The Snake Cult In Conan the Barbarian (1982)

Conan the Barbarian (1982) had one intriguing plot known as the Snake Cult. The villains were first introduced with the movie version of Thulsa Doom commanding his soldiers to massacre the Cimmerian village. The massacre is very real and brutal, unlike the sanitized version that came during the 1990s Conan the Adventurer cartoon. They carry the two-headed snake symbol with the two heads coming together. They massacre the adults and sell the children into slavery. For me, it didn't make sense to sell the children to slavery rather than just murder them all to ensure no new generation can rise against him.

The cult isn't heard from again until later. The outskirts of Zamora have been invaded the Snake Cult. It's stated by a merchant that two to three years ago - it was just another snake cult. Now, it spreads everywhere. The evil towers are everywhere and now it's at Zamora for a reason. The worship of Set the snake god has now spread everywhere while Conan grew up as a gladiator. They murder people in the night. the Tower of Set in Zamora even has a woman willingly sacrificing herself to a giant snake. In the novels, virgins are brought to Set the snake god's altar to appease his wrath. Perhaps, Thulsa Doom thought that willing sacrifices will further appease his dark god.

The empire of Zamora is now the main focus. King Osric had mentioned that Rexor dared to challenge him. What's interesting is that King Osric's daughter ran off to join the Snake Cult. King Osric saying, "She is to be his!" suggests that an alliance of marriage is about to happen. It kind of makes sense (in part) to why Thulsa Doom has the king's daughter under his influence. Marrying the king's daughter (and getting rid of the king) would allow him to turn Zamora into the Kingdom of Set. Zamora was already a powerful kingdom and all Thulsa Doom probably needs is a marriage of convenience to allow his god Set's influence to crawl the Earth. Though it does seem nonsense since he can just slowly take over the city even without King Osric's daughter.

The very words of Valeria show how evil Thulsa Doom is. Thulsa Doom is apparently thousands of years old. King Osric mentions Thulsa Doom is a demigod - perhaps a child of Set and a human woman from a now-forgotten race. The only purpose of those who are in Set's cult is to die in the service of the serpent god. What can be seen clearly is that the followers are willing to die for the cause of the serpent god Set. Thulsa Doom demonstrates his power by letting a woman commit suicide before Conan's eyes. Thulsa Doom brags of power that his human followers slowly give up their humanity as seen in events later. Thulsa Doom has Conan crucified which for me wasn't a very good decision. Thulsa Doom has the tendency to underestimate his opponents which would result in his demise.

Later, Conan would realize the cult's depravity such as having a cannibalistic orgy. What amazes me is that the Princess herself starts to hiss at Valeria. It seems that the cult members start to lose their humanity as they engage in cannibalistic behavior. The novelization doesn't seem to tell us who's been butchered, the commentary says that the followers are turned into stew, the extra DVD feature tells us that the Cult of Set's followers are into cannibalism (a contradiction in the commentary). The feast was probably in preparation for the future union of Thulsa and the princess. The princess is in the room with Thulsa before the raid. Why Thulsa escaped is unknown. Somehow, you can notice Thulsa is a real coward. He doesn't really participate directly in all his raids - preferring to let his mindless followers do the fighting for him. Thulsa probably turned into a snake as part of some ritual and may have lost his human senses while doing so. Also, Thulsa doesn't seem to learn his lesson about not underestimating his opponents either. He could've prepared more reinforcements during the raid in his temple.

The finale does show somehow the blindness of the cult members and how it lived and died with Thulsa Doom. Thulsa is probably leading a mass suicide ceremony though it seems he's also suggesting they burn down some place. Conan kills Thulsa but why aren't the followers avenging their master? It seems it's because it's a cult of personality. Thulsa has had them as mindless minions who have become too emotionally dependent on him. They probably see that Thulsa is not immortal nor invincible. Everything they believed in fell before their eyes in the personality-based worship of the serpent god. This resulted in the great awakening from the worship of Set as they throw away their torches one by one.