This Solomon Kane May Be Too Mysterious

Solomon Kane #1

Dark Horse’s new Solomon Kane series is the latest attempt at a comic book based on one of author Robert E. Howard’s (creator of Conan) lesser-known characters. Solomon Kane is a 17th century Puritan wanderer who apparently travels to the dark corners of the world seeking to vanquish evil in all its forms—usually in the name of God. Howard’s Kane always dresses in black, wears a cool, black slouch hat and carries various weapons, including a sword, dagger, musket and a pair of flintlock pistols. His adversaries tend to be those who traffic in magic as well as monsters, vampires and pirates.

For the first issue of the new series, writer Scott Allie selects a story fragment written by Howard in the late 1920s or early 1930s, entitled “The Castle of the Devil.” The original story does little more than introduce Kane as well as John Silent, a fellow Englishman who he befriends, and tells of the two cutting down a young man from a gallows and heading to the local castle to confront the Baron apparently responsible for the hanging. And that’s it. Perhaps wisely, Allie builds on this whisper of a story and introduces the German Baron, his Persian wife, the fact their castle was built atop a former abbey that once housed a Satan-worshiping priest and other juicy details that would appear to set up an interesting longer tale, although it’s too early to tell.

A main complaint about this first issue is the fact that the reader is thrown into the story without much explanation about Kane—who is he? Why is he wandering? What’s an Englishman doing in Germany? Etc. Allie seems to assume that the reader has some kind of previous knowledge of the character, which is a huge assumption since Kane only appeared in several dozen stories, mostly in Weird Tales, between 1928-32. His adventures also were collected and reprinted in books and paperbacks in the 1960s (I bought them), and there were a few Marvel comics adaptations in the 1970s and 80s. A Solomon Kane film has been completed, starring James Purefoy (Mark Antony in the HBO series, “Rome”). It’s to be released later this year or early next year and is the first part of a projected Kane trilogy.

Additionally, the art by Mario Guevara is so sketchy that sometimes it is hard to tell exactly is happening. He seems to be trying to channel the legendary Joe Kubert, who provided a variant cover (John Cassidy drew the regular version—and it is a beauty). His style doesn’t do much for me.

All-in-all, this a book with some promise but it might be better to wait for the series to be collected and reprinted because, presumably, an introduction would include more information about the character.—RFM

3/5 stars