Conan the barbarian... starring in Savage Tales

[Roquefort Raider]

What follows is typical of the Thomas-edited Conan magazines: a scholarly article on matters pertaining to Conan, his creator or some other Howard-related subject. Here the piece is written by Glenn Lord, the first and still today the greatest Robert E. Howard scholar. The subject is Robert Howard himself, and the article is illustrated by Frank Brunner. I tell you, those were truly golden days for Conan fandom!

Next we have a Gerry Conway/Gray Morrow science-fantasy story; as ever, Morrow doesn't disappoint.

Because Savage Tales is the mag that never ceases giving, on the next page we have another Barry Smith effort: the poem Cimmeria, which actually predates the creation of Conan, printed right from the pencils. Here's a link to the complete story (although that particular version is inked). By the way, the link is to a version inked by Smith himself; Tim A. Conrad also inked a version that would see print in SSoC #24.

Following this, a reprint from Joe Maneely's The Crusader, a series I'd love to read more of.

Right after, we get the "Probable outline of Conan's career" (see above) reprinted in full, with images taken from the original Conan stories in Weird Tales. In thos pre-internet days, this was a priceless resource!

We round up the issue with a reprint of the King Kull story "the skull of silence", that had seen print in Tower of shadows#10, with the added bonus of an unused cover by the story's artist, the ever-amazing Berni Wrightson.



Cripes, even the "next issue" page is fantastic: it's a full-page Conan image by Windsor-Smith, not taken from any story!

I purchased Savage Tales #2 twice. My first copy is missing pages 3 and 4 (but not the corresponding ones at the end of the book), meaning that someone very delicately cut the page away in such a way that it doesn't show at all. I suppose he wanted the splash page to put on his wall, and if I regret both the disfigurement of the comic and the sale of a damaged book, I can at least appreciate the person's tastes!

[benday-dot]

The story goes as this: We are introduced to one Valeria of the Red Brotherhood, a young, tall woman who started a career as a pirate and wants nothing more than to be treated as one of the lads. But being a sculptural blonde makes it hard for her scurvy comrades to keep their hands to themselves, and she had to look for work land-side in the country of Stygia (kinda like Egypt, culturally speaking). While there, an officer in a mercenary company she had hired her sword to made untoward advances that she met with a blade, and she had to flee the wrath of his men (including his own brother) down in the jungles of Kush and beyond. Luckily for her, one of the mercenaries of that band had been Conan, and although his intentions are no more honourable than theirs, he at least never forces himself on a woman when she says no (Savage Tales #1 notwithstanding). So as the story opens, Valeria climbs on a steep, rocky mount to see if she's still being followed, and that's where Conan rejoins her to tell her that he's killed all her pursuers.

And that gorgeous art... Oh, Lord.

Stellar review RR and with insight keen as a Cimmerian's sword.

I have to tell you that before Savage Tales, before Robert E. Howard himself, my first exposure to Red Nails was actually in that early 80's coloured one-shot you mention. Having asked, nay pleaded for it, I received it as a Christmas gift, and while not the slightest bit festive, it sure made me as happy as a mead filled barbarian.

I long since acquired the exquisite Savage Tales you well here discuss, the Marvel Treasury Edition, and, of course, Howard's own masterful telling of the tale.

That opening sequence you ably describe, with Conan and Valeria up on the jungle escarpment with the great, horrible and ancient lizard thing below looms like a colossus in my love of all things Conan and Howard. Specifically, Smith's almost romantic rendering, so delicate, yet terrible, is cemented in my mind as such a paramount expression of both the beautiful and the barbaric that was key to understanding Howard's romance of the primitive.

The lush colouring of the jungle foliage that highlights Smith's own palette in the Treasury Edition and the 80's one-shot is just another accent on the glory of this scene.

Because Savage Tales is the mag that never ceases giving, on the next page we have another Barry Smith effort: the poem Cimmeria, which actually predates the creation of Conan, printed right from the pencils. Here's a link to the complete story (although that particular version is inked). By the way, the link is to a version inked by Smith himself; Tim A. Conrad also inked a version that would see print in SSoC #24.

