When it comes to building an epic fantasy franchise, standard-bearers like Game of Thrones and The Lord of the Rings sit at the top of the genre, setting the bar for everything that followed. But one DC comic quietly delivered a story that feels like a brutal mix of both. Running for 12 issues between 2019 and 2021 under DC’s Black Label imprint, The Last God (now collected as The Fellspyre Chronicles) is a dark fantasy masterpiece that is aging like fine wine.
Even though it carries the DC logo, The Last God has absolutely nothing to do with caped crusaders or multiversal reboots. Written by Phillip Kennedy Johnson with artwork from Riccardo Federici, the comic builds its own world around a forgotten war, a terrifying demonic tyrant named Mol Uhltep, and a kingdom still dealing with the damage left behind.
The best part is how the story splits its heroes across two different timelines. One follows an aging group of warriors who supposedly defeated Mol Uhltep 30 years earlier. The other follows a new fellowship that discovers the truth behind that victory and has to deal with the consequences. It is classic fantasy adventure with the safety net removed, making The Last God a seriously good pick for anyone looking for something darker after Game of Thrones or The Lord of the Rings.
The Last God Channels Game Of Thrones With Its Brutal Political Betrayals
The entire foundation of The Last God rests on a massive lie. Thirty years ago, a group of legendary warriors known as the Godslayers supposedly defeated the demon Mol Uhltep and saved the kingdom of Cain Anuun. Led by the celebrated King Tyr, they returned home as heroes and spent decades enjoying the glory of a victory that never actually happened.
That lie falls apart in the opening issue. Mol Uhltep was never truly defeated, and when his forces return during Cain Anuun’s 30th-anniversary celebration, the kingdom quickly descends into chaos. Tyr is brutally killed, while a new group of unlikely survivors is forced to finish the job the original Godslayers never could.
From Westeros to Middle-Earth to the Continent · Eight Questions How Well Do You Know Fantasy TV? “The night is dark and full of terrors.”
🪨Game of ThronesWinter is coming
👑Rings of PowerOne ring to rule
🗡️The WitcherToss a coin
⚢Wheel of TimeThe Pattern weaves
👻The SandmanLord of Dreams
01
HBO’s Game of Thrones — the pop-culture juggernaut that made fantasy TV prestige — premiered with the episode “Winter Is Coming.” Across eight seasons it picked up a record 59 Emmy wins. In which year did its first episode air?
✓ Correct! 2011 — April 17, to be exact. The unaired pilot was so notoriously poor (after a friends-and-family screening, novelist George R.R. Martin reportedly told showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss they had a real problem) that nearly all of it was reshot before broadcast. The retooled premiere immediately became HBO’s biggest hit since The Sopranos. The series ran 73 episodes across eight seasons through 2019.
✗ Wrong. The answer is 2011. 2009 is when the original pilot was filmed (and largely reshot). 2013 is when Season 3’s Red Wedding episode aired. 2014 is when Season 4’s “The Watchers on the Wall” reset what TV could do with effects. GoT debuted April 17, 2011.
02
Game of Thrones, House of the Dragon and the upcoming A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms are all adapted from the sprawling A Song of Ice and Fire universe. Name the author whose unfinished novels (the next book has been pending since 2011) underpin every adaptation.
✓ Correct! George R.R. Martin (born 1948). The first ASOIAF novel A Game of Thrones came out in 1996; the most recent in the main sequence (A Dance with Dragons) in 2011. The Winds of Winter is now over 13 years overdue. Martin has remained heavily involved in the HBO universe through House of the Dragon, the upcoming A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms (2026), and an in-development Aegon’s Conquest series.
✗ Wrong. The answer is George R.R. Martin. Brandon Sanderson is the Cosmere/Stormlight Archive author (and the writer Robert Jordan’s estate hired to finish Wheel of Time). Patrick Rothfuss is the Kingkiller Chronicle author with his own infamous-publication-delay reputation. Joe Abercrombie writes the First Law series. ASOIAF is Martin’s.
03
Netflix’s The Witcher (2019–) adapted Andrzej Sapkowski’s novels with a lead actor who’s a famously hardcore fan of the source material — he wore the white wig, did much of his own swordplay, and personally pushed back against Lauren Schmidt Hissrich’s scripts before departing after Season 3. Name him.
