(W/A) Val Semeiks, Various (CA) Michael Higgins As CONAN THE BARBARIAN closed out the 1980s, it was a time of transition for the title - with storytelling innovations coming from veteran creators and new talent alike! In Val Semeiks' climactic run on the title, Conan weighs pleasure and pain in a magical desert city, wrests the Blade of Zed from a mad cleric and runs a gantlet of fantastic beasts in a city of shadows. Larry Hama delivers the elegiac verse of 'Drumsong,' while Don Perlin writes and draws the Western-styled 'The Mask of Vengeance.' Gerry Conway makes Conan a cat's paw to a cult of cat people, and Michael Higgins turns back the clock for an eight-issue storyline exploring Conan's formative years in Cimmeria! Collecting CONAN THE BARBARIAN (1970) #214-240 and WHAT IF? (1989) #16. Rated T+

(W) Larry Hama, Various (A) Val Semeiks, Various (CA) Joe St. Pierre The animal unleashed! Horribly transformed from a failed attempt to regain his Adamantium, a tormented and animalistic Wolverine teeters on the brink of going completely feral. Can the enigmatic assassin Elektra help him fight his way back from the edge? Mentoring Logan in the martial arts, she challenges him to re-forge his humanity - and he'll need it when Onslaught rips the X-Men apart! Plus: When ninja strike, Yukio and Amiko become targets in Japan! Wolverine teams up with Venom in a wild interdimensional adventure! And look back into Logan's long history, from his post-World War II life in Japan to his days as a spy alongside Carol Danvers! Collecting WOLVERINE (1988) #101-109, #102.5 and ANNUAL '96; UNCANNY X-MEN (1981) #332; VENOM: TOOTH AND CLAW #1-3; LOGAN: PATH OF THE WARLORD and LOGAN: SHADOW SOCIETY. Rated T+