Sword of Sorcery

American comic books are one of the most interesting mediums for storytelling, despite the common conception of them as stories for children. A personal favorite of mine is the sadly short-lived series Sword of Sorcery by writer Christy Marx, who has written for various TV and comic series, including Jem and the Holograms, G.I. Joe, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Conan the Adventurer, Conan the Barbarian, and Red Sonja. A reimagining of an 80’s comic of the same name, Sword of Sorcery follows Amy Winston, a normal teenage g who lives with her mother, moves around constantly, and is taught sword fighting and the different qualities of gemstones. On her seventeenth birthday, she discovers her grand destiny. Her real name is Amaya, the princess of House Amethyst, in the world of Nilaa, and she is destined to rule her house and defeat her evil aunt Mordiel. Aiding her are various allies, most notably her mother, Lady Graciel, Princess Ingvie and House Citrine, Lady Akikra of House Onyx, her grandfather Firojha of House Turquoise, Preet the thief and unknown heir to House Turquoise, Elzere, a head of the guard and heir to the latent power of one of the houses (the series ended before we could find out which), and Prince Hadran of House Diamond. Also showing up to her aid later on is a character that, if you are familiar with DC comics extended universe, you should be familiar with, John Constantine, the Hellblazer. However, dark forces are stirring, and an ancient evil is awakening to destroy Nilaa. It’s up to the Princess of Amethyst to put an end to it, reunite her House and save the world. Or it would have been, had the story not been cancelled nine issues in and never continued or finished, leaving us with an epic cliffhanger and pure rage at Dan Didio and the rest of DC’s editorial staff for cancelling everything that is good but doesn’t star their beloved cash bat or has him stealing the spotlight from the far more deserving characters.

            One of the best parts of Sword of Sorcery is its characters and the way that Marx seemed to think ahead when it came to assigning powers to the various houses. For example, House Citrine, the house of knowledge where every member has the latent ability to memorize anything they’ve seen, read, or heard, and recall it with perfect clarity, is composed entirely of people of people of what appears to be African or Hispanic descent (Nilaa’s people are all descendants of people who came to it from Earth, so they would resemble the people of Earth). The people of House Onyx are a group of assassins for hire, and are mostly bald and extremely pale. House Diamond is a bunch of white guys with white hair, and the morality of the house depends entirely on which member you are talking about, with Prince Hadran and his younger brother Talzanar being good guys, while Lord Reishan is an opportunistic jerk, and the eldest son Zushan is a complete self-serving villain who claims first rights to the wives of the soldiers under him despite the many women he already has and allies himself with the main villain of the series for no reason other than to be on the winning side. House Amethyst is composed of white women with blonde hair and violet eyes, and is split between our hero and her mother on one side, and the initial villain Mordiel on the other side. The series does a great job of spreading the morality out, with none of the characters having their morality be defined by their appearance. Amaya is intelligent and noble, but she is far out of her depth. Lady Graciel might be the strongest at the start of the series, but she has a bad habit of never telling her daughter anything, which leads to Amaya getting into trouble more often than not. I also mentioned House Onyx earlier, and while I called them assassins, which they are, that is not entirely accurate. They are more like mercenaries, fulfilling contracts in full, it just so happens that the latent power of House Onyx shuts down the power of other Houses, which leads to them being hired as assassins most of the time. But House Onyx also has strict rules that say they can’t go against the heads of Houses, who are also the only ones who can afford their assassinations and would be the most likely targets, which leaves House Onyx’s assassinations unused except for rogue elements in the House. The writer clearly put a lot of thought into how race would be portrayed, and for the most part, she succeeds. The only part that is somewhat iffy is near the end. The ultimate villain of the series, Lord Kaala, is the result of a forbidden marriage between a member of House Onyx and House Diamond. He is extremely powerful, capable of brainwashing people, teleporting through shadows, immortality, energy blasts, and other abilities, all tied to a magic black diamond of his creation. He is incapable of brainwashing those with the blood power of one the Houses however. His endgame involves brainwashing the people of both his home Houses to use as an army to take over the rest of Nilaa, using his powers, with neither House putting up much of a fight to his power. If you want to read each House as a different race, then you can see why it would be a problem that Kaala can take over both of his home houses so easily. However, it isn’t like this is unique for him. Kaala is actually a new version of a classic DC villain named Eclipso, who has long possessed corrupting powers, having previously brainwashed and controlled people like Superman, Wonder Woman, the rest of the Justice League, the Suicide Squad, Batman, and many other extremely powerful individuals. As such, it makes sense that Kaala can control people like this.

            Overall, Sword of Sorcery is a great series. It is just sad that editor-in-chief Dan Didio is one of the dumbest people to ever run a company, and never gave Sword of Sorcery the chance it needed to become something impressive. It’s been six years since the series ended, and we haven’t seen Amaya in anything other than cameos, and Eclipso has had his origin returned to his prior characterization, meaning that we will likely never get a conclusion to the story. It’s sad, but what we do have is very much worth reading.