Thulsa Doom has returned.
On 23 September, the Atlantean necromancer resurfaced in Conan the Barbarian: Tides of the Tyrant-King #1, with plans stretching from the Hyborian Age into 1920s London.
But before we start pulling old issues off the shelf, we’d like to remind you that you do not need to read anything on this list before starting Tides of the Tyrant-King.
Jim Zub and artist Jesús Merino have built the four-issue series so that #1 works as the beginning. You can pick it up cold, follow the story, and have a perfectly good time.
Read all of it, take the shorter route, or jump straight into Tides #1 and come back later.
But, if you want the fuller experience, here is what to pull from the shelf.
The reading order at a glance
Every entry before Tides #1 is optional.
The entries marked “Closest setup” cover Conan’s earlier confrontation with Doom and the two direct preludes.
The supporting comics follow the Black Stone cult across the ages, while the two Howard stories introduce characters the event draws upon.
| Order | Read | What it adds |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Robert E. Howard’s “Delcardes’ Cat” (also published as “The Cat and the Skull”) | Thulsa Doom’s original appearance |
| 2 | Conan the Barbarian Free Comic Book Day (FCBD) 2023 and #1-4: “Bound in Black Stone” | Supporting context |
| 3 | Conan the Barbarian #5-8: “Thrice Marked for Death” | Supporting context |
| 4 | Conan the Barbarian #9-12: “The Age Unconquered” | Closest setup |
| 5 | The Savage Sword of Conan #4, then Conan: Battle of the Black Stone FCBD 2024 and #1-4 | Supporting context |
| 6 | Conan the Barbarian #29-31: “Ghosts and Echoes” | Supporting context |
| 7 | Robert E. Howard’s “Skull-Face” | Costigan, Zuleika, and the London story |
| 8 | Conan the Barbarian: Tides of the Tyrant-King #0, the FCBD 2026 prelude | Closest setup |
| 9 | The Savage Sword of Conan #16 | Closest setup |
| 10 | Conan the Barbarian: Tides of the Tyrant-King #1 | Start here whenever you’re ready |
For a shorter route, read “The Age Unconquered,” Tides #0, and Savage Sword #16, in that order. You can also just go straight to #1 and return to these stories afterward, but just remember: this is a suggested reading sequence, not a chronology of events.
1. Delcardes’ Cat
Thulsa Doom first appears in Howard’s fiction as an enemy of Kull of Atlantis.
“Delcardes’ Cat” brings the king of Valusia a supposedly ancient, talking cat, with the skull-faced sorcerer behind the deception. Here is Doom before the film and the comics brought him into Conan’s world.
Start here if you want to meet Howard’s original Doom before following the Black Stone into “The Age Unconquered.”
It gives Kull’s presence in that arc an added pleasure: the Cimmerian is entering the world where his returning enemy first belonged.
2. Bound in Black Stone
Start with Conan’s return toward Cimmeria, where the dead are marching and a Pictish scout named Brissa has her own reasons to seek the Citadel of the Black Stone.
The cult, the soul-stealing Emerald Water, and the Stone’s influence across the ages all enter the story here. So does Thulsa Doom’s name.
Pay attention to the Cimmerians Conan meets on the road home. “Massacred Memories” in Savage Sword #16 returns to this adventure.
3. Thrice Marked for Death
In Shadizar, a grieving Conan falls in with the Gloryhounds thieves’ guild.
Their theft of a relic called Tarim’s Touch brings him back within reach of the Black Stone and the spirits bound to it.
The cliffhanger in #8 leads straight into “The Age Unconquered,” so keep the next volume handy.
If you take the shorter route, all you need to know is that sorcery has cast Conan’s soul far beyond his own age.
4. The Age Unconquered
If you revisit one earlier arc, make it this one.
Conan finds himself in the Thurian Age alongside Kull and Brule, following the Black Stone’s history toward Atlantis and Thulsa Doom.
Their confrontation is the one Zub points to when he speaks of Doom’s return. Conan leaves it believing the necromancer defeated.
These four issues put that unfinished business back before you, with De La Torre drawing the Cimmerian in the age of King Kull.
5. Savage Sword #4 and Battle of the Black Stone
Savage Sword #4 gathers the short stories that prepare Howard’s heroes for Battle of the Black Stone.
Read those first, then the event’s Free Comic Book Day prelude and four-issue series. Solomon Kane, Dark Agnes, El Borak, and others are drawn into the struggle.
The Stone’s eye sigil connects these heroes across time. That is the useful background here as Tides turns toward 1924 London.
Find #4 in The Savage Sword of Conan Vol. 2. The Battle of the Black Stone paperback collects its FCBD prelude and #1-4.
6. Ghosts and Echoes
The Black Stone cult still has followers willing to kill for Doom.
Among them is the Son of the Tooth, an assassin sent to exact vengeance on Conan. The cult has not forgiven the Cimmerian for “The Age Unconquered.”
Use the single issues or digital editions for a pre-Tides read: Vol. 8 arrives after the event’s first issue.
That collection also includes #32, “A Sacred Task,” a separate adventure you can leave outside this reading order.
7. Skull-Face
Stephen Costigan’s story begins in “Skull-Face,” where the American veteran of the Great War becomes entangled with the sorcerer Kathulos in London’s Limehouse district. Zuleika and Yun Shatu’s Temple of Dreams are here too.
This is the Howard tale behind the London side of Tides.
Read it after “Ghosts and Echoes” and before Tides #0 if you want those characters fresh in mind as Zub and Merino take them up.
You’ll recognize what the comics draw from Howard and where they begin to depart from his story.
Reading the original will reveal some of the source material’s surprises, so you can also save it until after the event.
8. Tides of the Tyrant-King #0
Now turn to the direct preludes. #0 follows Conan in the Zingara-Argos borderlands and formally introduces Stephen Costigan for this arc.
Although #0 originally appeared during the “Ghosts and Echoes” arc, reading it afterward keeps the two preludes together immediately before #1.
You can read the prelude free on Titan’s website.
9. The Savage Sword of Conan #16
“Massacred Memories” revisits Conan’s past; “The Ghosts of Wahpeton” brings in Steve Corcoran; and “The Warrior Within” introduces Zuleika, whose ability to reach into her past lives matters to Tides.
Pick up the single issue for this reading order. The collection, The Savage Sword of Conan Vol. 5, follows in November.
Then open Tides of the Tyrant-King #1
If you want to range further, Scourge of the Serpent develops Zub’s larger story across the ages, while Howard’s “Skull-Face” supplies the source material for Costigan and Zuleika.
Both are optional additions to this reading order.
Conan the Barbarian: Tides of the Tyrant-King #1 is already here! Go to your local comic shop for the issue and the two preludes to get caught up!
Lo Terry
In his effort to help Heroic Signatures tell legendary stories, Lo Terry does a lot. Sometimes, that means spearheading an innovative, AI-driven tavern adventure. In others it means writing words in the voice of a mischievous merchant for people to chuckle at. It's a fun time.
