Robert E. Howard's story was first published in Weird Tales, December 1934, and composed of six chapters.
1. The Blood-Red Crescent
2. The Tree of Death
3. A Letter to Nemedia
4. Wolves of the Desert
5. The Voice From the Crystal
6. The Vulture's Wings
While there's obviously a lot more to famous yarn, all and sundry jumped on Conan's crucifixion in Chapter 2.
Description follows:
"By the side of the caravan road a heavy cross had been planted, and on this grim tree a man hung, nailed there by iron spikes through hands and feet. Naked but for a loin-cloth, the man was almost a giant in stature, and his muscles stood out in thick corded ridges on limbs and body, which the sun had long ago burned brown. The perspiration of agony beaded his face and mighty breast, but from under the tangled black mane that fell over his low, broad forehead, his blue eyes blazed with an unquenched fire. Blood oozed sluggishly from the lacerations in his hands and feet."
After spitting savagely at his captor's face, Constantius mockingly reminds to think of him when the desert scavengers are tearing at his living flesh.
He is ultimately rescued (albeit in cynical fashion), by Olgerd Vladislav, war-chief of the fierce nomadic Zuagirs.
Conan the Barbarian (1982)
Iconic sequence changes things somewhat, as instead of saltire, muscular frame is pinned to the Tree of Woe.
Oh, rescue is played out off-screen, so in terms of gore; recreation is very mild.
Marvel Comics Super Special #21
Conan the Barbarian Movie Special is a rewrite of Marvel comic. |
Licensed video games were nothing to write home about.
NES outing was a butchered adaptation of the C64 version of Myth: History in the Making. They changed sprite, bizarrely removed areas and horrific soundtrack made ears bleed.
Best of all, final stage was cut.
Lazy bastards.
Scraping the bottom of Hyborian barrel.
Conan (2004) |
God of War wannabe failed to impress.
The Savage Sword of Conan #5 (April 1975)
Script: Roy Thomas Art: John Buscema and The Tribe |
Chapter III: The Tree of Death
Not only is pencil and ink awesome, adaptation is obscenely accurate to source material, including the gory removal of iron spikes.
Miscellany
#190 (October 1991) |
And.
Conan the Savage #3 (October 1995) |
Conan the Avenger #21 (December 2015)
Unlike TSSOC which crammed entire story in a single comic, Dark Horse bloated situation across six issues (or parts), between November 2015 - April 2016.
Cover by Paul Renaud. |
Next time I'll be looking at live-action.
'Probably'...
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