Likewise, the poem Cimmeria, which also serves as a coda to that 80's one-shot, stands for me as perhaps the supreme expression of the Howardian ideal of the primitive. The solitary man in the wild, autonomous in his element, unassailable with a virtue and native power neither bought nor stolen, nor sinisterly held. If ever there is such a thing as visual tone poem for Howard's whole philosophy then it is to be found in the pristine and bloody Cimmeria.

[berk]

Because Savage Tales is the mag that never ceases giving, on the next page we have another Barry Smith effort: the poem Cimmeria, which actually predates the creation of Conan, printed right from the pencils. Here's a link to the complete story (although that particular version is inked). By the way, the link is to a version inked by Smith himself; Tim A. Conrad also inked a version that would see print in SSoC #24.

I remember the version Conrad inked and it was beautiful, but this all-Windsor-Smith one tops it. The texture added by his shading to everything from Conan's physique to the foliage in the midst of which he moves and acts transports you to another world and conveys a hard to describe feeling of depth and substance shared by the Severins' artwork in Kull.

[Roquefort Raider]

That opening sequence you ably describe, with Conan and Valeria up on the jungle escarpment with the great, horrible and ancient lizard thing below looms like a colossus in my love of all things Conan and Howard. Specifically, Smith's almost romantic rendering, so delicate, yet terrible, is cemented in my mind as such a paramount expression of both the beautiful and the barbaric that was key to understanding Howard's romance of the primitive.

The lush colouring of the jungle foliage that highlights Smith's own palette in the Treasury Edition and the 80's one-shot is just another accent on the glory of this scene.

Very well said; the romantic aspect of the primitive is a key aspect of Howard's work, but although many pay lip respect to the famous lines from Beyond the black river ("Barbarism is the natural state of mankind. Civilization is unnatural. It is a whim of circumstance. And barbarism must always ultimately triumph"), few writers see it as more than an affirmation of nihilism.

Regarding the colouring: I couldn't agree more, and despite being something of a black and white snob, this is one of the instances where I find the coloured version superior to the original. My own first contact with Red nails was the translated version published by Les humanoïdes associés in 1976, which thankfully used the Marvel Treasury as its source material (color and all). (It cost ten bucks at the times, which was a lot of money in 76, especially to a lad of 12 with a paper run as sole source of disposable income!!!) But it was worth every penny.

I remember the version Conrad inked and it was beautiful, but this all-Windsor-Smith one tops it. The texture added by his shading to everything from Conan's physique to the foliage in the midst of which he moves and acts transports you to another world and conveys a hard to describe feeling of depth and substance shared by the Severins' artwork in Kull.

Growing up I always put Smith and the Severins in the same league when it came to rendering. They had the same elegance, the same historical verisimilitude, the same way of making us believe that what we saw, albeit fantastical, might have been real at some point.

[Roquefort Raider]

Four months after Savage Tales #2, readers were treated to the end of Red Nails in issue #3. In the editorial pages, Roy explained the distribution and pecuniary problems faced by the title, and ominously warned us that this might be the last issue of the mag! (Noooooooooooo!!!) (Luckily, we know now that when numbers came in, they would warrant continued publication).

Savage Tales #3 has a painted cover by Pablo Marcos, also something I haven't seen that often. (I am not, generally speaking, a big fan of Mr. Marcos pencil work; but this cover does the job. It has an almost Romita-like quality to it, despite the trademarked Marcos posture of the main character).



The issue is mostly about parts II and III of Red nails, still with the astonishing Smith artwork. In a nutshell, the story unfolds as follows: Conan rejoins Valeria and Techotl, who takes them to his people in a corner of this shut-in city of Xuchotl. There our heroes learn what's going on in this strange place. Centuries before, some rebel tribe from Stygia (whose members for some reason all carry Aztec- and Mayan-sounding names) fled from their homeland and the anger of Stygia's king. Many of them were killed by the dragons who in those days were more numerous in those parts, and they ended up at the closed doors of the walled city of Xuchotl (the inhabitants of which didn't exactly welcome the newcomers). A slave from the city, called Tolkemec, opened the city gates to the rebel Stygians, who slaughtered the local population and took their place in the city. (The treacherous Tolkemec will eventually be tortured and thrown in the catacombs beneath the city. Good for him)! The rebels' leaders, the two brothers Xotalanc and Techultli, later argued over a woman they both desired, which caused a very violent feud between their respective followers. The Xotalancas had the habit of collecting the heads of their Techultli enemies and keeping them on shelves, while the Techultli hammered a red nail in a black pillar for every Xotalanc murdered. After a few generations, both tribes were now very few in numbers and rapidly dying out.

