Heart, Mind and Soul: The Triumvirate that will Make King Conan the Sequel We’ve Been Waiting For
For decades, the idea of a third Conan movie starring Arnold Schwarzenegger has been the silent battle cry of Crom-loving fans. It’s been a turbulent era: Arnold was sworn in as governor, and our hopes were dashed. After his turn in politics, we dared to hope again after The Last Stand. The movie wasn’t a breakout, but I enjoyed it—and it convinced me that Arnold, even then, was ready to step into the role of King Conan. But that was in 2013, over 10 years ago. The final season of Fubar in 2025 reassured me that Arnold could still cut it as King Conan. However, as of earlier this year, there was still little hope of the trilogy’s final chapter being greenlit. My hopes were dashed. Again. And now, as if out of the blue, King Conan has been confirmed by Arnold himself.
We’ve suffered through the reboot (no offense, Momoa), navigated endless rumors, and heard about a dozen failed pitches. But the dream—the real dream—has always been to see Arnold Schwarzenegger wield the Atlantean Sword once more. And now it looks like we’ll live to see Arnold return to wear Aquilonia’s crown upon a troubled brow. I. Am. Stoked.
As of May 2026, it’s no longer a rumor. King Conan is officially in pre-production, with cameras set to roll in 2027. But what is it about this iteration that makes me confident it will be awesome? It comes down to a perfect “Triumvirate” of creative forces that aligns the star, the filmmaker, and the force behind the original movie:
1. The Physicality: Arnold’s “Unforgiven”
Arnold has been clear: this isn’t Conan the Destroyer 2. He has spent years waiting for the right moment. I am relieved he intends to avoid the mistake of playing a “young” hero in an old man’s body. He’s compared his vision to Clint Eastwood’s Unforgiven—a story about a king who has grown complacent after 40 years on the throne, only to be forced back into the fray. I don’t think we’re looking at an adaptation of Hour of the Dragon, or Conan of the Isles (two literary tales of Conan’s latter years), but by embracing his age rather than hiding it, Arnold promises a meditation on mortality and power that could be just as compelling as those two classic Conan novels. Executed just right, this movie could have as much impact as the first Conan movie.
2. The Execution: The McQuarrie Factor
Christopher McQuarrie—the mind behind the recent Mission: Impossible juggernauts—is a hard-hitter who could work for this third installment. I’m a bit nervous, I must admit, not because I don’t believe in McQuarrie, but simply because I can’t imagine any current director being able to fill Milius’s Hyborian boots. Still, McQuarrie is a practical action legend in an era of CGI versions of cartoons. He is one of the few directors capable of delivering action worthy of the brutal, visceral combat of the 1980s originals while making a modern movie for the 2020s.
3. The Soul: Milius’s Hyborian Vision
John Milius is the emotional pillar of this production. Milius, the visionary director of the 1982 classic, is currently fighting his own health battle, but his influence is the project’s very soul. Arnold has expressed his admiration for Milius. Assuming Milius does get involved, or that Arnold holds enough production power to ensure Milius’s vision is respected, I think we can expect this film will honor the grit and the atmospheric, painterly fantasy of the original Conan movie. Whether Milius is officially in the credits as a producer or simply the guiding spirit in the writer’s room, his presence will be what makes this a true sequel rather than just a brand extension.
The “Game of Thrones” Trap
Conan’s universe (even in his latter years as he sat on the throne of Aquilonia) is not a complex web of political maneuvering or slow-burn palace intrigue. Robert E. Howard’s work was about the primeval individual—the man against the world, the sword against the sorcerer. Even in Hour of the Dragon, a tale of Conan’s time after he lost his throne, palace intrigue makes way for visceral Conan action. If the film tries to turn Hyboria into a Westeros clone, it will lose its soul in favor of a trend that has already lost steam. The tension in a Conan story should come from physical and existential threats, not from political intrigue, betrayal, and volatile relationships in the best tradition of daytime soaps.
The “Rings of Power” Trap
Attempting to force modern sensibilities or meta-commentary into the pulp fantasy world of Hyboria would mean a catastrophe like the one Rings of Power unleashed on Tolkien’s Middle-Earth. Conan doesn’t need to be “updated”; he needs to be preserved. In Hyboria, “strong female characters” are like Sandahl Bergman’s Valeria… not just strong physically, but also having a well-developed personality, with flaws, limits and emotional depth, unlike the shallower, modern archetypes often force-fed to audiences today. The beauty of Conan is that he is an anachronism—a relic of a savage, honest past dropped into a world that has forgotten how to be truly alive. Let’s see if the new production team is unafraid of the possible “toxic male” label.
Why the McQuarrie/Arnold/Milius Triumvirate Is the Ticket
McQuarrie’s Mission: Impossible work proved he’s a student of old-school tension. He isn’t a “message” director. He builds suspense through physics, geography, and consequences, not through socio-political exposition.
Arnold has a very personal, authorial and emotional connection to Conan. He knows exactly what the fans love because he is the fan. He has far too much investment in his own legacy to let King Conan be turned into a lecture.
The “Milius standard” is inherently hostile to modern corporate polish. Milius is all about grit, blood, and the “will to power.” Keeping his name at the masthead forces the production to hold onto that raw, primitive spirit.
The Unforgiven Mold and Why It Fits King Conan Perfectly
In 1982, Conan was a force of nature—a man who carved his own destiny through sheer, raw will power. Seeing that same man 40 years later, “complacent” and “tired of the job,” offers a much more compelling dramatic arc than simply putting him back in a loincloth and having him fight an endless stream of nameless minions.
The beauty of the Unforgiven angle is that it will bring gravitas to King Conan. Being a ruler isn’t just about the crown; it’s about the burden of the decisions you’ve made. It feels like Conan might have to reckon with the person he used to be.
Unforgiven came out at a time when Hollywood needed a lean, mean, character-driven story where every action has a visceral, final consequence. It would be great if King Conan could have a similar impact on the genre.
It’s a great time to be a Conan fan. Titan Comics opened the way, and now the King is returning to the silver screen.
About the Author
Jules-Pierre Malartre currently lives on a small island west of Montreal (Quebec), which is as close to the Great White North that he will ever dare go, but still cold enough to save him from big-ass spiders, alien abductions, undead dinosaurs and tourists who find his French accent charming. In 2005, he quit a promising aerospace engineering career to go into freelance writing, which was a very, very bad idea according to his mother. Since then, he has become considerably poorer, but he has grown much happier. Along the way, he adopted cats—lots of cats! When he is not writing technical manuals, newspaper articles, press releases or blogs on anything from comic books to yoga, he is busy working on his first novel, a semi-autobiographical fictional account of his life that dares to ask the question, “where did God go wrong with me anyway?” His first short story, “The Rest Was Easy,” was published by the online literary magazine Amarillo Bay in 2013. The five people who read it liked it. He’s well aware that it took him over a decade to publish another one, so he’d really appreciate it if you'd cut him some slack about it! He loves coffee, cats and reading, mostly because those three things go very well together.
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