much persuading.

Zub: Working on No Surrender felt like a once in a life time opportunity. Being back with No Road Home and working to prove that it wasn't a fluke is just surreal (and a ton of fun). Could we threepeat it? I don't want to assume anything. Our focus is to make sure the final issues get proofed and sent out on time so readers can enjoy this mythic monstrosity. I'm trying not to worry about anything past that right now.