Conan and Valeria are hired by Techultli's king, and just the following night the Xotalancas risk everything in one massive assault that leaves all of them dead. Conan is sent by Techultli's king to the Xotalanc corner of the city, just to make sure nobody's still hiding out there, but it is a dupery: he instructs some of his men to murder the Cimmerian. Needless to say, the murder attempt fails.



Why would the ingrate have his new employee killed? Well, it has to do with Valeria, the object of all desires in this story. The king wants her as his new queen (or at least his plaything), while the current queen wants to steal her youth to renew her own. See, the queen is the actual woman that Xotalanc and Techultli originally fought over centuries before; she's a sorceress who treats the current king like a puppet. Conan returns in time to find the treacherous king strapped to a Rube Goldberg torture device and Valeria about to be sacrificed in some nasty ritual that involves being tied naked to a slab of stone, this being a non-code publication. ("Yay!" thought 12 year old me back in '76). The Cimmerian is about to butcher the whole lot of degenerates, when he steps on a wolf-trap cleverly (and oh so conveniently) hidden within the floor tiles.

As the queen is about to slay Valeria, who should then appear but old Tolkemec, the slave who had initially opened the doors of the city to the invading Stygians. He, too, managed to survive the centuries and has spent his time in the catacombs looking for some means of revenge, which he now has found: a sceptre that shoots lightning. So while Conan is busy chewing his leg free from the trap (or at least working on its hinges with his knife), Tolkemec proceeds with the annihilation of the last few citizens of Xuchotl. All save the queen, that is, who frees Conan from the trap so he can stop Tolkemec, which he does with a thrown dagger. The queen shows little gratitude and grabs the sceptre, with which she intends to make sure she'll be the last character alive in this tale rivalling Hamlet with its immense body count. However, Valeria then decides that enough is enough and, having freed herself from the restraining ropes that tied her to the altar, she stabs the witch in the back. She and Conan walk off into the sunrise, foreswearing whatever haunted jewels might be found in this gruesome city.

Death! Mayem! Sex! Ancient civilizations! Sorcery! It doesn't get better than this!

Savage Tales #3 also presents the first appearance of Red Sonja in her famous steel bikini (or at least a precursor thereto), in a double page spread by Spanish artist Esteban Maroto. This is not the image usually presented as the first "iron bikini" appearance, but I'll let you be the judge:

[Roquefort Raider]

The rest of the issue presents a prose tale by Ray Capella, featuring a new character called Arquel of Argos. It is a "tale of the Hyborian age", for lack of a better term, and is highlighted by bits of art by Frank Brunner and Al Williamson. It's basically fan fiction, and not a feature I'd have liked to see on a regular basis.

We then have a re-presentation of "Fury of the Femizons", which had been published in Savage Tales #1. Sure, it was only two issues earlier... but it had been a few years, so why not? The same Femizons would be reused in Fantastic Four, as they're the people who gave us Tundra, the seven foot tall red-haired lady with a thing for Ben Grimm.

A new article by Roy Thomas presents the art that originally graced the prose publication of Red nails in Weird tales: the cover by the peerless Margaret Brundage, of course (and a book on Ms. Brundage's Weird Tales covers has been announced for, like, ever) as well as black and white illustrations by H. D. Delay.



Notice that both Smith and Delay stuck to the description of Valeria's outfit.

And there's MORE!!!

Jim Steranko once played with the idea of a sword and sorcery character named Talon, whom he presents here. Had the project been continued, Talon would have preceded Marvel's Conan in the field. Despite the skill of Steranko, I don't see how this Talon guy would have been all that different from so many Conan clones, though... it's hard to judge from just one image, but he doesn't have the otherworldly quality of an Elric nor the quirckiness of a Fafhrd or of a Gray Mouser. Would Talon have taken comicdom by storm? We'll never know.