✓ Correct! Henry Cavill. He played Geralt of Rivia for three seasons before exiting in 2022 over creative differences with the show’s writers’ room (the books-vs-show approach being the open wound). Liam Hemsworth was announced as his replacement and takes over from Season 4 (2025). Cavill’s exit was widely treated as a major moment of fan-vs-streamer tension and contributed to the late-2022/2023 Netflix-fantasy-slate scrutiny.
✗ Wrong. The answer is Henry Cavill. Liam Hemsworth replaces him as Geralt from Season 4 (2025) onward. Aidan Turner played Kili in The Hobbit films. Sam Heughan is Outlander’s Jamie Fraser. The Witcher’s original Geralt is Henry Cavill, through Seasons 1–3.
04
House of the Dragon — the Game of Thrones prequel chronicling the Targaryen civil war known as the Dance of the Dragons — is set how long before the events of the original series?
✓ Correct! Approximately 200 years before A Game of Thrones (172 years before Robert’s Rebellion, more precisely). The series adapts material from George R.R. Martin’s Fire & Blood (2018), a fictionalised in-universe history of the Targaryen dynasty. House of the Dragon premiered in August 2022, drew 9.99 million viewers across HBO’s simultaneous-platform debut and Season 2 followed in 2024 with the Battle of Rook’s Rest as its climactic setpiece.
✗ Wrong. The answer is ~200 years. The Targaryen kings featured (Viserys I, Aegon II, Rhaenyra) reign during the Dance of the Dragons (129–131 AC), which is roughly 172 years before Robert’s Rebellion in the original series. Martin’s Fire & Blood is the in-universe history that the show mines for source material.
05
The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power — reportedly the most expensive TV series ever made, with a five-season commitment from its streamer at well over $1 billion total budget — is set in Middle-earth’s Second Age, thousands of years before The Hobbit. Which streaming service is it on?
✓ Correct! Amazon Prime Video. Amazon paid $250 million just for the rights from the Tolkien Estate in 2017, then committed to a five-season run with reported per-season budgets of $400–$465 million on Season 1 alone. Showrunners J.D. Payne and Patrick McKay were given access to the appendices of The Lord of the Rings (specifically the Second Age material) but not The Silmarillion proper, leading to many adaptation choices that have divided Tolkien purists.
✗ Wrong. The answer is Amazon Prime Video. Netflix has The Witcher and Sandman. HBO Max has Game of Thrones and HotD. Apple TV+ has Foundation. Rings of Power is Amazon’s flagship original drama and reportedly its single biggest production-budget bet.
06
Amazon’s The Wheel of Time (2021–) is adapted from a 14-novel epic fantasy series running from 1990 to 2013. The series’ original author died in 2007 after completing only 11 of the planned books; Brandon Sanderson was hired by the estate to finish the final three. Who was the original author?
✓ Correct! Robert Jordan — pen name of James Oliver Rigney Jr. He started The Wheel of Time in 1990 with The Eye of the World and worked on the series for 17 years before dying of cardiac amyloidosis in 2007 with three books left to go. His widow Harriet McDougal hired Brandon Sanderson, then a young Mistborn-era novelist, on the strength of a eulogy he wrote for Jordan; Sanderson finished the series across The Gathering Storm, Towers of Midnight and A Memory of Light.
✗ Wrong. The answer is Robert Jordan (James Oliver Rigney Jr.). Terry Brooks wrote the Shannara saga. Raymond E. Feist wrote the Riftwar Saga. Terry Pratchett wrote the Discworld series. The Wheel of Time is Jordan’s, with Brandon Sanderson finishing the last three books from his notes.
07
Netflix’s The Sandman (2022–) adapts a beloved 75-issue DC/Vertigo comic that ran 1989–96 about Morpheus, the Lord of Dreams, and his troubled siblings — the Endless. Whose comics is the show based on?
