Reading “Ill Met in Lankhmar” by Fritz Leiber was a formative experience for me. As mentioned in my previous essay, “Fritz Leiber, Mike Mignola, and Me,” I was impressed by Mignola’s covers. This was not the first time Mignola drew Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser, however. He also worked on a comic series by Dark Horse about the Twain with Howard Chaykin. Chaykin had drawn the Twain in a series by DC even before that. Both series are collected in the Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser Omnibus.

I had previously bought and read Chaykin’s and Mignola’s adaptation of “Ill Met in Lankhmar” at a new defunct comic book store. I remember not being thrilled. Having reread it in the Omnibus I am not sure why. It was an almost perfect adaptation. Chaykin and Mignola would go on to adapt “The Cursed Circle,” “The Howling Tower,” “The Price of Pain-Ease,” “Bazaar of the Bizarre,” “Lean Times in Lankhmar,” and “When the Sea King is Away.” I think they are all almost perfect adaptations. Mike Mignola’s art captures the strangeness and foreboding of the stories. It is somewhat expressionistic but not so expressionistic that the work becomes ungrounded. He says in his afterword that it is his favorite art previous to his Hellboy series. Chaykin captures the character and voices of the Twain perfectly.

Unfortunately, I was not thrilled by the earlier stories which Denny O’Neil wrote and Chaykin illustrated. From a foreword in the graphic novel I gathered neither apparently is Chaykin. I don’t think his artwork is all that bad, but it probably is not his best. Walter Simonson and Jim Starlin also worked on the series. Both talented artists. Maybe not their best work either, but nothing to be ashamed about.

I think the problem may be Denny O’Neil’s script. O’Neil has written stories for comics that are considered classics and many of which I enjoyed. I loved his series The Question. But like all writers, and particularly all comic book writers, he is uneven. This is not his best work. I don’t think he has the right instincts for Sword and Sorcery. The first story in the series is a loose adaptation of “The Price of Pain-Ease.” A very loose adaptation. Several things are changed, namely the ghosts of Fafhrd’s and the Mouser’s girlfriends are absent. This was probably because it was the first issue but it takes away a lot from the story. It would have been better, for example, to adapt the first story Leiber wrote, “Jewels in the Forest.” It is followed by an adaptation of “Thieves’ House” which is closer to the original than the previous story. It is also probably the best of the DC series. The rest are either originals or loose adaptations of other stories.

I don’t think Denny O’Neil really captured Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser. His attempts at witty dialogue fall far short of Leiber’s.

Is the Omnibus, however, worth getting? Yes, for the Chaykin and Mignola stories. They alone are worth the price of the book. I don’t want one to think because I spent time a lot space criticizing the weaker stories that the Omnibus isn’t worth getting. Even the Denny O’Neil stories are of interest as the earliest adaptations of the Twain only. The Chaykin and Mignola stories however far excel them. So over all I recommend picking this up if you are a fan of The Twain.