The issue rounds up with a full page (each!) biography of Roy Thomas and Barry Smith.

Another grand slam for Marvel, here. I mean, how can you go wrong when even your table of contents looks like this?

[benday-dot]

Very well said; the romantic aspect of the primitive is a key aspect of Howard's work, but although many pay lip respect to the famous lines from Beyond the black river ("Barbarism is the natural state of mankind. Civilization is unnatural. It is a whim of circumstance. And barbarism must always ultimately triumph"), few writers see it as more than an affirmation of nihilism.

Exactly Ben. Howard may have thought civilization doomed, but he was no decadent himself, and certainly not a nihilist. To him barbarism, was not just reddened swords and ruined cities; it was an exultation of the primal, the pure. The man living by his devices, thriving by them even. It was aesthetic full of a verve for life, even if that life be finally ephemeral, and indeed of no higher purpose than itself. It was fatalistic, and not a little melancholy, but never negating of the great thirst to breathe in a day to its fullest. Hey, isn't that a little like Conan.

And it goes without saying, regarding Savage Tales #3, that was another great review of a truly great magazine of a vanished yesteryear.

[Polar Bear]

RR, I have nothing to add, but I've enjoyed this thread immensely. Great reading.

[berk]

The rest of the issue presents a prose tale by Ray Capella, featuring a new character called Arquel of Argos. It is a "tale of the Hyborian age", for lack of a better term, and is highlighted by bits of art by Frank Brunner and Al Williamson. It's basically fan fiction, and not a feature I'd have liked to see on a regular basis.

Frank Brunner did a Conan story later on in SSoC, but I wonder what an Al Williamson Conan or Kull or whatever REH character might have been like ... though his slick style might not have been as suited to the gritty REH-style fantasy as it was to Flash Gordon or ERB-style "planet romances".

We then have a re-presentation of "Fury of the Femizons", which had been published in Savage Tales #1. Sure, it was only two issues earlier... but it had been a few years, so why not? The same Femizons would be reused in Fantastic Four, as they're the people who gave us Tundra, the seven foot tall red-haired lady with a thing for Ben Grimm.

Have they ever ret-conned Thundra's back-story to make it sound a bit less foolish? Maybe they could explain away the "Femizons" by saying that it was only the name given them by us dumb earthlings or something.

A new article by Roy Thomas presents the art that originally graced the prose publication of Red nails in Weird tales: the cover by the peerless Margaret Brundage, of course (and a book on Ms. Brundage's Weird Tales covers has been announced for, like, ever) as well as black and white illustrations by H. D. Delay.

I like Brundage's black and white drawings better than her cover paintings, though the latter do have a weird charm of their own. I've always hated those big "swash-buckler" boots, though, whether here or on superheroes like Captain America.

Jim Steranko once played with the idea of a sword and sorcery character named Talon, whom he presents here. Had the project been continued, Talon would have preceded Marvel's Conan in the field. Despite the skill of Steranko, I don't see how this Talon guy would have been all that different from so many Conan clones, though... it's hard to judge from just one image, but he doesn't have the otherworldly quality of an Elric nor the quirckiness of a Fafhrd or of a Gray Mouser. Would Talon have taken comicdom by storm? We'll never know.

Even if it turned out to be a generic sword and sorcery barbarian story, I think Steranko's art would have elevated it to something more special. Would love to have seen this happen.

[foxley]

Savage Tales #3 also presents the first appearance of Red Sonja in her famous steel bikini (or at least a precursor thereto), in a double page spread by Spanish artist Esteban Maroto. This is not the image usually presented as the first "iron bikini" appearance, but I'll let you be the judge:

Actually I think I can clarify this. Maroto created the 'iron bikini' look for an uncommissioned illustration he sent to Roy Thomas.This illustration had been printed for the first time in Jim Steranko's magazine Comixscene #5 in black and white. Morato then did the double page spread in Savage Tales #3 using the same design, and used it for her first solo story in Savage Sword of Conan #1 (three months after this). John Buscema then picked up the design, followed by Dick Giordano and (most famously) Frank Thorne who made it his own, and from there it began the standard look for Red Sonja.

