New York Comic Con 2025 ripped through like a storm (though I managed to avoid the actual storm that hit Manhattan on Sunday evening) and I came through it dizzied but also energized. Since I wasn’t at the show last year, I felt a distinct upsurge in the number of people who stopped by to see me and I signed plenty of comics. I was only at the show three out of four days, but still felt like I’d been there for the full run by the time I got home and celebrated Canadian Thanksgiving with my family.

Yesterday I was completely wiped out and worried that Con Crud was going to take me down, but a couple deep sleeps and some herbal tea is helping me recover just in time to make the trek to Madison, Wisconsin for Gamehole this weekend.

I didn’t have time to do as many sketches this year, but that was just the nature of the show – running around for meetings, signings, and other events.

Other quick highlights:
• Catching up with friends and industry peers on the showfloor and after hours, including planning for my next creator-owned comic series.

• Watching the Blue Jays wrap up their series against the Yankees at a New York bar, quietly enjoying a pint while the locals saw their playoff chances slip away into the night.

• Playing the victim during the Random House 80’s-themed Murder Mystery Party with a half-dozen authors and 70 fans coming together to try and solve my murder. They failed to catch the killer, but it was still a fun time for all involved.

• A late night karaoke session to celebrate Daniel Kibblesmith‘s birthday. Many souls were sacrificed on the altar of rock.

CONAN THE BARBARIAN #25 arrived the day before the convention began, so people were eager to check it out. The response to our milestone issue has been phenomenal, a testament to Alex Horley‘s stunning oil painted page art and hard work from everyone else on the team.

Conan the Barbarian #25 – Back to Press!

Speaking of CONAN THE BARBARIAN #25, I just found out that less than a week after release the issue has SOLD OUT and is being rushed back for a second printing to meet reorder demand.

Make sure you get your order in with your favorite comic shop now. Issue #25 2nd print (with cover art by Alex Horley) will arrive in stores alongside Conan the Barbarian #26 on November 12th!

Talking With Holly Hughes

Holly Hughes wrote the essays in the back of Glitterbomb, my Hollywood Horror series at Image back in 2016-2017. Now she has her own podcast and we chatted all about working in creative fields, collaboration, appreciation, mindset and more!

So Wizard on the Showfloor

At New York Comic Con I chatted with the So Wizard Podcast all about the convention, Conan, and more.

Current + Upcoming Releases

Upcoming Appearances

Other Links

• Javi has a great art tutorial all about shape visualization and execution, an important skill for taking drawing skills to a higher level.

• Matt Levin has another great comic culture and history video, this one detailing the history and massive influence of Jean Giraud Mœbius. I finally had a chance to meet Matt in person at New York Comic Con and let him know how sharp his videos have been.

Jim

It’s a big week here in Zubville – CONAN THE BARBARIAN #25, our special fully painted anniversary issue, arrives in stores tomorrow and New York Comic Con kicks off starting Thursday! Getting ahead on writing deadlines and prepping for upcoming trips has been a lot to juggle, but I really am looking forward to seeing friends and fans in the Big Apple. Last time I was there (two years ago, time is flying) we were in the afterglow of the Conan launch and now we’re roaring forward into year three of the series.

I’ll be at NYCC on Thursday through Saturday, three days instead of four, because it’s also Canadian Thanksgiving this weekend and I want to be home for it. In past years I’ve missed Thanksgiving by staying at the convention through Sunday and always regretted it. Don’t get me wrong, the show is good, but there’s nothing on the last day that’s worth missing that time with family.

Otherwise, check HERE for details on my schedule at the show – Where I’m at, signings, and other events and if you get a chance to check out issue 25 this week please let me know what you think of it!

Dungeon Variant

Speaking of issue #25, I popped by Dungeon Comics in Oakville to sign some of their CONAN THE BARBARIAN #25 shop variants illustrated by Mike Rooth ahead of their release. Mike did up a great image and used the original Marvel logo to enhance the classic feel of this extra-special issue.