✓ Correct! Neil Gaiman. The 75-issue Sandman ran at DC’s mature-readers Vertigo imprint from 1989 to 1996 (with later spinoffs Sandman: Overture, etc.) and is widely cited alongside Watchmen and Maus as proof of comics’ literary potential. Gaiman’s direct involvement was central to the Netflix show’s development. Note that ongoing public controversies around Gaiman from 2024 onward have shaped the show’s future and Season 2’s framing.
✗ Wrong. The answer is Neil Gaiman. Alan Moore wrote Watchmen, V for Vendetta and From Hell. Grant Morrison wrote Doom Patrol, The Invisibles and All-Star Superman. Mike Mignola is the creator of Hellboy. Sandman is Gaiman’s.
08
Netflix’s Shadow and Bone (2021–23) wove together the Shadow and Bone trilogy (Alina Starkov, the Sun Summoner) with the Six of Crows duology (Kaz Brekker’s Crows heist crew). Both source novel series are set in the same imagined Tsarist-Russia-coded fantasy world. Whose books are they?
✓ Correct! Leigh Bardugo. Her Grishaverse spans the Shadow and Bone trilogy (2012–14), the Six of Crows duology (2015–16), the King of Scars duology (2019–21) and various short fiction. Netflix’s adaptation merged plotlines from the two main series simultaneously and was cancelled after two seasons in 2023, with a Six of Crows-focused spinoff that had been in development at one point also abandoned.
✗ Wrong. The answer is Leigh Bardugo. Sarah J. Maas writes the Throne of Glass and ACOTAR series (the latter has a Hulu show in development). Cassandra Clare writes the Shadowhunters Chronicles (which also got a TV adaptation, on Freeform 2016–19). Marie Lu writes Legend and Warcross. The Grishaverse is Leigh Bardugo’s.
The Maester’s Verdict · Final Tally Your Realm Standing
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/ 8
Lord of the Realm — or smallfolk in the keep?
The Game of Thrones influence becomes clear once the politics get ugly. Mol Uhltep commands an army of infected, zombie-like soldiers, making him feel like a darker version of the Night King. Instead of ice, however, his Flowers of Disease twist their victims through grotesque body horror, combining bone with dark, unnatural growths.
But the monsters are only half the danger. Cain Anuun is filled with political corruption, backstabbing, and people willing to bury the truth for power. The Godslayers’ lie shows how easily history can be rewritten, while the lack of plot armor makes every character feel vulnerable. Heroes can die without warning, and survivors are left carrying the damage. That makes every victory feel earned, and every loss hit much harder.
A Ragtag Fellowship Gives The Last God A Classic Lord Of The Rings Vibe
The gladiator Eyvindr faces the six-eyed monster Mol Uhltep.
The Lord of the Rings influence is just as clear, especially in the way The Last God builds its main quest. A new fellowship is thrown together from gladiators, disgraced knights, and an arrogant prince, then sent across the dangerous lands of Cain Anuun to stop an evil that could destroy the entire kingdom. Mol Uhltep hangs over the journey like Sauron, rarely needing to appear to make his presence feel dangerous.
The comic also takes its world-building seriously. Every issue includes detailed back matter filled with maps, historical texts, old songs, and other pieces of Cain Anuun’s history. These small additions make the kingdom feel like it existed long before the story began, rather than simply being a setting created for the heroes’ adventure. That attention to detail is a big part of what gives The Last God the same sense of scale that made The Lord of the Rings so memorable.
The Last God would not hit nearly as hard without Riccardo Federici’s insane artwork. Federici goes all in on the body horror, turning the plague’s victims into grotesque floral nightmares instead of standard zombie monsters. Some of these designs are genuinely nasty to look at, in the best possible way.
But the artwork never ends up carrying the whole book. At just 12 issues, The Last God has no room for filler, with the story moving straight from its opening betrayal to the final bloody showdown. It balances the shock of its visuals with real psychological damage and character growth, making the series surprisingly hard to put down once it gets going. Now collected as The Fellspyre Chronicles, it is an easy weekend binge for anyone looking for a darker, messier fantasy story.
The Lord of the Rings is a multimedia franchise consisting of several movies and a TV show released by Amazon titled The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power. The franchise is based on J.R.R. Tolkien’s book series that began in 1954 with The Fellowship of the Ring. The Lord of the Rings saw mainstream popularity with Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit trilogies.