So take your pick which you consider to be its first appearance.

[Roquefort Raider]

Actually I think I can clarify this. Maroto created the 'iron bikini' look for an uncommissioned illustration he sent to Roy Thomas.This illustration had been printed for the first time in Jim Steranko's magazine Comixscene #5 in black and white. Morato then did the double page spread in Savage Tales #3 using the same design, and used it for her first solo story in Savage Sword of Conan #1 (three months after this). John Buscema then picked up the design, followed by Dick Giordano and (most famously) Frank Thorne who made it his own, and from there it began the standard look for Red Sonja.

So take your pick which you consider to be its first appearance.

Extremely interesting. foxley! Thanks for the info! So the first iron bikini image to be drawn would have been the second published, and vice-versa. I love these historical tidbits!

Maroto, a great designer, also created a fantasy outfit that started a trend, since Shanna the she-devil adopted it eventually (and it's not that far from the fur bikini that Bêlit would wear in the Conan mag).

[Rob Allen]

Savage Tales #3 has a painted cover by Pablo Marcos, also something I haven't seen that often. (I am not, generally speaking, a big fan of Mr. Marcos pencil work; but this cover does the job. It has an almost Romita-like quality to it, despite the trademarked Marcos posture of the main character).

It's entirely likely that Romita modified the cover art a bit. Stan liked the way Romita drew faces, and often had him "fix" the faces on covers, especially in this era when John was Art Director and was in the bullpen every day.

This habit caused a bit of trouble when Stan had John re-do the faces on a Frank Kelly Freas cover for Unknown Worlds of Science Fiction. Freas objected, as did many fans, and Stan & John publicly apologized.

[Roquefort Raider]

So, cancelled? Not cancelled? On page26 of Savage Tales #4, a two-page editorial tells us about how the mag had been resurrected again, this time (hopefully) to stay. Letters had been written, some encouraging, others insulting; rumours had been spread; but the most important part is that ST#3 had sold better than the other Marvel B&W mags, so Stan Lee had green-lighted renewed publication... on a bi-monthly, not quarterly basis. But no Barry Smith.

There would be no dearth of great talent, though, as the cover so aptly demonstrated:



Neal Adams himself painted the cover for issue 4, as he would for at least one more. He also contributed to the first story of this issue (which I assumed he inked over Gil Kane's breakdowns or pencils). Pablo Marcos provided the grey tones.

And what a story that is! Another true Conan classic, and very likely to most successful non-Conan Howard story to be adapted into the Marvel Conan canon. The original prose story, "The dark man", featured Turlogh Dubh O'Brien, an Irish swordsman who starred in two stories (this one and "Gods of Bal-Saggoth"), one fragment ("Shadow of the Hun"), and was mentioned in another tale "Spears of Clontarf". Turlogh is physically very close to Conan, and although his character is noticeably more melancholy (he lacks the "gigantic mirth" bit), he could easily pass for Conan on one of his bad days. And sadly, that would be the case in this tragic story.



It is well known that Conan comes from the land of Cimmeria, cold, bleak and quite gloomy. He left to explore the world and was quite successful in his choice of careers, but at the start of our tale he's grown a bit weary of the artificial pleasures of the south; he's grown homesick and thinks of the girl he left behind when he first journeyed away from home.

This allows Kane and Adams to give us a glimpse of the life of Conan as a youth.



I particularly like the look on Conan's face, in the third panel; this is a seamless fusion of Kane and Adams. The intensity is there, the emotion is there, it's quite powerful.

[Roquefort Raider]

I am not (oh, the heresy!) the world's biggest fan of Neal's pencils... (merely a standard fan). But his inking? It's magical. It's beautiful. It's slick and smooth and three-dimensional and gorgeous. I love every Adams-inked comic I own, no matter who pencilled it; he just crank everything to eleven. Lovely stuff when it's over the pencils of a Gil Kane, of course!

So... Conan journeys back to Cimmeria, dreams of married bliss perhaps tempting him as he travels... but when he arrives, it is to find that his village has been attacked by Vanir raiders (The Vanir live in the country immediately to the west, and have been more or less at war with the Cimmerians for basically ever). Conan's girlfriend, Mara, has been abducted! Her mother tells Conan that she spoke often of him (as if he needed that to go and get her).