If you want to order your own copy, check HERE.

Casually Comics

I’m back on Casually Comics, chatting with Sasha all about our second year of Conan the Barbarian – our extra special 25th issue, the Scourge of the Serpent mini-series event, sales, fans, and more!

The Comics Sanctuary

Here’s a livestream interview I did with Alfredo Rueda at El Santuario de los Comics. The site is Spanish but our interview is in English:

Current + Upcoming Releases

Upcoming Appearances

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• This is your last chance to get the CONAN: BATTLE OF THE BLACK STONE action figure from Heroic Signatures – the pre-order period ends this Friday, October 10th! I’ll bring one of the prototypes to NYCC so people can check it out first-hand.

• Kieron Gillen has just started a series of blogposts reminiscing about his 101 Favorite Tabletop RPGs. This is going to be good, and reminds me of when he and I chatted up a storm about comics and games on my YouTube channel (and he talks fast so feel free to use the captions).

• Jackson’s Art Store has an article that covers the history of the pencil. Mundane sounding, I know, but the sequence of events are pretty interesting.

Jim

I had a lot of fun in Tennesee, meeting new readers and old collectors, and hanging out with industry friends and current collaborators. Over the summer I attended so many four day shows that doing an event that was only Saturday and Sunday felt luxurious and gone in a flash. Good times!

On Sunday, I had breakfast with Richard Starkings and Tyler Smith at Comicraft, who letter all the Conan comics. Richard is the guy who pioneered digital lettering techniques back in the 90’s and I’m thrilled to have him on our series, bringing such depth of knowledge and care to each issue. With so many projects on the go, Tyler is at the forefront working with me on the initial lettering pass and edits, with Richared involved in complex scenes, problem solving, and special font design.

Comic lettering isn’t understood by many comic fans. When lettering works properly it effortlessly guides the reader through each panel and page and we are usually too caught up in reading to appreciate the care that goes into where that lettering is placed, fonts and color choices, or how balloons or caption boxes stack to create clarity, but when lettering is done poorly it is the only thing we notice because the reading process gets derailed.

Conan the Barbarian is unusual in that there are practically no sound effects at all. Writer-Editor Roy Thomas realized right from the first issue in 1970 that endless panels of slashing and screaming onomatopoeia would not effectively translate the power or poetry of Robert E. Howard’s prose to the comic page, so more atmospheric narration was used instead. That lyrical approach, which I continue to use to this day, gives scenes a tension and gravity all their own and makes Conan stand out amongst its peers. It’s a challenge to come up with new and interesting ways to describe sensory information beyond what we see in the artwork, but it’s also worth the extra effort.

Here’s a lettering example from our most recent issue on the flagship series, Conan the Barbarian #24:

8 text callouts on an action-oriented page is a good balance of reading and visuals. If there’s a lot of action on the page I will throttle text back even more and let the art do the ‘talking’. That said, dialogue scenes can certainly get more dense in terms of lettering. Here’s a page from Conan: Scourge of the Serpent #1 with 18!

Having each number correspond to the lettering script makes it easy for everyone to reference the document and compare. It also makes it much easier to ask for changes (“Can we add a new line between #4 and 5?” or “Let’s cut balloon 8 entirely because it’s no longer needed”).

Chatting With Sal

I couldn’t believe it had been more than two years since I chatted on camera with Sal Crivelli from Comic Pop, so when the opportunity came up I jumped at the chance.

It really felt like no time has passed at all and the conversation that rolled out was as fun and energetic as always. Anecdotes and info galore. Make sure you check it out.

Comic Tropes After Dark

Another person I absolutely love talking with is Chris Piers at Comic Tropes. His deep love of comics and optimistic energy is always inspiring. In 30 minutes we cover quite a bit about the last two years of Conan at Titan and our current event mini-series.

