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Sunday, July 13, 2025

Favourite Comics: Savage Sword of Conan issues 16 - Worms of the Earth by Barry Smith & Tim Conrad

It was on a very hot summers day in 1977 when on a family weekend holiday to Blackpool with my mum and dad, that I spied a copy of “Savage Sword of Conan” #16 (Dec 1976) . At this time Conan was my favourite comic book character, so it was a no brainer, I was going to buy this issue without my customary check to see who the creators were. As it turns out this was a true comic book classic issue with artistic efforts by John Buscema, Alfredo Alcala, Walt Simonson, Barry Smith, and Tim Conrad, all wrapped up in a wonderful Earl Norem cover. Not only was this my first Conan black and white magazine it was my introduction to the then new art style of Barry Smith (with Tim Conrad) on the wonderful “Worms of the Earth” featuring Bran Mak Morn the legendary King of the Picts.
Of course the main strip in this issue featuring Conan was just as impressive with some of big John's and Alfredo Alcala's best art.
It wouldn’t be until around 1979/80 when I picked up issue 17 of "Savage Sword of Conan" which continued the tale of Bran Mak Morn this time with Tim Conrad completing the art chores, this still looked very nice but lacked the excitement and wonder that Barry Smiths brought to the previous tale. The Buscema / Alcala team as expected provided their usual wonderful work on the main Conan strip.
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5 comments:

  1. KidJuly 13, 2025 at 6:18 AM

    Hard to believe that Buscema didn't care for Alcala's inking of his pencils, eh, McS? Hard to believe, but true! These covers seem very familiar to me, so it's extremely likely that I had them at the time. Wonderful art from beginning to end.

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  2. McSCOTTYJuly 13, 2025 at 8:52 AM

    They were a perfect artistic team so it is really hard to understand Buscema's objections to Alcala. Did he ever change his mind on that? I have shown the covers on here before and of course they were used for the UK reprint version , perhaps you saw them there .

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    Replies
    1. KidJuly 13, 2025 at 9:33 AM

      He didn't change his mind as far as I know, McS. He thought his brother Sal was the best inker of his work, though I don't necessarily agree with him. It could well be that it's the UK covers I recall as I think I originally had most of them.

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  3. Rip JaggerJuly 17, 2025 at 8:17 AM

    Those tasty images make me want to dig out my copies. Buscema and Alcala were amazing! Big John apparently didn't like Alcala's inks, but I think the combo was fantastic in black and white.

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  4. McSCOTTYJuly 17, 2025 at 11:05 PM

    I had forgotten just how impressed I was with Smiths art until I reread it again for this post. It is very hard to understand why Big John was not a fan of AAs amazing inks , they were a wonderful team

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