Conan pursues the Vanir all the way to Vanaheim, and learns they've travelled to an island in the middle of a very wide lake. He borrows the fishing boat of a man who pointed him in the right direction, and steers the small skiff in the rough and freezing waters. A while later, he sights a boat full of dead people: big red-headed Vanirmen and short, darker men. The latter apparently died defending a black statue that was on board, representing a warrior of their race.

Conan takes the statue with him, finding it surprisingly light even if it feels like metal. He later reaches the island where Mara has been taken, and makes his way to the raiders' longhouse. As he lays hiding, he witnesses two of the Vanir (who have found his fishing boat) struggling to bring the statue indoors, and it now seems very heavy indeed.

Inside the longhouse it's a party: the raiders' leader, Thorfel, is about to force Mara into marrying him; he even managed to bring a priest of Mitra to celebrate the nuptials! Mara will have none of this, and as she sees there is no hope to escape dishonor, she makes her quietus with a bare bodkin.



(Now that was a lady who could have handled Conan, I'm sure).

The Cimmerian, who was right outside and was just about to barge in and rescue her, goes berserk. He slaughters a great many Vanir, but numbers would have beaten him in the end... if a crowd of newly-arrived short dark men hadn't attacked at that very moment! The newcomers, with arrows and blades, finish off the last Vanirmen (although it is Conan who kill Thorfel after Mara expires in his arms, recognizing him for a brief moment). The leader of the dark men then explains that they are Picts, and have come to rescue their god: the dark statue representing Brule the spear slayer, who used to be best buddies with King Kull. The statue had been stolen from Pictland by Pict renegades, who had in turn fallen under the swords of the Vanir on the lake's waters. Conan leaves with Mara's body, so she can rest in her own land.

When the story was reprinted (in colored form) in Marvel Treasury Edition #15, it was a little closer to the Turlogh Dubh story in that our hero didn't know who the Picts were. Of course, as Roy doubtless realized after scripting the story the first time, Picts and Cimmerians are well aware of the others' existence: they hate each other with a vengeance! Conan really should have recognized them on sight! And so in ST#4, we have this caption: "What manner of them were these, who slew twice their number of fierce lake-dwellers?" which is replaced in the Treasury edition by ""The smaller men are Picts... fierce enemies of Conan's own hillborn people... yet many leagues from the wilderness they call home". And later, when Conan addresses the chief of the Picts, he knows whom he's addressing:





(By the way, while the metal statue in this Hyborian Age version is one representing Brule, the one in the Turlogh story was that of another Howard character: Bran Mak Morn, king of the Picts. Nice substitution of famous Picts, here).

[Roquefort Raider]

I love that about Roy... How he'd take pains to make sure even a small error was corrected if possible.

The story is moving, and is one of the most personal featuring the character. Mara was briefly seen again in the latter days of "Savage sword of Conan", in at least one story featuring young Conan, but she was drawn differently. I wish we had known her better, but the several writers who tried to tell us about Conan the youth usually started everything from scratch and would never get their stories straight. (Sometimes Conan's an orphan, sometimes not; the names of his childhood friends would change, etc.) The almost complete lack of a supernatural element, if one forgets about the weight-shifting statue, also helps anchor the tale in a more realistic and relatable context.

After this momentous story, the mag has an article on the film Jason and the argonauts, and then a reprint featuring Joe Maneely's Crusader. Maneely is one fine artist, and the script is also pretty good; it emphasizes the nobility of the two opponents in a duel between Saladin and the hero.



Another article follows, this one talking about the famous and classic Gnome Press edition of the Conan prose stories. Would you believe that one of them had a cover by Frank Kelly Freas?



The following feature is another reprint, this time from Conan the barbarian #11. I had always figured that it had seen print in Savage Tales first and in CtB 11 second, because of some art correction that covered exposed flesh, but no; it was actually more than a year before it was reprinted here. Comic Book Artist #2 gave us a look at the unedited artwork, which was provided (and inked) by the artist):



The right panel is an uncensored version of the leftmost one. The towel has been added, so you can imagine what the middle panel actually should have looked like.