Comic Book Club

Rounding out this hat trick of interviews, I checked in with Alex and Justin at the Comic Book Club and we talked about building long term stories and collaborating with amazing artists.

Current + Upcoming Releases

Upcoming Appearances

Other Links

• Last week I made this General Tso’s Chicken recipe from Brian Lagerstrom and it really was better than takeout.

• Dom of X has the first look at the Deluxe oversized hardcover edition of Conan vol. 1: Bound in Black Stone – Check that beauty out!

• Over the years there have been rumors and tall tales spun about how He-Man and Conan are connected, but Shawn Curley is on the case, unravelling the truth from the lies with info right from the source.

• I didn’t know artist Skottie Young had his own YouTube channel, but now that I do know I’m subscribed and digging into all the older videos.

Jim

CONAN THE BARBARIAN #24, the climax of our Nest of Serpents arc (which, as you can see from the amazing artwork above, is a title that’s both literal and symbolic), is in stores TODAY and, I’m obviously a bit biased, but I think it’s sharp sword & sorcery entertainment. This issue is propelled to amazing heights by the line art of Fernando Dagnino and colors of Diego Rodriguez, with sublime lettering by Richard Starkings and Tyler Smith, and a captivating lore essay by the always informative Jeff Shanks.

We’re cookin’ now, kids! Big atmosphere, big monsters, big action.

CONAN THE BARBARIAN #25, our fully painted King Conan done-in-one epic anniversary issue, is on Final Order Cutoff NOW so make sure you let your favorite local or online retailer know which cover(s) grab you and get in that pre-order. It’s going to be one for the ages, as will our event mini-series…

Hype Trailer Is Hype

…Speaking of which, Titan has put together this teaser trailer for the CONAN: SCOURGE OF THE SERPENT mini-series. Let Ivan Gil‘s excellent artwork and the pounding soundtrack sweep you up in the excitement of our time-twirled epic. The first issue arrives in stores on September 24th!

Dragon Con Interviews

While I was at Dragon Con a couple weeks ago, I spoke to a couple different press outlets:
• Over on the Super Powered Fancast, I chatted about how wild the convention was and comics I enjoyed growing up.

• An English Man in San Diego recorded a short interview with me where we talk swords & sorcery, D&D, conventions, great new comics, and more.

AI’s Latest Fawning Fakery

I received this email last week and it took me a few seconds to realize “Rebecca” generated this message with AI. It’s oddly specific yet also vague at the same time.

A quick search of “Rebecca”‘s contact info revealed that they can also tutor my child in Math, compose essays, and write my next resume.

It’s laser targeted at me (and many other authors are receiving similar targeted emails from different outlets), with distinct info about Savage Sword #10 and my career injected with excitement, but there’s also a glossy emptiness to all of it. By the time I hit the sales pitch I already knew it was generated, and also creeped out by how specific it was.

Stay vigilent and don’t fall for this kind of crapola.

Also, this recent comic strip about AI by Riley Wigglewood made me chuckle:

Current + Upcoming Releases

Upcoming Appearances

Thrilled to announce I’ll be at New York Comic Con in early October celebrating the release of Conan the Barbarian #25 that week! So excited to be back in Artist Alley with the Comic Sketch Art crew.

Other Links

• It’s nice to see the new Conan the Barbarian series listed alongside other classics in this article about the Best Conan Comics on Superhero Hype.

• My friend Francis Manapul‘s YouTube channel is packed with great art advice and the latest videos, showing him penciling and inking top notch quality art from his creator-owned comic series The Rocketfellers, is an ideal way to see a skilled artist at work and learn from his technique.

• Equally inspiring to watch is my buddy Dan Panosian‘s YouTube channel. Lots of great traditional and digital technique on display you can learn from.

• Over on the Robert E. Howard Foundation‘s YouTube channel, they’ve posted the first part of a series of videos for Cimmerian September with an all-star panel of writers and researchers talking about the original Conan the Barbarian stories.

