User:Wapitikev



In the the summer of 1982, I discovered the Acer reprints (and expansion) of the Lancer Conan series. I have collected and read every Conan novel and short story published in north america after the mid 70s except for the Donald M. Grant editions. All are still in my print collection, save for the movie adaptation of Conan the Barbarian 1982 by deCamp and Carter (it, and the movie, were too far out to ever be considered Conan stories, although I do have an e-copy of both for research purposes). I even have a print copy of the Blade and the Spell of Conan, Amra fanzine compilations. I'm also a huge HPL fan and have more than one book of REH's horror fiction.

I'm not a fan of the Savage Sword magazine stories (the "comics-code" imposter is second only to the '86 movie as the biggest fake Conan ever foisted on an unsuspecting public) but I am plowing through the collected trade paperbacks as bathroom reading...as an amateur illustrator, I enjoy the art more than the story. "'From under a mop of unruly black hair smoldered a pair of dangerous blue eyes.' - Robert E. Howard, 'The God in the Bowl', 1932. The third Conan Story ever written - Hyborian Genesis (essay), Patrice Louinet. First published 1953, after Howard's death."As mentioned above, I despise the Schwarzenegger Conan movies for a plethora of reasons, not the least of which is: CONAN DOES NOT HAVE BROWN HAIR!!!!!!!!!! For some reason, the producers allowed Schwarz to grow his own hair long while training for the part and then decided NOT to dye it black!. They had to have a hair and makeup person to wrangle the hair anyway...keeping it dyed would not have been that much more trouble! Conan was 17-20 during the time he was a thief in Zamora...Schwarz was 34 during filming of Barbarian and 36 while filming Destroyer...a far cry in looks from any 18-19yo. In Destroyer, Conan looked old enough to be Jehnna's dad instead of a teenager only a few years her senior (the Robert Jordan novelization says they are the same age!). And Schwartz is too short to be Conan. Robert E. Howard himself stated that Conan was 6' tall when he was 15, at Venarium, and "...lacking much of his full growth." (letter to P. Schuyler Miller, 1936). 6ft 1.5in is a little short in my humble opinion if Conan was growing like a bad weed for 2 or 3 years between Venarium and when Destroyer takes place (setting aside for the moment that Destroyer is a sequel to Barbarian, a story which DID NOT INCLUDE VENARIUM AT ALL!!!). The movie shows Queen Taramis as the same height as Conan, for Crom's sake! (in the novelization, Conan is stated to be the same Height as Bombatta, himself described as head taller than any of the others in the raiding party from the start of the film...which included Taramis!) Needless to say, I'm not looking forward to the forthcoming Schwarzenegger/King Conan movie.

The Momoa Conan movie was far closer to the spirit of Howard's Conan. At least Momoa was only 31 when attempting to play a character that was about 26 (or more) and, at 6' 4", he seems the correct height to play the Cimmerian, not to mention that HIS HAIR IS ACTUALLY BLACK! But Momoa's build seems a bit small for Conan at 26, more closely resembling what I imagine Conan's build to be like when he is 18-20. The biggest problem with Momoa however is that HIS EYES ARE NOT BLUE!!!!! Granted that's only annoying during the close-ups, but how difficult would it have been to have him wear contacts, or fix it in post-production!? The movie itself has moments of amazing scenery and set design worthy of a Lord of The Rings film...but the simplistic/rushed scenarios that string them together ruin the potential for character development and suck the gravitas out of most scenes (its a bad sign when a movie looks better than it sounds). The novel adaptation by Stackpole is orders of magnitude better at telling the same story. Unfortunately, everything after the first 100 pages, while well written, is too high-fantasy and has too many continuity problems to be considered anything but an inaccurate legend of Howard's character.

To date, there has yet to be a Conan film with a lead character that matches REH's descriptions of Conan.

I have little or no hope that Hollywood will ever get it right.

My Conan Chronology
Apocrypha (inaccurate legends) - Stories that require far too much fudging to be considered stories about the Character Conan, as written by Robert E. Howard. Howard and pastiche tales - Timeline of stories by Howard and others that (with a relatively small amount of fudging) I consider to fit within the life of the Character Conan, as written by Robert E Howard.
 * Conan the Barbarian (Bantam)
 * Conan the Barbarian (Berkley) (well written, recommended)
 * Conan of Venarium
 * Conan the Defiant
 * Conan the Indomitable
 * Conan the Free Lance
 * Conan the Formidable
 * Conan the Destroyer (plausible Conan story if: A- The Heart of Ahriman had been changed to some other magical talisman, and B - an explanation for Valeria, other than Conan the Barbarian, had been written to preceed it. Good story, recommended)
 * "Legions of the Dead" - 17yrs
 * "The Thing in the Crypt" - 17yrs
 * "Hall of the Dead" - 18yrs
 * Conan the Fearless - 18yrs
 * Conan the Warlord - 18yrs
 * Battle of Venarium - [REH letter to P.S. Miller] 15yrs
 * "The Frost-Giant's Daughter" - 15yrs
 * Conan the Bold - 15-16yrs
 * "The God in the Bowl" - 16yrs
 * "Tower of the Elephant" -17 yrs
 * Conan the Magnificent - 18yrs
 * Conan the Invincible - 18yrs
 * "Nestor Synopsis" - 18yrs
 * "Rogues in the House" - 18yrs
 * Conan returns to Cimmeria - [REH letter to P.S. Miller]
 * Conan the Victorious - 20yrs
 * Conan the Unconquered - 20yrs
 * Conan and the Sorcerer - 19yrs
 * Conan the Mercenary - 19yrs. Perhaps the best story of the trilogy by Offutt, it portrays both a Character who is very Conan-like at some points and very un-Conan-like at others.
 * Conan: The Sword of Skelos - 19yrs
 * "Yaralet Fragment" (a.k.a. "The Hand of Nergal") - 20yrs
 * Conan the Hunter - 26yrs
 * ...to be continued