Pick of the Brown Bag
May 15, 2022
by
Ray Tate
Welcome to a focused issue of The Pick of the Brown Bag. This week I look at the new Conan related title Belit and Valeria from Ablaze Comics. Courtesy of Max Bemis, Rodney Buchemi and Dinei Ribeiro.
So, I'll level with you. I'm not really a huge fan of Conan the Barbarian. I've liked the selective doses I've experienced, and I've liked what I perused from creator Robert E. Howard. I just never harbored the desire to be a completist.
That said. I've read "Queen of the Black Coast," Belit's first and only appearance and its counter Red Nails; the novella introducing Valeria.
These stories by the way are available at Project Gutenberg, a superb source for free electronic public domain works.
The new story's relatively simple. Belit comes back from the dead, satisfies her urges, somehow overwhelms Valeria and intends to trade her for a sorcerer who may be able to explain the necromancy that brought her back to life. Double-crosses result in Belit battling a giant serpent and those she intended to barter with.
The tale begins with Belit arising from her watery grave and encountering mermaids. By far this is my favorite scene. It's a good dovetail of continuity from "Queen of the Black Coast." The mermaids behave very naturally. They're not luring men to their deaths, nor falling in love with surface dwellers. They're just hanging out and eating fish by the shore.
Belit in this scene is as naked as a PG book will allow--a head scratcher given this book should, by MPAA standards, be rated R. I'll address that factor later.
Robert E. Howard describes Belit as being somewhat of a nudist. She only typically wears a girdle...
...and the jewels she plundered. While he describes her breasts as bare, he doesn't say anything about the nipples.
As Miley Cyrus sagely pointed out:
The link will take you to one of my older postings but more importantly it also features a playable Youtube video of Miley singing a very clean version of "Jolene." Not her usual fare and quite melodic. Women should never be dismissed as mere sex objects, nor should their sexual nature as human beings be repressed.
Those hoping to eventually see Belit's nipples will be disappointed. Though, she shows as much skin as possible, again, as much as a PG book will allow, Valeria is the one who flashes her tits.
Ah, spoiler alert, I suppose. Surely, this scene if not Valeria's second bare-breasted moment should earn the book a big fat R. That begs the question. Why so, dainty when depicting Belit?
Valeria in fact is clad head to toe in Red Nails until she's selected to be concubine and then sacrifice. None of her nudity is by choice, and she doesn't seem to be the type to flash her knockers, even as a tactical distraction.
According to Red Nails, Valeria is a seasoned pirate. Her background is only hinted at but her characterization crystalized:
"You walk more like a hillman than a sailor," he said. "You must be an Aquilonian. The suns of Darfar never burnt your white skin brown. Many a princess would envy you."
"I am from Aquilonia," she replied. His compliments no longer irritated her. His evident admiration pleased her. For another man to have kept her watch while she slept would have angered her; she had always fiercely resented any man's attempting to shield or protect her because of her sex. But she found a secret pleasure in the fact that this man had done so. And he had not taken advantage of her fright and the weakness resulting from it. After all, she reflected, her companion was no common man.
Valeria's philosophy is suffrage based, and that's where I feel the tit-flashing conflicts with her persona. She doesn't mind if somebody sees her naked after a fight that tears off her clothing. She's not going to try to cover up her naughty bits to emulate a comical figure in some sort of bad, broad burlesque. It would be more like. Yeah, I'm naked. I'm beautiful. So what? Stop staring, and hand me that shirt.
Valeria's willingness to display her goods is only one problem with her characterization. In Red Nails, Robert E. Howard depicts Valeria, in contrast to Belit, as thoughtful and pragmatic. Like Conan she doesn't waste words.
Bemis on the other hand gives Valeria quite a chattery disposition, which disagrees with Howard's buccaneer.
Valeria is a mistress of the sword and has a mean right cross. In Red Nails only the sheerest brute force overcomes her. That and sorcery. In other scenes, Howard demonstrates her prowess. She fights side by side with Conan, slaying three warriors in one clash.
Bemis offers no explanation as to how Belit captured Valeria, in the first place. Valeria is just introduced in a cage. I don't understand. I can buy the idea that the newly resurrected Belit crosses paths with Valeria. I just cannot comprehend how she bested her without so much as a scratch on either.
Artist Rodney Buchemi's Valeria also differs too much from Howard's imagery. She looks and behaves more like a bad imitation of Gabrielle from Xena Warrior Princess. She doesn't once exhibit the corsair's bearing that Robert E. Howard paints so vividly.
She was tall, full-bosomed and large-limbed, with compact shoulders. Her whole figure reflected an unusual strength, without detracting from the femininity of her appearance. She was all woman, in spite of her bearing and her garments. The latter were incongruous, in view of her present environs. Instead of a skirt she wore short, wide-legged silk breeches, which ceased a hand's breadth short of her knees, and were upheld by a wide silken sash worn as a girdle. Flaring-topped boots of soft leather came almost to her knees, and a low-necked, wide-collared, wide-sleeved silk shirt completed her costume. On one shapely hip she wore a straight double-edged sword, and on the other a long dirk. Her unruly golden hair, cut square at her shoulders, was confined by a band of crimson satin.
Against the background of somber, primitive forest she posed with an unconscious picturesqueness, bizarre and out of place. She should have been posed against a background of sea-clouds, painted masts and wheeling gulls. There was the color of the sea in her wide eyes. And that was as it should have been, because this was Valeria of the Red Brotherhood, whose deeds are celebrated in song and ballad wherever seafarers gather.
Pertaining to Belit, Rodney Buchemi's artwork is utterly magnificent. He definitely channels the late great George Perez when rendering the female form.
Belit moves like a panther, and that's congruent with Howard's descriptive. He doesn't indicate she's the giantess that Buchemi makes her to be, but I'm perfectly willing to accept that as artistic license.
According to Bemis' story, Belit returns to the world sexually frustrated.
I'm okay with that, makes perfect sense, really, but I object to the coarseness when she phrases her desire. Bemis continues this crude dialogue throughout the book, and it becomes quite tiring especially when compared with the bad poetry Robert E. Howard wrote:
"Look at me, Conan!' She threw wide her arms. 'I am Bêlit, queen of the black coast. Oh, tiger of the North, you are cold as the snowy mountains which bred you. Take me and crush me with your fierce love! Go with me to the ends of the earth and the ends of the sea! I am a queen by fire and steel and slaughter—be thou my king!"
Now, look, compared to actual poets, that's not good by any measure, but it's better than this:
And certainly better than this:
So, should you buy Belit and Valeria? I'd have to say not at full price. I can only recommend Bucehmi's marvelous artwork. Bemis' story glosses over a matter of plot importance, laces the dialogue with crudity not pleasing for the Robert E. Howard fan and fails in a number key elements of characterization. I also question the restraint when depicting the nudity of one character but not the other. If Bemis had stretched a little and provided some his own bad poetry instead of gutter tongue and Ablaze Publishing decided exactly who the audience was going to be, this might have been an at least mediocre pairing.