Tarzan - The Black Edition

These are hands down my favorite versions of ERB's Tarzan of the Apes. Much of that is nostalgia. I literally gave up food money to land the first six volumes of this set. I completed it as the years rolled by and have even dropped dime on the Neal Adams art portfolios which feature this art and more. I have more to say at the end of what is a divine gallery. 

(Apparently, Neal Adams also produced a painting for Tarzan and the Ant Men. I must say his is superior in drama to Vallejo's below.)

When Ballantine contracted with Neal Adams to do a gallery of new Tarzan covers for their paperback reprints of ERB's classic hero, they apparently also contracted with Boris Vallejo to do the same thing. What happened is that we have two of the great artists of the time doing Tarzan covers at the same time. I'll be blunt and say that most of Vallejo's work leaves me a bit cold. He is often compared to Frank Frazetta, who clearly inspired him, but Vallejo is all about surfaces while Frazetta and to some extent Adams, are all about interiors. They capture a feeling, a mood, a notion while Boris Vallejo merely illustrates and paints brawny men and nubile women in motion. There's something missing. That said, these covers are still fairly early in his career, and he hadn't lost that certain something that first made him a so interesting. Later though that little bit of magic gets lost as an obsession with the human form overwhelms all else. 

This Post is a Revised Dojo Classic. 

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Tarzan - The New Adventures!

Tarzan of the Apes is one of the most iconic adventure heroes in all of the printed word. Created by Edgar Rice Burroughs over one hundred years ago, Tarzan has managed to find an audience in one medium or another ever since. Beginning in the pulps, and shifting quickly to novelizations, the character was elevated to even greater status by Hollywood adaptations and some of the finest comic strip and comic book adventures ever imagined. 

So, it only makes sense that Tarzan might try to conquer the internet. I cannot say that's happened, but certainly there's a plethora of Tarzan material available in digital form, and most of it now husbanded over at the Official Website of ERB Inc. It is there that new comic strip style stories began to appear written by Roy Thomas and drawn by comics greats such as Pablo Maros. There are new adaptations of the novels and fresh comic book escapades under the banner Tarzan - The New Adventures. 

I have to confess I don't much like reading comics online. It just doesn't work for me as effectively as having a printed book in my little meaty fingers. And with the publication the first two "New Adventures" being published by Dark Horse I get my chance to revel in these hot-off-the-presses Tarzan yarns. The strips assume only the novels as background continuity so that gives the creators greater flexibility while still keeping that Tarzan charm. 

Writer Roy Thomas and artist Thomas Grindberg kick things off with a wild and hair-raising romp that includes classic ERB tropes such as a lost city filled with strangely familiar residents from Greek mythology, as well as the more familiar city of Opar in which the enticing Queen La rules a population of savage wild men. Grindberg's muscular artwork is ideal for the Ape Man, his poses showcasing the clenched power of the ERB's most famous hero. 

When Grindberg had to leave the strip, Thomas arranges to replace him with Benito Gallego. Thomas and Gallego have worked together more than a few times on some Indy comic projects, but this is the one they were born and bred to make together. Gallego evokes the classic work of the legendary "Big" John Buscema with whom Thomas worked so closely on many a Marvel project including a heroic run on Conan the Barbarian. Thomas and Buscema worked together on Tarzan before as well when Marvel briefly acquired the license in the later 70s'. 

In this story another vintage ERB property is pushed into the larger Tarzan mythos with the descendant of the scientist who made The Monster Men. Also important to the story is the ERB novel Tarzan and the Leopard Men, since that cult raises its furry head as well. Tarzan is forced to confront a horrifying hybrid created using the arcane techniques Professor Arthur Maxon. These were some rousing reads. The format of pacing the stories as classic Sunday pages really worked to the benefit of both. Thomas and Gallego were moving on to a sequel to Tarzan the Terrible and visit to Pal-Ul-Don. I look forward to it. 

This one is highly recommended. 

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