• Tripwire Magazine is funding archival volumes of their classic comic creator interviews, a great piece of comic journalism that deserves to be read and preserved.

Jim

Wait, it’s already Wednesday?! Oh man~

Stacy and I woke up before the sun on Monday and flew home from Seattle after World Con. Our heads are still on west coast time and overall exhaustion from this schedule is driving us into weird work hours and napping over the past couple days while we try to reorganize before Fan Expo Canada.

(Above is a panel from Marvel Comics #1000, a celebratory anthology issue I was honored to contribute to in 2019. Working with Canadian superstar artist Nick Bradshaw on a Blade story, even just a 1-pager, was such a blast. I’d love to write more street level or supernatural superhero stories and Blade is a character I know I could use to deliver thrills, chills, and mighty blood spills. 🙂 )

The World Con That Was

After boothing with Howard and Sandra Tayler at Gen Con just a couple weeks ago, it was amazing to see them again and experience our first World Con with their guidance. World Con is the oldest science fiction and fantasy convention and it’s not quite like any comic or tabletop gaming convention I’ve been to before.

The heart of World Con is panel programming – hundreds of panels, really. This year’s program guide had 3-5 panel listings per page and was 196 pages! Since we didn’t have a table of our own, Stacy and I attended way more panels than ever before, taking in a cross section of fan and professional discussions across a wide range of subjects. Most of the workshops covered the basics in terms of writing, editing, and marketing, while some of the more obscure panels were fun in terms of digging into ideas and worlds that don’t normally get much emphasis. It’s diverse, dynamic, and all quite dizzying.

Being at the Hugo Awards was a fun experience, similar to any other award show, but with the added prestige that the Hugos has across genre publishing. Being there when my friend Ryan North won the Hugo for Best Graphic Story or Comic was a thrill.

I ran into quite a few friends but also met a lot of new people too – authors, artists and editors working in sci-fi and fantasy. Comics have never had a huge presence at World Con, but entrenched attitudes about the medium are slowly shifting, so it was good to represent sequential art on discussions and hoist the flag for comics in general. I don’t know if it’s a show I can add to my schedule every year (especially since each World Con is hosted in a different city, so travel costs can vary wildly), but it was worth being there this time and putting a face to the name of a lot of people whose work I admire.

All that said, it was five days of intense conventioning, after the five days that was San Diego Comic Con and five days that was Gen Con, so I’m definitely feeling creaky as we head into Fan Expo Canada this week-

Fan Expo Canada is This Week?!

Yes, this week is Canada’s biggest pop culture convention, Fan Expo Canada, August 21-24, 2025. I’m a special guest at this year’s show and will be set up with in the Comic Sketch Art section of Artist Alley at CREATOR TABLE CP70.

Since this is my local show here in Toronto, I’ll have quite a few Conan the Barbarian back issues and variant covers on hand so, if you’re on the hunt, feel free to reach out and hopefully I can fill in gaps in your collection and sign them at the same time. My location is the opposite from last year, down near the food vendors in the exhibit hall:

Conan Is Even Bigger Than Before

This October, Titan is releasing CONAN THE BARBARIAN Vol. 1: BOUND IN BLACK STONE in a new oversized hardcover deluxe edition, and they just posted up this quick flip-through of the book to show readers and retailers what’s inside:

Current + Upcoming Releases

Upcoming Appearances

Other Links

• When I was an instructor at Seneca, one of the courses I taught was Animation History, so I have an extensive collection of old animated films and always keep an eye out for new releases of classic material – This November, Cartoon Logic is releasing a restored high definition collection of Aesop’s Fables cartoon shorts from the 1920’s. I have a lot of these cartoons, but the quality is quite low so I look forward to upgrading.

• John Shableski talks about explosive graphic novel sales growth at Otto Bookstore, an independant shop in Williamsport, PA – “Our graphic novel selection went from those three titles to 1100 and nearly 3/4 of the titles are middle grade.”

Jim