Wednesday, August 26, 2015
Black and White Wednesday: "The Forever Phial" by Thomas and Conrad
Happy birthday to Groove, happy birthday to Groove, happy bir--oh, what's up, Groove-ophiles! Yeah, today's Ol' Groove's twenty-third twenty-ninth birthday (remember, in the Groovy Age they told us not to trust anyone over 30--and you know you can trust Ol' Groove)! So, since it's m'b-day, then I get to share one of my all-time faves! And since it's Black and White Wednesday, how 'bout this masterpiece by Roy Thomas and Tim Conrad from Savage Sword of Conan #8 (which came out the month Young Groove turned twelve)! "The Forever Phial" is a a tale of Young Conan (how fitting!) written by Roy, himself, with the singularly spectacular art by young Tim Conrad whose Barry (Windsor-) Smith meets the Golden Age meets Mike Kaluta style always turned me on, baby! Hey, we even get a little red in this b&w tale--it's just that special!
I looked and thought: "Oh, it's Windsor-Smith." Then noticed the "oddity" (nice 70's word, huh?) in the anatomies. Cool. Love the meaning of red color in a BW story.
ReplyDeleteHappy birthday. By the way, what was the average lifespan in the Hyborian Age? Any guess?
Happy Birthday Groovy One! Here's to a 100 happy healthy more!! Thanks for posting this cool story. As a kid/teen my local magazine stores would almost never. Let me buy SSOC. So I only bought a very few in the late 70's. Boy have times changed huh? Even when I turned 18 I had to show my ID to buy a few copies at times. And I was 6-2 & looked older. SSSHHHEESSSHHH!! Have a AWESOME day!!
ReplyDeleteNo red effect in the Dark Horse reprints! I bought the first two books to relive the shock of perusing through part 1 of "The people of the black circle"(and boy is it still strong!) and to read others Thomas/Buscema/Alcala hits. My favorite tale as a whole might be "The citadel at the center of time", at least until next re-re-re-reading (Checking for the panel made me want to dive in that world again). Happy you who have the original mag, the books don't have the title, but ESSENTIAL would have been more than appropriate here. Anyway, I'm not jealous enough not to wish you all the best (So we can still have our daily fix thinks selfish me).No,really Happy Birthday.
ReplyDeleteHappy Birthday Groove! Yeah nothing beats a serving of our favourite Hyborian hero Conan! Have a great one Groove!
ReplyDelete- Mike from Trinidad & Tobago.