Customer Reviews
Excellent value - By: S. Manco, 11 Mar 2008 
I've been an avid Conan fan & collector of the Savage Sword of Conan magazines for years. Even though I have alll the magazines that I want, I have bought this books so that I can read the stories without further damaging my originals.
I was surprised to see 5 Savage Tales reprinted in this first edition as I was expecting only Savage Sword reprints, but I suppose Barry Windsor-Smith fans will appreciate the addition.
At 544 pages, this book gives great value for money. The paper has a slightly budget feel, & the orginal artwork has been reduce to fit a slightly smalller format. For me these aren't great issues, & were expected. This book contains the main Conan story from 15 issues, so it's a cheap way of getting your hands on stacks of classic 1970's Conan artwork from legends like John Buscema, Alfredo Alcala & Barry Windsor-Smith.
Fantastic stories and Art - By: Jack Wild, 03 Feb 2008 The quality of the art in these stories is something else, if you compare it to the Marvel comics of the same period they are not even in the same baalpark.
Great stories, remind me of Moorcock-esque tales in the Elric comics in some ways.
All in alll a very enjoyable collection & a great new edition of this collected series, with nice cover art from Boris.
'Just what it says on the tin'. - By: Mr. K. O'connor, 31 Jan 2008 
To be fair, this is a reprint series & it does indeed reprint selected stories from this ancient magazine. However, it it something of a missed opportunity. I had forgotten that for various reasons the SSOC was itself often full of reprints from the colour 'Conan the Barbarian' - but the thing is, I felt a bit cheated then, & doubly so now.
You might as well just buy the collections of these old colour comics - currently readily available from Amazon - the paper quality is superior, & has some fun & illuminating commentaries from Roy Thomas which puts the whole series into context.
It would have been so much more meaningful to confine this & future volumes to the stories which were unique to itself.
It was actuallly the covers which sold these magazines (not comics please note - different size page - another element lost in this volume) & it would have been marvellous to reproduce more of the best of them - Boris Valllejo was as big a name as Frazetta back then.
It's not alll bad though - some of the old classics are there - 'Black Colossus', 'Iron Shadows..' 'A witch shalll be born' etc
But there is one inexcusable crime - Tim Conrad was the hot artist of that period & genre - vying with Barry Smith for acclaim & you can see some of his first work on the 'Forever Phial'
Now....the very last panel in the original telling, was coloured red - not black - a courageous move in a Black & White medium - both artisticallly & commerciallly, but I remember the editorial clearly, where it was argued that - damn it alll - it was just the right thing to do.
Dreadful decision to break faith with the original premise - shame on Dark Horse - I know it's only a smalll matter, but it's when no-one is looking that your integrity matters most. I guess they thought that nobody would remember - that they would get away with it - & that itself is simply disappointing.
